Place of Travel Deals, Frequent Flyer/Guest Programs
I saw it on Lufthansa in flight magazine yesterday. LH will offer in flight wifi on transatlantic flights, it covers pretty much from Eastern Europe all the way to US and Canada west coast.
You can read more information here
Don’t know how I missed this, from Apr 1st, united Elite can earn Elite Bonus when flying ANA, in addition, earning ratio had changed to better
For TRANSPACIFIC, INTRA-JAPAN WITH INTERNATIONAL CONNECTION AND INTRA-ASIA FLIGHTS (NOT INCLUDING FLIGHTS BETWEEN JAPAN AND AUSTRALIA, CHINA, INDIA, OR KOREA):
You will earn 100% base miles on many discounted economy fares.
For other flights, base miles earning fare class still the same.
This made United/Continental Elite can earn Elite bonus on all UA, CO, US, LH and most AC, now all NH flights.
More detail can be found here
The best part of these deals is they don’t require airport rental. airline programs in US for rental car miles require airport rental, I know sometimes you get miles for non airport rental, but that’s lucky, I won’t count on it.
1 Europcar for BMI miles, one day rental can get you 1700 BMI miles, you can directly book on flybmi.com, the price is not bad at all.
2 Avis and Lufthansa, they had this promotion last year and now just extend the offer to 12/31/2011
As a base member of Miles & More, Avis will reward you with:
- 1.000 Miles for your second rental
- 1.500 Miles for your third rental
- 2.000 Miles for your 4th to 6th rental
- 2.500 Miles for your 7th to 10th rental
- 3.000 Miles starting with your 11th rental
You can book on any avis website using AWD code mentioned in promotion.
3 Avis and Virgin Atlantic, 1000 miles per rental for most AWD code, I know this is not a best promotion, but if you really have no place to put your miles or short on VS, this is best option.
Many airlines have modified their award chart in 2011 including Lufthansa, Delta, United and now Air Canada. With exception of Delta, all others at least gave us 90 days notification, so who will be the next one? I am guessing it will be US airways!
Gary already had a post explained Air Canada changes in detail, basically, most best redemption value will be gone such as 100K/120K to Asia 1 in Bus/First class or 80K/100K to Europe 1 in Business/First or 100K to OZ.
The only survivor is within Asia 1, which includes China, Hong Kong, Japan, North Korea, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam. Price will still be 20K/30K/50K in Eco/Bus/First, so I can still enjoy business class ticket from China to Thailand or Singapore or Vietnam for every $15000 USD I charge to my Fideltiy AMEX card.
Flying Blue(Air France/KLM/Kenya Airways) Program has launched a new offer with Avis car rental, up 50000 bonus miles
Rent with Avis between 1 April and 30 September 2011 and you could earn over 50,000 Award Miles. As a loyal customer, you’ll receive Bonus Miles in increasing amounts starting with your second rental, must be 3 day or longer
To qualify, reservations must be made using a Flying Blue/Avis Worldwide Discount (AWD) number: Ivory members F982700; Silver members F982800; Gold members F982900; Platinum members F983000 or with a KLM Flying Blue AWD number: Ivory members Z266200; Silver members Z266100; Gold members Z190300; Platinum members K885100. Reservations made on www.avis-flyingblue.com and klm.com (with Flying Blue membership level selected) will automatically have the correct AWD embedded in the rental.
The bonus will be awarded as follows
2nd qualifying rental = 2000 bonus Flying Blue Miles;
3rd qualifying rental = 5000 bonus Flying Blue Miles;
4th qualifying rental = 7500 bonus Flying Blue Miles;
5th qualifying rental = 14000 bonus Flying Blue Miles;
6th qualifying rental = 20000 bonus Flying Blue Miles.
These Accumulator bonuses in addition to the minimum standard Flying Blue Miles award of 500 Flying Blue Miles will equal a total award of at least 51,500 Flying Blue Miles for the 6 rentals.
Flying Blue program has discounted redemption offer year round, 50K can get you a free business class ticket to Europe from US during discount period.
Has anyone matched flying blue Elite status few weeks ago, I know I should!!
Update: Here is the offer link and T&C link, part 4 mentioned 3 days or more
Some people may already know Hilton Q2 promotion, which equate next to nothing, 1000 bonus points per night. so if you are big spender, the bonus doesn’t help.
However, there are several other airlines bonus offer that are stackable with Q2 promotion
1 Triple Virgin Atlantic miles: Member who choose fixed miles will earn 1000 VS miles per stay(100 for Hampton Inn)+2000 bonus(200). I personally don’t like VS program very much, inability to combine partners and extremely high taxes, but if you want to top off VS miles, this is a good time. If you ever have a chance to fly PEK-LHR in business/first on Air China, it only costs you 63000 miles for business and 75,000 for first class, good luck on finding 2 seats
2 Triple Alitalia miles: Member who choose fixed miles will earn 600 AZ miles per stay(120 for Hampton inn)+1200 bonus miles(240). There are some good value in Alitalia program such as Middle East to USA only 80K in business class, but it’s not worth the effort to start from 0
3 5000 BA miles: This is a rumor, let see how it goes.
Lucky mentioned this offer, which you can get status match to up AF top status Platinum tier. you must include proof of membership in another customer loyalty program that includes the status name and validity period.
