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Reasons to Avoid Northwest DC-9s

by Gary Leff on October 21, 2006

Oct 21 2006

The Upgrade Travel Blog says you should avoid Northwest DC-9s because these aging planes are increasingly responsible for delays, with a single plane causing 2564 minutes of delays so far year to date. I say you should avoid Northwest DC-9s because their first class cabins offer a tighter pitch (34 – 35 inches) than United’s economy plus on an Airbus A320 (36 inches). And the United Airbus offers channel 9 air traffic control, rather than no inflight entertainment at all. Who needs unlimited domestic upgrades when that just means first class on a Northwest DC-9?

5000 Northwest Bonus Miles for Next Roundtrip

by Gary Leff on October 14, 2006

Oct 14 2006

Northwests Daily Offers Celebrating 20 Years of Worldperks

by Gary Leff on October 6, 2006

Oct 06 2006

Northwest is finally promoting the 20th anniversary of its frequent flyer program. There’s a not-all-that-right instant win game from October 4-23, and much like American’s effort several months back they have an ‘offer of the day’. Today’s is quite nice — double iDine miles for your next 12 dines through November 30 (up to 20 miles per dollar spent if you’re already an ‘elite’ member of the dining program).Worth continuing to check out…

100 Free Northwest Miles and a 2000 Mile Online Booking Bonus

by Gary Leff on August 7, 2006

Aug 07 2006

Worldperks University has added a new, third course — read a couple quick screens, take a three question ‘quiz’, and get 100 bonus miles. The offer says miles post in 3-4 weeks, but they actually post instantly. When you complete the quiz you also become eligible for Book and fly one roundtrip flight on an NWA- or KLM-operated flight within the next 90 days and earn an additional 2,000 Bonus Miles. Back in March Northwest introduced the first two easy quizzes, I’m glad to be able to ‘enroll’ in another one at the start of a new semester… (Hat tip to Slippahs.)

20,000 Miles for a Northwest Visa

by Gary Leff on July 22, 2006

Jul 22 2006

I may have mentioned this before, but I don’t think so. Via Free Frequent Flyer Miles, Northwest’s co-branded Visa product is matching the standard signup incentives offered by United and American — 20,000 miles with first purchase (though US Bank won’t waive the fee for the first year like Chase and Citibank will). Still, if you’re going to sign up for a Northwest Visa this looks like the best offer.

Northwest Shopping Bonus

by Gary Leff on July 12, 2006

Jul 12 2006

Northwest is offering 500 bonus miles for shopping online through their Worldperks Mall and spending $150 or more between July 1 and September 15. Registration is required. See the details on the offer, because some of their participating merchants (eg hotel, car, flowers) are excluded from earning the bonus. All your online purchases should — of course — receive some kind of reward, whether it’s Northwest miles or something else. The best one-stop sources for learning about the best bonuses are the extensive RewardsDB charts and the Webflyer tool. It’s always worth checking out these resources before making an online purchase of any kind. (And it’s not just miles – you can earn cash rebates, too.)

Northwest Small Business Program Signup Bonus

by Gary Leff on June 21, 2006

Jun 21 2006

If you enter promo code BTN06 while signing up for BizPerks, the Northwest Airlines small business program, you’ll receive 50,000 bonus Biz Perks points. These covert to, say, 5 free club passes and 5 free drink coupons or a domestic upgrade and a couple club passes. The offer expires September 30th. Update: To qualify for the points you need a flight in full fare coach (B fare) or higher by September 30th credited to the Bizperks account. Still worth signing up just in case, but no longer the gimme it first appeared.

Northwest Gets One Right

by Gary Leff on April 22, 2006

Apr 22 2006

Last month Northwest began charging $15 to pre-reserve its best (sic) coach seats. Now they’ve relented and decided not to charge this fee to elite members. One benefit has always been blocking the better coach seats for elites. There’s not really much in the way of ‘better’ coach seats on Northwest, unlike United which offers elites extra legroom at the front of the coach cabin. But all of a sudden non-elites could take these seats for $15, and even elites had to pay. (Bizarrely under the scheme, elites would get upgraded to first class but still be charged extra money for cruddy the coach seating they had pre-reserved.) Now Northwest says they’ll still reserve some of these seats exclusively for elites and won’t charge elites for ‘coach choice’ seating. It’s a small victory, a very…

Northwest lies about the advantages of charging for premium coach seats.

by Gary Leff on March 21, 2006

Mar 21 2006

Last week I mentioned that I didn’t think Northwest’s move to charge for ‘premium’ seats in coach (which, outside of exit rows, aren’t in any way actually better) was a big deal. For infrequent flyers it’s neutral or a positive, the opportunity to access seats — though not meaningfully better — otherwise were mostly available to Northwest elites. For frequent flyers it’s more or less a non-issue: if you’re regularly flying Northwest and spending much time at all in coach you should be changing airlines. The only positive Northwest has is its domestic upgrade program, which isn’t just complimentary but also something they regularly deliver on. Still, charging elites for something they used to get for free (without even anything new offered up in return) is never a good thing. But what really irks me…

Northwest Elite Status for Asia Residents

by Gary Leff on March 19, 2006

Mar 19 2006

Northwest is again explicitly targeting Asia-Pacific frequent flyers with offers of an elite status match. Details are rather scarce on the website, certainly they’ll match up to Gold (mid-tier) but I wonder whether they’ll go to Platinum since they’re looking for any possible incremental revenue while in bankruptcy. Presumably matched status will last through the end of the year. No information is provided on what documentation is required of your existing status levels.In all likelihood this will operate in a similar manner as when they offered it in 2005, detailed discussion of which can be found at Flyertalk.com.

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