10,000 Mile Bonus For One-Way Star Alliance Award Booked With TAP Air Portugal Miles

by Gary Leff

Sep 17 2020

There are a significant number of readers with Star Alliance Gold status and a lot of miles in the TAP Air Portugal Miles & Go program since they were selling miles for $0.0087 apiece as part of their mileage subscription program and matching status earlier this year.

TAP’s Miles & Go is running a mileage bonus (rather than a discount) on all Star Alliance partner flights. They will award “Club TAP” mileage subscription members with a 10,000 mile bonus for booking a one-way award on Star Alliance and other airline partners.

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American Express Will Begin Re-Opening Lounges October 5, On Track For 5 New And Expanded Clubs

by Gary Leff

Sep 16 2020

A couple of weeks ago I called on Centurion lounges to open or at least for American Express to speak to its plans for re-opening. They’ve now done so. American Express tells me that on October 5 they will re-open their Philadelphia and Seattle lounges “with more locations to follow.” They’ve also detailed plans for 5 new and expanded lounges.

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Desperate For Cash, Thai Airways Will Sell You Time In Their Flight Simulators

by Gary Leff

Sep 16 2020

Thai Airways is currently in bankruptcy restructuring and suffering from the pandemic’s reduced demand and borders that are closed to tourism. The airline is looking for revenue anywhere it can find some. They’ve opened a restaurant so you can eat plane food on the ground. And they’re promoting deals for use of their flight simulators with an instructor, too.

According to Thai’s executive vice president of operations, Squadron Leader Soradech Namruangsri, the revenue-generating opportunity comes because the airline hasn’t resumed normal operations.

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FAA Will Continue To Protect Incumbent Airline Slots At The Most Congested Airports

by Gary Leff

Sep 16 2020

At many congested airports a ‘slot’, or limited number of permissions, is required to take off and land. Generally airlines have slots granted in perpetuity by government and these become properties rights that they can buy, sell, and trade.

However if they don’t use the slots they have at least 80% of the time, they can lose them. These rules have been waived during the pandemic, and the FAA plans to continue extending them.

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American Airlines Will Give You Bonus Points For Traveling On Award Tickets In October

by Gary Leff

Sep 16 2020

American Airlines will give out 250 bonus miles for every award segment flown in October, up to 2000 miles for eight segments. Registration required by October 7 in the promotions tab of your account.

Notably the bonus is available for flying the segment rather than booking the flight, so if you book award travel for someone else using your miles they can earn this bonus.

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One Man Has Now Flown 22 Million Miles on United Airlines

by Gary Leff

united-planes-runway
Sep 15 2020

Two years ago United Airlines flyer Tom Stuker flew his 20 millionth mile. He’s kept up the pace because he just hit 22 million flown miles on United.

Tom Stuler has a Titanium Global Services card and a United plane named after him. Stuker has flown to Australia over 300 times and goes to Hawaii 3-4 times each year. In 2017 he had flown “over 9000 flights” on United.

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