Flyertalk member KVS produced a short video tribute to the Alitalia $39+tax business class fare error from Toronto to Cyprus. It was a year ago today that the fare was on offer, and the tickets were valid a year from date of issue, so we now say thanks and rest in peace to perhaps the greatest of all mistake fares.I’ll share details of my own Toronto-Milan-Cyprus-Milan-Rome-Milan-Toronto trip shortly.
Up to 25,000 Bonus Miles for Partner Activity
Apr
05
2007
Delta is offering up to 25,000 bonus miles for activity with their partners. Registration is required. The offer is 5000 miles for each 5 unique partners with activity during the qualifying period of April 1 – May 31 (too tight a timeline for my tastes). Airline partners don’t count. Each partner counts only once, so only one Hilton stay would count as a partner (but a Hilton stay and a Marriott stay would be two partners). Transferring points into Delta should count, and each source should be a different partner, so I may transfer points in from Starwood, American Express Membership Rewards, and Radisson Goldpoints.Read the terms and conditions on the promo, but it should be pretty easy to rack up 5000 bonus miles — much harder to hit a full 25,000.
First Class Norfolk, Virginia to/from San Francisco for $368 round trip
It’s available in either direction and it’s refundable. Search for first class tickets at delta.com or expedia. There’s no minimum or maximum stay, these are actually one-way fares ($368 is just the all-in roundtrip price, although may vary slightly depending on the connections you make). It’s a refundable YUP fare, fare basis YUPBV. Discussed on Flyertalk here.
500 Delta Miles for Auto Insurance Quote Can Be Done Every 6 Months
Mar
20
2007
Free Frequent Flyer Miles points out that you can get 500 miles for an auto insurance quote from Ameriprise, and that it works every six months. So even if you’ve done it before it might be time to do it again.
That Super Deal at the Intercontinental Los Angeles…
Mar
17
2007
Turns out that the 5000 point award nights aren’t even a mistake. I speculated that someone miscoded the hotel as participating in PointBreaks, since the number of points matched that offer but the hotel wasn’t in the list of participating properties (and would have been the most expensive hotel in the list, by far). But it is a planned special offer:Exclusive for Priority Club® members, stay at the new InterContinental Los Angeles Century City, March 15, 2007 through September 4, 2007, to receive triple points, triple miles or triple credit with any 2 night consecutive stay during this introductory period. Plus, Priority Club members can take advantage of our very special Reward Night PointBreaks offer of only 5,000 points a night for stays from March 15 to May 15, 2007.
Another Hotel Program Devaluation Without Warning…
Mar
15
2007
Sometime this morning Priority Club changed their redemption chart. For example, some Holiday Inns jump from 15,000 points to 25,000 points. And some Intercontinentals go from 30,000 points to 40,000 points. The Boston, DC, Vienna, and Tahiti properties are notable among them. There’s no chart of changes by property, so I’ll just be piecing together which ones have changed. Naturally, there’s a Flyertalk discussion and folks are none too pleased. Bumping the prices of some hotels by a third is bad enough. I understand it (there were some great values there, and great values don’t last). But it’s disappointing. However, making the changes without any notice whatsoever is criminal.
Deeply Discounted Award Rooms at the Intercontinental Los Angeles
Mar
15
2007
The Intercontinental Los Angeles Century City (formerly Park Hyatt) has award rooms available for just 5000 Priority Club points, and availability appears to stretch through May 16. Dates after that are pricing out at the usual 30,000 points per night. Though Priority Club does sometimes discount award redemptions (eg 24,000 points instead of 30,000 points for an Intercontinental), this award price is unprecedented… likely an error, though I’m having a hard time figuring out what the keystroke mistake would have been. Perhaps someone mistakenly coded it as a PointBreaks property. Frequently Priority Club awards are available for any room at a given hotel, including suites, and presumably this is an error on the hotel’s part. Discussion of the phenomenon can be found at Flyertalk’s suite redemption alert thread. These suite redemptions are generally honored —…
Confessions of a former Enterprise manager
Consumerist has a great post, an insider’s perspective on renting cars from Enterprise. Everything’s negotiable. Even knowing that, I still won’t rent from them. But for those who don’t mind the undignified “walkaround” of the vehicle and hard sell of insurance, you may benefit from the tips. 1. Enterprise doesn’t have any set prices. That rate you got when you called in was either the full retail rate, or the first number that popped into the agent’s head. There are three main categories of rentals: personal (retail), corporate, and insurance, but on every single contract that goes out the agent manually types out how much you pay per day and he has authority to make it pretty much whatever he thinks you should pay. … 2. By now everyone knows that you don’t need that…
Netflix Signup Bonuses
Netflix is offering 2500 American Airlines miles for new enrollment. Offer expires May 31.The United Mileage Plus offer is just 2000 miles with signup but another 2000 miles if you charge your membership to a United Visa. Total 4000 miles, and no clear expiration date on the offer. If you’re already a member, consider cancelling (copy down your queue first!) and signing up someone else in the house with a different credit card. If you’ve already gotten the United bonus, consider cancelling and signing up someone else for the American bonus. Or vice versa.
New United Fee Waivers for 1Ks
Mar
14
2007
As of this past Sunday, United is waiving paper ticket fees, Australian Electronic Travel Authority Fees (which up until recently were free), and the $25 same-day confirmed change fees for 1K, Global Services, and passengers flying on paid premium class ickets. I still miss the days when same-day confirmed changes (not on the day of departure, but well in advance) were no cost to Premier Executive and 1K members. I could book an 8am flight and call up a week later, still long in advance of travel, and change it to a 2pm as long as the same fare class I had ticketed was available on the 2pm (and technically as long as the fare I had purchased wasn’t time or flight specific, but those rules were often ignored). Still, fee waivers are good, and…
