I’m just back off of a two week trip, our annual Asia first class redemption. Prior to the gutting of the United award chart I booked two first class awards that combined five different Star Alliance international first class products, and managed to work around Starnet blocking for my transpac segments. After much time with agents who insisted that All Nippon Airways doesn’t serve Washington-Dulles (funny, I attended their party celebrating 20 years of service, and they only refer to the flight as NH 1) I did secure ANA three-class first, which I hadn’t flown since 2006. One sad note however is that I believe in July three-cabin service will leave DC, meaning I’ll have to hop over to Chicago if I want ANA F. On the return I fought agents who didn’t believe it…
ASIA
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Some Thoughts on Results at the Freddie Awards
I wasn’t at the Freddie Awards this year, during the ceremony I was in the Thai Airways first class spa at Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi airport. So I don’t have a lot to share about the event. But I’ve been reviewing the results. Certainly I have a different take on who should have won in many cases, I wouldn’t call Alaska’s MVP Gold the best airline elite status for instance. But what really struck me was Delta Skymiles winning the best elite level in Europe. Delta offers almost nothing to the European elite members (although European addressed Skymiles accounts have historically earned Platinum status with only 50,000 elite qualifying miles). There’s no complimentary upgrade program except when Europeans have already crossed the pond. It’s a terrible program for international upgrades. And what else is there, really, for…
Priority Club’s Annoying Habit of Improperly Denying Points Credit for Stays
One Mile at a Time had to fight for his Priority Club points to post from a recent stay at the InterContinental Grand Stanford in Hong Kong. Priority Club initially refused to credit the points, which didn’t post on their own, even though the booking was made on their own website. They explained, Unfortunately, the room rate paid during the stay in question was deeply discounted and is ineligible for credit to your account. We have provided the link for Priority Club Rewards’ Terms and Conditions below: They also explained that eligible in-hotel spend might earn points, and encouraged Lucky to send his bill in ordetr to credit those points. However, if you have incurred other charges during your stay , you may forward your itemized invoice to us in JPEG or PDF format so…
The End of the Northwest Visa, and Some Basics on Proprietary Bank Points-Based Rewards Programs
With the Northwest/Delta merger (Delta acquisition of Northwest), the surviving credit card partner is American Express. The US Bank-issued Visa will be going away later in the year. American Express, with its higher interchange fees, is likley in a position to be offering more for miles, and American Express has played an integral role in the financial viability of Delta over time — prepurchasing as much as a half a billion dollars worth of miles at a time and extending a $100 million line of credit. Naturally this is a blow to US Bank, as their Northwest partnership is big business for them. Word is that they are going to try to keep customers in a new proprietary points program, offering their own points where 20,000 points buys a domestic ticket on any airline. Most…
A Good Time to Book Way Ahead for Transpacific Premium Award Travel
I don’t usually talk about planning award travel ten months off, but I happened to notice today that there are tons of dates in January, 2010 available where All Nippon Airways is offering two first class award seats, Chicago – Tokyo. I didn’t check the reverse, or other gateways (New York-JFK, Los Angeles, San Francisco… sadly ANA is pulling first class from Washington-Dulles in July, and first class award seats departing Japan have been harder to secure in the recent past) but if you’re having difficulty getting back my suggestion is to search first class awards on Asiana — Seoul – JFK, Seoul – Chicago, and the ubiquitously available Seoul – Los Angeles (this is certainly the most available transpacific flight in first class for an award, offering seats nearly every day of the year…
Starwood Cash & Points Availability Search Glitch
Starwood Preferred Guest’s website gets a lot of criticism, including from me. I’m frequently frustrated that it won’t display all reservations, especially if the reservation involves an upgraded room or if the hotel has touched or modified the reservation in some way. Detail on points posted to your account is limited as well, my own biggest frustration being that any given Platinum 500 point amenity doesn’t ever appear linked to a property so it’s difficult to track down missing point or to tell Starwood if a particular set of points are missing from a given stay. That said, the website is much improved. I like their hotel search function that shows availability on a single screen for lowest cash price, award availability, and availability for cash and points. (I do wish SPG50 rate plan availability…
Continental Onepass Signup Bonus
Continental is offering 2000 bonus miles for new members and an additional 5000 for those members who fly Continental by the end of 2009. No minimum fare class is required to earn the flight bonus. The only restriction is that the address on the member’s account must list an address in the Mid Pacific, South Pacific, China or South Asia (excludes Japan). Residency is defined by the address on the OnePass account.
The Frustrations of Booking United Awards Before Their Gutted Award Chart Went Into Effect
Yesterday was another “award booking day,” where I spend a bit of time helping various friends with their award travel. One managed a Bali trip in first class on Asiana and Singapore. Another started off with a Thailand trip, ran into a bit of difficulty, and settled on Bali as wlel. Both were using United miles. Yesterday, it turns out, was actually award booking day on United for much of the frequent flyer world. That’s because as the New Year struck, so did United’s bloody award chart increase. In fact, at one point yesterday the regular international awards phone number featured hold times in excess of 90 minutes. That’s the number I usually favor, instead of elite agents, because the international call centers are frequently very helpful. Domestic agents can sometimes be helpful, and sure…
Award Booking Day
I only accomplished a limited amount of ‘work’ yesterday, spending more time than I should have developing award tickets for co-workers. One colleague is traveling to Bangkok and Singapore. It’s a first class award booked with Air Canada Aeroplan points. But the outbound was especially arduous — the only transpacific flight we could find on the needed day was Asiana’s Los Angeles – Seoul flight, but to connect to it from DC required a 6am departure connecting through Chicago — the early morning LA non-stop flight didn’t provide enough connecting time at LAX. (Asiana’s LA-Seoul flights, to some extent their LA-Chicago flights, and Air China’s flights are perhaps the most available Star Alliance transpac awards in premium classes, just a tip…)As the trip approached, United’s Dulles-Beijing flight opened up. Granted it’s United (and their old…
Air Canada Aeroplan: My New Favorite Airline Frequent Flyer Program?
For anyone that predicts the spin-off of a frequent flyer program into a separate publicly traded business must mean a devaluation of the program, check out the changes to Aeroplan and see what you think! The Aeroplan program has recently developed a reputation as stingy, but it’s anything but. Sure, they collect pretty hefty fees on award redemptions, usually called fuel surcharges. But when you combine at least two non-Air Canada partners on a single award they price taxes and fees manually and don’t include a fuel surcharge. I recently ticketed a first class award to Asia with Aeroplan points and the total taxes and fees were less than US$60. Air Canada is a member of the Star Alliance, so Aeroplan points can be used to book plenty of partners — this solves the frequent flyer…
