Signing up with Air Canada Vacations will get you 100 Aeroplan miles. That is all. (Via Free Frequent Flyer Miles.)
100 Free Continental Miles, or Onepass Finally Fixes the Terms and Conditions on its Minor Free Miles Offers
Free Frequent Flyer Miles posts a link to an offer of 100 free Continental Airlines miles. 100 easy Continental Airlines miles, apparently for letting them know that you read about earning miles by paying your bills automatically via the airline’s credit and debit cards. What’s most interesting to me is this — there have long been reports that many of these offers are specific to things that someone with a co-branded Continental Airlines credit card might take advantage of, but the terms and conditions of the offers never said anything about requiring such a card in order to receive the bonus miles. There have been reports of folks not getting the miles, usually folks who don’t have the card. I’ve never known it personally, I do have their card, one of the nice benefits I…
Amtrak Double Points and 10,000 Bonus Points for 10 One-way Trips Through December 14
Amtrak’s new website has launched, it’s been an annoying couple of days unable to check balances or redeem points. But they’ve brought it back with a new bonus, “Take Ten”. (registration required.) 10 trips = 10,000 bonus points. Plus, double points along the way. Take Ten-the celebration starts on Friday, October 1, 2010. It’s the ten-year anniversary of Amtrak Guest Rewards, and we’re celebrating our members with more ways to better serve you, including an improved program, extended service center hours, a better online experience, mobile site, and the new Take Ten promotion. Earn with Take Ten from 10/1/10 through 12/14/10 – 10,000 bonus points when you Take Ten trips – Double points on all Amtrak® travel – Plus, the points you already earn for Amtrak travel So we get double points on everything through…
British Airways to Offer Full Mileage Earning on Discount Fares, Increased Elite Tier Earning on Discount Fares, and Increased Silver Elite Bonuses
Yesterday I wrote about the American Airlines side of mileage changes with the American-British Airways-Iberia joint business venture. The changes to British Airways Executive Club are as expected: British Airways Executive Club members can now earn and redeem miles and earn Tier Points on all American Airlines flights. But here’s the kicker. In lining up more with American Airlines mileage earning, (1) Elite mileage earning increases for BA Silvers. They’ll earn a 100% bonus instead of a 25% bonus. BA Silver is considered the equivalent of American Airlines Platinum, and so they’ve upped the mileage bonuses to match American’s offering. (2) Flying discount coach now earns full redeemable miles, whereas it used to earn as little as 25%. (3) Flying discount coach also earns 50% elite tier points, up from 25%. This is a huge…
American AAdvantage Members Can Now Earn and Redeem Miles for British Airways Transatlantic, and Upgrade on BA and Iberia
As noted a week ago, British Airways, Iberia, and American have been working on reciprocal upgrades. They’ve done more than just introduce upgrades as part of their joint business venture, however. I said that they needed to introduce better redemption as well, and they did. Effective today, American AAdvantage allows members to earn and redeem miles for flights on British Airways between the US and London. Previously this was excluded from the program, and we always had to use the workaround of flying from Canada, Mexico, or the Caribbean if we wanted to use BA as part of an American AAdvantage award transatlantic. Less than the mileage earning, I’m interested in the redemption side of things. And BA award availability is really quite amazing from most US gateways, especially in first class (business class can…
This Week Around Boarding Area (or Things I Was Too Lazy to Blog Myself)
Lucky points out that Red Carpet Clubs will start offering free drinks today, now that Continental and United have merged. This was a foregone conclusion when American caved, and something I predicted last year when US Airways introduced free alcohol (though not in Philadelphia or Pittsburgh due to local liquor laws, and not in Boston due to lack of a liquor license, hah!). He also notes that the United clubs will offer free wi-fi to everyone with access, not just members, which is great for those of us who gain admittance through Star Alliance partner airline status. Lucky also notes that All Nippon’s award chart will get rid of the lower mileage award pricing for distances under 1600 miles roundtrip beginning in April, 2011. Everything else about their award chart remains the same, though it…
Wyndham Rewards Visa as a Good ‘Backup’ Card for Light Spenders to Use Where Amex Isn’t Accepted
Earlier in the week I was answering questions about why the Wyndham Rewards Visa wasn’t nominated in this year’s Frequent traveler awards. And the only reason is that it’s a new card in the summer of 2010, and the awards are based on offerings available in 2009. But I admit, it’s the first time I gave the card a look, and so it’s an interesting coincidence that Loyalty Traveler analyzes the card this week. It’s a no fee visa that could be useful even for folks without an interest in points in the Wyndham Rewards program, because their points conversion to airline miles is fairly reasonable. For the most part you earn 2 points per dollar spent and 2.5 points transfer to an airline mile — so you’re earning 0.8 miles per dollar. Ok, not…
Up to 9,999 Air Canada Aeroplan Miles with Avis
Avis is offering up to 9,999 Air Canada Aeroplan miles for rentals through March 31, but the bonus is somewhat limited in usability… not least of which because it’s just for my readers in or visiting Canada. In addition.. First, it requires a 5-day rental or longer. And second the higher mileage bonuses are applicable to higher car classes, smaller cars mean fewer miles. Vehicle Car Group Bonus Miles Coupon # Sub-compact / Compact A or B 2,500 MCAA037 Mid-size to Full-size C, D, E 5,000 MCAA038 Premium, SUV, Minivan F, G, H, V, W 7,500 MCAA039 Premium SUV Z 9,999 MCAA040 The coupon code above generates the mileage bonus but per the terms and conditions of the offer must be used in conjunction with discount code (AWD#) H660500, which auto-populated when you click the…
United 40% Off to Australia
United is running another ‘TWARE’ sale, 40% off of flights to Australia. The discount code is TWRAU. Need to ticket today for travel through November 30, and of course this will work on T, L, and K fares .. which means not upgradeable with United’s systemwide upgrades for 100,00-mile flyers. Of course, even when the link stops working, sometimes the promo code still works.
Starwood’s Outrageously Priced, Unattainable High-End Hotel Redemptions
Ever since my speculations about Starwood Preferred Guest award categories for next year, I’ve been thinking more and more about their award structure and am increasingly bothered by another feature of their redemption program — the exorbitantly high redemption rates for some of their high-end properties that are described as ‘all-sute’ hotels. Some of their most expensive high-end properties, such as the W Maldives and St. Regis Bora Bora, are all suites. That is part of why they’re as expensive as they are. In order to get the same value out of a (regular, not all-suite) category 7 hotel award as a category 2 weekend hotel award, the rate for the property is going to need to be about $1000 or more per night. That’s at the standard 30,000 Starpoints for a category 7 hotel,…
