October 1 was the inaugural Bilt Rewards ‘Rent Day’. There were some smashing deals, and they promised to be back monthly.
They’re back with some great offers including elite status with United Airlines – literally for everyone.
President Biden has declared war on ‘add-on’ fees, including hotel resort fees. While we can all sympathize with the sentiment, his announcement is unlikely to do much to benefit hotel guests.
Aeroplan is unique in offering a status level between 25,000 and 50,000 elite qualifying miles. Their 35,000 point level isn’t Star Alliance Gold, so doesn’t entitle the member to lounge access on partners. But it has come with access to Air Canada’s own lounges. That’s changing next year.
American Airlines expects to begin taking delivery of new extended range narrowbody planes – the Airbus A321XLR – starting in the first quarter of 2024.
At an internal meeting, a recording of which was reviewed by View From The Wing, executives at the airline discussed how they plan to deploy the plane.
In general there’s a branded marketing tie-in to these tarmac transfer deals, best thought of as a merchant-funded offer conceptually similar to statement credits and elite status provided through credit card issuers. Here Jaguar’s electric I-PACE is what’s being promoted, showcased for the very customers that United values most. There’s even a 50,000 mile offer for buying one.
A week ago I was first to cover that Singapore Airlines would drop Dom Perignon from its first class and Suites cabin, though generally still offer two outstanding choices: Krug and Taittinger Comtes de Champagne.
It turns out that the reason for the change isn’t budgetary (they got a great deal from Taittinger) or a sourcing problem (there’s no Dom Perignon supply chain breakdown) but rather the airline, which was at one point reportedly the world’s second-largest purchaser of Dom, has been shut out from access.
The premium American Airlines credit card, the Citi Executive AAdvantage card, is a bit of a throwback. The card has been largely unchanged since it launched in summer 2011. So it doesn’t have many of the benefits of other airline premium cards. However, it is by far the cheapest way to gain club access with American Airlines, since the price of membership has risen while this card’s annual fee has not. The card is overdue for a refresh.
It’s much, much easier to earn status when you already have status with American. If you were flying to earn status and not engaging in any other activity, it would take $18,182 for an existing Executive Platinum member to re-earn Executive Platinum. In contrast, someone starting with no status and earning Executive Platinum on flying alone would need to spend $27,012 on tickets. But you don’t have to start fresh.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
Bilt Rewards, the loyalty program which lets you earn points for paying rent and which offers probably the single best no annual fee rewards card in the market (the Bilt Mastercard), announced a growth round of $150 million in new funding at a $1.5 billion post-money valuation. Their round was led by Left Lane Capital and included Smash Capital, Wells Fargo, Greystar, Invitation Homes, Camber Creek, Fifth Wall, and Prosus Ventures.
These things can be somewhat challenging to date, but it appears to me that Bilt Rewards is faster from launch to unicorn status than Square, Instacart or Twitter were. And there’s two reasons this strikes me as important.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
