Points.com is offering 5000 American, USAirways, or Alaska miles for upgrading to a ‘Gold’ membership for $49.95. The membership isn’t worth much, but buying miles at one cent apiece is generally a good deal. There’s no clear expiration date on the offer, so verify that your mileage choice is available before offering up payment.
First Class – Harrisburg, PA to St. Croix – $156+tax
Aug
16
2006
This has already gone out over Fare Alert so not sure how long this will last. As discussed on Flyertalk, there’s a $156+tax first class fare from Harrisburg, PA (just a few hours drive from DC) to St. Croix on USAirways. Go to Travelocity (or the USAirways site), enter MDT and STX as your origin and destination, and select discounted first class for your fare type. (Or don’t specify fare type, it will still pull up this fare as it’s the cheapest fare in the market even for coach.) Service is only on Saturdays — and only from Aug 12 to Sep 2 and starting again November 4 — so you either fly in and out same day (just under an hour in the airport!) or stay for a full week. It’s an A fare…
2500 Starwood Points for Adding a Second Card to Your Amex Account
Passed along to me this morning, thanks to Don: American Express is promoting adding an authorzed user to your Starwood Amex account by offering 2500 Starwood points with the first additional card requested. The offer comes via email — the web page for adding an authorized user to your account does not mention the bonus. No offer code is listed. The terms and conditions (which don’t mention this as targeted or restricted in any way to recipients of the email) are as follows: Terms and Conditions (when applicable) 1. The Additional Cardmember must be 18 or older and never have had a defaulted account with American Express. Any account you have with American Express must not be in default. 2. 2,500 bonus Starpoints will be awarded to your Starpoints Account in 8-12 weeks for an…
Security Screening Make Believe
Taking off your shoes at the security checkpoint is now mandatory — as though it wasn’t before. Okay, it varied by airport, with some incredulous TSA staffers asking passengers “WHAT are you doing taking off your shoes? You don’t have to do that!” (in the same tone one might ask, “have you soiled your underwear AGAIN?”) But generally shoe removal was ‘recommended’ but optional — though if you chose not to, you received secondary screening that included taking off your shoes. Now you have to take them off in the first instance. And no more soiled comments from screeners. The joke of it is that the x-ray machines you’re putting your shoes through can’t actually detect explosives. So what’s the nonsense reason for taking off shoes? Consistency! Oh, and in case you’re concealing a James…
Round-the-World tickets
The New York Times mentions one of the neat tricks about international travel. If you’re going to buy a business class ticket somewhere, it’s often no more expensive to buy a business class round-the-world ticket and get a lot of extra flying for free. Where you buy the ticket and start the journey makes a ton of difference in the cost, as the Upgrade Travel Blog observes:Start in Sri Lanka. If you’re going around the world twice or more, consider buying the second (and third, etc.) ticket someplace like Colombo, Sri Lanka. I’m not kidding. You can buy a business class RTW ticket there for about the same price as a coach RTW ticket in the US or most of Europe, on the same airlines. The article mentions this, but it’s really worth driving home.…
W Hotels Store Blowout Sale
I’m a little late to the game here, most items are already sold out, but the W Hotels Store is having a blowout sale with items up to 80% off. At least it appears that they’re adding items to the sale, so keep checking back as well. I just picked up a couple shirts.
Two new useful sites for the frequent flyer and the miles collector
I get pitched pretty regularly with emails touting the next great travel tool, item for purchase, or community and wouldn’t I like to write about it on this website? Two recent emails I’ve gotten, though, highlight some things that may be actually useful. One is About Airport Parking which the website’s creator describes as: I just wanted to let you know about a new site we just launched, www.aboutairportparking.com. We’ve collected information, including prices, on all the major lots we could find in the U.S. We then integrated this data with Google Maps to make it easier for people to find the right lot for them. We also include some traveler tools like current flight status and average security wait times, but it’d be a great idea to also include real-time parking availability down the…
The Case of the Missing Mileage Credit
I’m quoted in a Sunday Washington Post story on missing frequent flyer miles. Michael Shapiro goes looking for why frequent flyer miles we earn don’t always post to our accounts. Most of the time it isn’t the fault of the airline or hotel whose miles you’re accuing. Generally they have to be told what miles to credit by the partner you earned the miles with. The most frequent reason miles don’t get posted is because you haven’t given the number to the partner in the first place. Sometimes, of course, that’s not your fault. I’ve had American Airlines reps not know how to enter a Mexicana Frecuenta number. And websites like Orbitz don’t even give you a chance to enter partner frequent flyer numbers (this feature is one thing I prefer about Expedia). There can…
Starwood Offers Shakira Redemption
Starwood is offering two VIP tickets and backstage passes to a Shakira concert for 20,000 Starwood points. Eleven concerts are listed and 10 packages are available per concert. The offer is limited to ‘elite members’ apparently, but not just Platinums. Not a bad experiential redemption if you’re into that sort of thing.
The Myth of Buying Airline Tickets Wednesday at Midnight
Upgrade Travel Blog has a detailed explanation about why the myth of buying tickets Wednesday at midnight is wrong. The myth goes this way: What’s the absolute best time to purchase a ticket directly from the airlines? Turns out it’s Wednesday from midnight to 1a.m. in the time zone of the airline’s “home base.”[…] Why? That’s when the computer systems of most airlines get rid of the reserved but unbooked lower fare reservations. However, Held reservations don’t all expire Wednesdays Most fares that are put on hold aren’t that cheap to begin withMidnight isn’t when new fares are loaded — they’re distributed at 10:00am, 12:30pm, and 8pm EST and loaded about 2-6 hours later in the GDS and airline sites. Read the whole thing.
