Southwest has long shied away from participating in the large computer reservation systems like Galileo and Worldspan (though there has been some minor Sabre participation). That’s why you can’t book Southwest flights on, say, Expedia or Travelocity. Southwest even stopped filing its fares with the Airline Tariff Publishing Co. in order to prevent Orbitz from using the information. Southwest managed to control the distribution of its tickets very effectively, moving most of its sales to its own website saving distribution costs in the process. Now comes word that a new Galileo tool may make Southwest flights available.
Free Points.com PointsPlus Membership
A current WebFlyer EyeSpy notes: Sign up with FAIRMONT President’s Club for free..(1-800-441-3313 in the US) then as a member you can get a one year complimentary PointsPLUS membership in points.com (a $19.95 value) allowing you unlimited exchanges of your loyalty points for one year. After receiving your president’s club membership, go to www.points.com/fpc
The State of Loyalty Programs
Mileage awards are getting more costly to use but miles are easier to accumulate. My own sense it that this tends to balance out. The article doesn’t even mention increased award opportunities that stem from airline alliances and opportunities for non-travel awards. A similar story with more details on award price increases can be found here. Obviously the revealed preferences of consumers — the fact that programs drive spending behavior — suggest that people believe there’s still alot of value in loyalty programs. Nearly half of all Americans carry credit cards tied to a loyalty program.
Hilton HHonors Signup Bonus
HHonors members who refer a friend between Apr. 1 and Dec. 31 will earn 1,000 HHonors bonus points for referrals who sign up and subsequently complete a stay at a Hilton Family hotel, plus another 1,000 points for additional qualifying stays completed by Dec. 31. Hilton has a new ‘member get member’ referral program. Existing Hilton HHonors members can refer up to 10 new members and can earn up to 25,000 bonus points. The new referred members receive a bonus 1,000 HHonors points after their second stay before Dec. 31. So anyone looking to join Hilton HHonors (and receive the bonus 1000 points) can certainly drop me a line and I’d be happy to send you my Hilton account number to use when signing up.
Avoid the rude guy at the counter
Sheraton is rolling out new automated checkin machines designed to allow checkin and checkout in under sixty seconds. Sheraton Speed Check is the most flexible kiosk of its kind, offering guests’ the ability to receive messages, additional room keys and upgrades, change room type, and view, print and email personal folios, in addition to check-in and check-out. There was a contest to name the machine, and the winning answer is “Sheraton Speed Check” .. which I think is a really great name, especially since that was my suggestion. (For the record, my other entries were Sweet Service Checkin Center, Sheraton Full Service Check-in Center, Sheraton Instant Rest, and the Sheraton eService Machine).
New Loyalty Programs
It seems like you can earn miles and points everywhere these days — and not just for spending on your affinity credit card, either. Brand spanking new programs include Benihana Emporer’s Club, Pizza Hut VIP Program (previously mentioned here), and Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse Friend of Steve Card.
Finally a United offer for Washington, DC
Earn 2,500 miles per domestic roundtrip (or Canada) to or from Washington-Dulles. This bonus can be earned 6 times and is applicable for travel completed between June 15 and September 30, 2004. Valid on United/United Express/Ted only, not on codeshare flights. Registration required.
Mercenaries and Private Contractors
There’s an ongoing discussion amongst several blogs about whether contracting for private security forces is a good idea. Mark Kleiman argues that hiring people at higher contract prices to deliver skills developed at government expense is a bad idea, amounting to competing with ourselves. Eugene Volokh offers up commercial pilots as a counterexample. [M]any Air Force pilots get better-paying jobs with the airlines when they leave the service. They’re selling to private airlines skills that were acquired at public expense. Some of them might leave the service earlier because of these job opportunities. Should we be worried about that? Should we try to keep the airlines from hiring them away? I realize the situation isn’t completely analogous — the government generally doesn’t do much hiring of private airlines for military transport (though I vaguely recall…
Mileage Sweepstakes
Points.com is giving away a million American Airlines miles (10 prizes of 100,000 miles apiece).
Random and Unrelated Cool Stuff
Sprint will give you a free ear bud for your cell phone. If you sell things on eBay, you will want to check out BidBot which will analyze past eBay auctions and help you get the best price for your merchandise. Google has a new shopping tool called Froogle. If you think data protection is cool, you may want a free “Backup for the Future” t-shirt. Or maybe you’d like a free book, 151 TIPS FOR MATURE TRAVELERS.