It can be any program on earth except SKYTEAM members
offer valid until March 31st, 2011
Air France have discounted redemption offer worldwide year round and award can be used for one way too, but they also charge high fuel taxes
They are also partner of membership rewards
From now until May 31st, 2011, register then fly Virgin Blue, V Australia and Virgin America and credit miles to Flying Club, you will receive double miles on all flights during promotional period.
Flying Club is not a bad program and offers reasonable redemption level on their partners. If you already flyVirgin America, it’s a good place to put your miles in.
Standby earlier or later flight is very common in US, especially for Elite members, but things are totally different in China. I want to share my “Standby” experience the other day
When we standby in US, we can either wait at gate or at lounge, where you can relax while waiting. In china, everything is different. There is no real “standby”, basically, it only happens in 3 scenario
1 you have flexible ticket and you want to take a diff flight, but the flight is full, so you wait at check in supervisor counter for 1 seat in order to exchange the ticket and get boarding pass
2 flight canceled, then you try to get on to another flight which is full, then you wait in the check in supervisor counter for a seat.
3 it’s my scenario now. 10 days ago, I checked the fare from HAK-PVG, only full Y fare was left for sale. I thought the price was not gonna get any lower and Chinese new year peak season was finished, just wait few more days. On Feb 10th, I checked fare again, every single flight was SOLD OUT from HAK-PVG for Feb 12th, 13rd and 14th, I thought I could just find a connecting fare, but EVERY SINGLE flight out of HAK to almost any city in China was sold out for those 3 days. The only option left for me is “Standby”
I got to airport 1.5 hour prior to departure to the airline ticket sales desk to add my name list on the waitlist, then I had to walk around and came back to sales desk until 40 minutes prior to departure. The sales desk then called check in supervisor and told him how many people were on the waitlist and how many “Standby” ticket she could sell. For my flight, there was 2 people “no show” yet, so she sold me a “standby fare” Then I went to supervisor desk to keep waiting, he printed a boarding pass, but could not give me until the boarding process began in case last 2 people showed up.
Lucky enough, there did not show, so I was able to rush to the gate at last minutes, if I was not a Gold card, I won’t be able to get on the flight because there were 2 more people waiting in lane and they got there far earlier than me.
you may wonder why there were only three people on the waitlist when so many people tried to get out the island. It was because airlines don’t like to tell people to “standby”, even if inexperienced traveller asked ticket sales desk in the airport, they won’t tell them to “standby”, so they just walked away.
You need to register this promotion and fly before Apr 30th, you will earn fixed amount of bonus miles or double miles depends on the market. it looks to me some weak markets are offered double miles.
Please remember, Air Canada doesn’t charge fuel surcharge for partner awards
Christmas trip to Hongkong, Macau and Hainan Island-Shenzhen Sheraton Grand China
Christmas trip to Hongkong, Macau and Hainan Island-Grand Hyatt
Christmas trip to Hongkong, Macau and Hainan Island-Hong Kong
Christmas trip to Hongkong, Macau and Hainan Island-Premier Jetfoil to Macau
Christmastrip to Hongkong, Macau and Hainan Island-Westin Macau
Christmas trip to Hongkong, Macau and Hainan Island-Macau
Christmas trip to Hongkong, Macau and Hainan Island-HKG to HAK on UO157
Christmas trip to Hongkong, Macau and Hainan Island-Back to Shanghai on Hainan airline
Hainan airline was rated 5 star by skytrax, personally, I won’t read the rating too much, but they are the truly the #1 airline in China. Hainan airline is a very young and it’s the only Providence/city government own airline become successful.Look what happened to Shanghai airlines? it had be merged with China eastern due to consecutive loss and huge debt. Air China, China eastern and China southern are owned by central government.
Hainan airline was very innovative compare to all other Chinese airlines, they were the first airline introduced Y up fare, first and only airline in China offers miles don’t expire as long as 1 activity in every 3 years. First airline introduced “Status match” . The best part was, they matched any airline on earth, even if you don’t have any status with any airlines, if you can show them proof that you have flew a sum of 40K km or 30 segments with all airlines in 2010, they will give you Gold status, which will be valid for 2 years. I got my Gold status using AA program.
Shanghai has 2 airports, PVG and SHA, but for some reason, one one flight on Shanghai airline arrives in SHA, all others on MU or HU arrives in PVG, which are located 75km away from my home. Hainan airline has 1 flight using A330 every other day, because the Aircraft will used for PVG-BRU late in the night.
Interesting part of Hainan Y up fare is you can not use first class check in counter and lounge, but with Gold card, you can use all of these, so best combination with HU is Gold card+ A clas(Y up) fare. After checking in, someone will escrow all Gold member to the lounge, but HAK lounge is under renovation, they just use separate an area in departure hall as temporary lounge.
After boarding the AC, I was shocked, business cabin only has 4 people, I, my wife, nanny and baby. I guess I was traveling on a non busy day. A330 Business class has lie flat seat, but it’s actually flatter than most lie flat, close to 180 degree. seat equipped with AVOD.
Flight landed on time, we finally arrived home after 3 weeks. Shanghai was COLD
Some thought about this trip, Hong Kong is a great city，I like it a lot, great food, lots to do. Macau? If not for gamble, I don’t see a reason to go again. In about 1 month, I will go to Tahiti, New Zealand and Japan and I am sure the trip will be more intertesting.
