You scored a great deal on your flight when you redeemed your miles. Your boss agreed to your time off request—even though it’s the busy season—and you found a reputable pet sitter to check in on Snowball while you’re gone. It may seem as though the most challenging prior-to-vacation tasks are behind you, but they aren’t. You still have to pack, and that means dealing with your luggage—something many people dread rather than enjoy.
The new year is upon us and so are a variety of new frequent flyer and loyalty program changes. Here’s what you need to know to get the traveling year started off right especially if you’re one of American’s coveted Concierge Key members.
Alaska Airlines recently received permission from the Department of Justice to purchase Virgin America, meaning the takeover is officially happening. Now that Alaska is sure the deal will go through, they have announced more details on how the two airlines will operate going forward, what changes will be made to elite benefits, and how the mileage accrual and award tickets will work.
Act fast to redeem Virgin Atlantic miles before the upcoming devaluation, and Citi ThankYou points transfers to Virgin Atlantic might get you to that award even faster thanks to a new bonus offer.
Starwood Preferred Guest is a
Amtrak Guest Rewards is a solid frequent traveler program offering members decent redemption rates, particularly for last-minute bookings and peak travel. Program members can
You’re probably already familiar with the three big credit card award programs: American Express Membership Rewards, Chase Ultimate Rewards and Citi ThankYou. They’re great because you can transfer the points you earn directly to frequent flyer programs. But there’s another very flexible program you should know about that also offers transfers to airlines partners: Starwood Preferred Guest.
One way to quickly build up a stash of frequent flyer miles is to take advantage of limited-time offers the airlines promote. Oftentimes, airlines like Avianca and banks like American Express will offer a bonus scheme when you transfer miles between accounts. That means you may earn a bonus when you transfer your miles to your husband’s account, or to a friend or child. Sometimes the deals aren’t worth it but when they are, you can leverage the promotion to earn plenty of free travel for yourself and potentially others. Let’s look at this method of earning loyalty currency.
World travelers are burdened with organizing a lot of details. But logging into numerous websites, keeping track of reservation emails, and juggling a dizzying number of apps doesn’t have to be part of your itinerary.
Traxo is an online travel service that tracks and organizes personal travel information, such as itineraries, loyalty account balances and receipts, and then displays it all on a convenient dashboard, either in the app or on the web. More than 200 travel sites are supported.
I shared my recent story about an exciting flight from Paris to Doha in first class on Qatar Airway’s A380. While the ground experience was nothing special, everything changed once we boarded and shortly after taking off. After spending some time in the gorgeous on-board bar, it was time for dinner.
Once we returned to our seats, our flight attendant greeted us warmly and asked if we were ready for our meal. I told him we were, and he went to work right away.
Without hesitation, I’d ordered caviar to start. Who could resist this?
Flying in international first class can be quite an amazing experience. Booking these seats can be tough to do since more and more airlines are removing first class cabins from their planes and devaluations are increasing the costs of these premium seats. But given the opportunity, the experience of flying international first class is well worth the effort. Especially when you are celebrating an engagement.
The Student Conservation Association (SCA) strives to inspire youth to engage with nature and to become lifelong stewards of the environment through hands-on service opportunities. Student volunteers learn important life skills while doing crucial work to help preserve national parks and other public lands. You can donate Southwest Rapid Reward points to this valuable organization.
There is a fantastic new way to give the gift of education to any friend or family member. And, it’s even a method to help you pay down your student loan while earning miles and points. Gift of College is a college savings registry of sorts.
You can purchase gift cards from the company that the recipient (or you) can use to pay off a student loan, or establish or contribute to his or her existing 529 plan. For miles and
Here’s the scoop on how to earn status on an alliance and not just an airline. The oneworld alliance may be smaller the other two major ones, but its 14 members (plus 21 affiliated members) can literally take you anywhere in the populated world.
If you regularly fly on Air Berlin, American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Qantas, Iberia, Finnair, Japan Airlines, LATAM Airlines, Malaysia Airlines, Qatar Airways, Royal Jordanian, S7 Airlines, or SriLankan Airlines, it’s a safe bet that you might benefit from oneworld tier status.
You may not be a New Year’s resolution type of person, but you’ll actually do yourself a disservice if you don’t make a few promises related to your travel hacking hobby. Earning miles and points that will help whisk you and your family around the globe in style isn’t easy, and it takes planning and organization.
Before you sing “Auld Lang Syne” at the dawn of the New Year, make a few resolutions that may help you get where you want to go in the next 12 months. Here are some resolutions shared by us at RewardExpert. You may want to commit to them as well.
Did you know you can get elite status on an alliance? Well you can. Here’s how to achieve it on SkyTeam. There are 20 member
In the two years since its inception, DUFL has changed the way savvy professionals travel for business. Voted Best New Travel App of 2015 by USA Today, this unique company eliminates the need to pack for a trip, check or stow luggage, even do laundry and visit the dry cleaner. They do it all for you.
Thousands of executives, salespeople, athletes, celebrities and others who use DUFL’s services enjoy a stress-free journey while the company’s staff carefully packs and ships their clothing, toiletries and personal items to their destination.
Part of an effective miles and points earning strategy is to take advantage of every opportunity to rack up extra miles. Here are some tips for earning miles in places you may not have thought of before.
Airline ticket and hotel prices go through the roof for the host city during big events like the upcoming Super Bowl, which is being held in Houston on Sunday, February 5.
One way to cut costs if you want to see it in person is to use points and miles where the price in miles is fixed regardless of the cash price of the ticket. Because tickets will be costly. You can expect to use 25,000 miles to get to Texas for the game though some airlines will cost more and at least one route is less.
