Dan’s Deals flags free wifi codes for United, US Airways, and American. When flying AA use code: HPAA When flying United use code: HPUNITED When flying USeless Airways use code: HPUSAIRWAYS Expiration of the codes is unknown. Now, there isn’t a whole lot of wifi going on at US Airways and United, but it’s reasonably widespread at American. And of course, with Airtran, Delta, and Virgin America wifi is free from November 20 through January 2 anyway. (HT: Frugal Travel Guy.)
Free Priority Club Platinum Status
Jared Blank of Online Travel Review passes along a link for free Priority Club Platinum status. Plus stay 5 nights within 90 days after signing up and they’ll kick you a $25 prepaid lodging gift card. The offer requires opening up a new Priority Club account, so it’s for new members only. Now, Platinum status doesn’t get you a whole lot outside of perhaps Crowne Plaza properties outside the United States. It’s supposed to get you upgrades but that doesn’t often mean much at the median Holiday Inn, though it’s frequently offered me one free breakfast during a stay and maybe a coupon for a free cocktail and appetizer as well. The bonus points are useful, of course, for in-hotel earning.
Return to the The Jefferson Hotel, Richmond — Better This Time
Last November I reported on my mediocre stay at the famed Jefferson Hotel in Richmond. While a grand hotel, there were significant problems: Noise from our upstairs neighbors, including hearing them walking around above us Exceptionally slow service in the hotel’s casual restaurant Valet parking dinged my car door The Assistant General Manager proactively called me the day after my stay, asked me about the stay, apologized and asked to comp a future night. I finally took her up on the offer, a full year later. I was given a small suite, similar though a bit smaller than my room last year. It was perfectly fine, the only thing that last year’s room had though was a bigger shower with three showerheads, one of the best showers I had experienced. I had no complaints about…
US Airways 100% Bonus on Purchased and Gifted Miles Extended Through November 30
The US Airways 100% bonus on purchased or gifted miles that was supposed to expire November 15 has apparently been extended to November 30. The landing page for buying and gifting miles still says the bonus expires November 15, but if you choose either buy or gift miles the terms on conditions on each of those pages now list the expiration date of the bonus as November 30. Now, some folks are a little bit nervous about US Airways miles at the moment since they’ve been having difficulty redeeming awards between the US and Europe on Lufthansa that are being offered to other Star Alliance members. The fear is that US Airways has implemented some sort of blocking scheme, similar to what United had in place for years, when they don’t want to pay the…
How Did My New Year Frequent Flyer Wishes Perform?
Randy Petersen generously offered me the opening editorial for the January issue of Inside Flyer some 11 months ago. I offered my 5 Frequent Flyer Wishes for the New Year. One came true unequivocably. One might have come true. And another is either true or two-thirds true. In short, my wishes are: ■United ends Starnet blocking. No other major North American program engages in the practice. No other Star Alliance member engages in the practice. United should allow its members to book the award seats being offered by its partners, not pretend that the partners aren’t offering them the seats. ■American and British Airways each permit members to book transatlantic awards on the other carrier. There’s no legal reason that this legacy restriction remains in place. ■Delta brings back at least 24 hour holds for…
Making a Grilled Cheese Sandwich With an Iron in Your Hotel Room
Bobby Laurie and Sara Keagle teach you how to make a grilled cheese sandwich with an iron in your hotel room in their first ‘tips from above’ video. I had the pleasure to meet them both, finally, in Houston last week. Their recent Crew Lounge podcast they wanted to know what in the world they were doing at Table #1 for the Frequent Traveler Awards. Well, I did the seating and… a last minute reshuffle it was just the most convenient thing for me to do to make table assignments work, hah! And a little insider’s tip for anyone at a dinner, table one is rarely if ever actually the best table. Either the table numbering starts from the wings of the room (and you generally want to be in the center) or the event…
What the TSA Thinks of You and Your Rights
Mom vs. the World blog is apparently a former TSA screener and offers telling insights into what screeners think about passengers and about passenger protestations about their rights. Seriously, here’s an unvarnished perspective that will help you understand the mentality of the checkpoint. Even without the nude-o-scopes, the TSA mocks you, And the way you dress and what you pack isn’t just your business. It’s disrespectful of the TSA screeners. [T]hat vibrator in your carry-on luggage that looks like it would satisfy an elephant, yeah I see that and I see you standing right in front of me. But sure be offended by the naked x-ray image a person in another room is seeing, don’t worry about the vibrator at all or the other weird and crazy crap in your bag. I have seen the…
COPA and Avianca to Join Star Alliance
Lucky beats me to the punch that Copa and Avianca will be joining Star Alliance. Continental, which used to own a majority share of Panama City-based Copa, retains a 10% ownership and significant marketing relationship. The carrier had been a member of Skyteam but left with Continental, and had been alliance-less since then. It’s not a surprise to see this coming along with United and fully integrating into Star. Columbian-based Avianca is merging with current Star Alliance member TAMUnited and Lufthansa partner TACA. Lucky thinks bringing Avianca and Copa into Star means that the combination of TAM and current oneworld carrier LAN will mean that that entity will be a oneworld carrier. And that’s certainly the most likely scenario, it would be strange to see such large competitors as Avianca (merged with TACA though retaining…
FlyBE’s Ultimate Award Capacity Control: Abolish Award Redemption for the Most Popular Routes
Seth writes that FlyBE is removing their most popular award destinations from their redemption chart, they’ll no longer allow their members to redeem for flights to Spain, Portugal and Croatia effective March 31. Why? Because that’s where their customers most wanted to go! It’s nonobvious to my why capacity controls won’t solve the problem of too many customers wanting to redeem on these routes, and they have to instead decide not to allow it at all. Rather reminds me of 2005 when Delta members were simply not allowed to redeem on Air France or KLM over the summer. Of course in that case Delta was paying a partner for seats, one customer service explanation at the time was that Delta had reached its budget for paying Air France and KLM for seats and wouldn’t spend…
50 Continental Miles Per Dollar at FTD and 1800Flowers for Co-branded Mastercard Holders
One of the neat features of the Continental Mastercard is double mileage earning for purchases made via the Continental mall. (One of the other features is the ability to take advantage of their frequent 100 or 250 free mile signup offers, such as for reading a web page that says you can do this or that with your card.) Flowers (and similar gift item) vendors often have some of the most lucrative mileage and cash rebate promos, since the products are fairly high margin. At times the offers through Continental are as low as 10 miles per dollar, and the offers do fluctuate. Currently both 1800Flowers and FTD are showing up at 25 miles per dollar. Which — for folks who have a Continental Mastercard — actually yields 50 miles per dollar via the card’s…
