I was recently at the Westin Maui, which is a lovely property but hardly for me. I knew exactly what to expect and the hotel absolutely lived up to expectations. It’s a large upscale (though not luxury) property on the beach in Maui. In general I’m not a fan of 700-plus room resorts.

Of course, the island of Maui itself is quite beautiful.

The Westin Maui is a factory. It’s a lovely physical property right on the beach, with a network of several pools. Despite taking up much geography with their pools, on a busy weekend there are never enough lounge chairs. Guests arrive down at the pool area at 8am or so, put out their towels and maybe a book, and then depart for the better part of the day. The hotel has a rule about not leaving your stuff unattended for more than an hour, but it isn’t enforced at all or at least wasn’t while I was there.

Their approach to the beach will annoy many but I actually appreciated it. They charge for beach chairs ($5 apiece) and umbrellas ($25 buys an umbrella and two chairs). While I’d be unhappy with this when the hotel isn’t full, over Presidents Weekend this served to ration the space on the beach which meant anyone willing to pay a bit could have space when they wanted it. A staff member sets up the chairs and umbrella for you, and gives you a slip of paper to sign it to your room (plus tax and a line for tip).

Fortunately as mid-week approached the hotel cleared out quite a bit and there were always pool chairs available.

The hotel has two separate buildings with rooms, the Ocean Tower (which is farther back from, but with a direct view of, the ocean) and the Beach Tower (closest to the beach and a side view of the ocean).

The Beach Tower rooms are much larger than the Ocean Tower rooms. The most desireable rooms are higher-numbered, even rooms on a high floor. Even-numbered rooms overlook the pools and out towards the ocean, the higher the number the closest to the beach. Rooms above perhaps floor 5 are better because their views of the ocean aren’t obstructed by trees.

Odd-numbered rooms also look out towards the ocean, but are above a parking lot, so don’t look down!

Ocean tower rooms on the other hand are really quite small, though the view is outstanding with a panoramic view of the water almost theatre-style with the resort oup close and water in the distance. The rooms are too small for my taste, though, so I’d always choose the Beach Tower (when comparing standard rooms). The ocean tower also has the least desireable rooms. On the backside, instead of facing the ocean they face the resort’s entrance and overlook the parking lot.

All rooms here have a refrigerator, which is nice. The hotel charges a $20 resort fee, which they advertise as including free internet, free self-parking, and 2 daily bottles of water. Two bottles just isn’t enough, though you can buy more at the extensive sundries shop. Personally, I like my water cold and I drink a lot of it so I bought a flat at the grocery store down the road at the Cannery Mall.

I also used the refrigerator for my half and half. I am very persnickety about my coffee, I won’t drink it with packaged or non-refrigerated creamer, so a refrigerator in the room means I can make coffee in the morning. Of course, I bring my own. Ironic, isn’t it, that I’m in Hawaii and I packed coffee? Though I did pick up some ground Kona for later in the week.

Although the hotel was fully booked when I arrived, they were still good at platinum recognition. They worked very hard to ensure my upgrade. Suites or even prime ocean view rooms aren’t really guaranteed here, especially over a busy weekend, but the hotel itself does seem to try hard to be as compliant as possible. I did overhear some unhappy platinums huffing and puffing over the insufficiency of their upgrades. It wasn’t because the hotel resented offering up the best possible rooms, it was just that they really were sold out.

In my own case I didn’t get the room I really wanted until the second day, but the hotel didn’t just tell me to check back later to see if I could move, they proactively found me the room I wanted, let me know where it would be, and took care of moving me. Since I would still have five nights left, it seemed worth making the switch and it was.

The hotel recognizes that they aren’t always able to offer upgrades (though on non-holiday weekends and especially as we get past prime winter weekends, the current economy may make it more possible), and they offer some property-specific value-added benefits for elites on top of the usual recognition.

Platinums receive 15% off of room service, 20% off at the spa, and some other benefits (such as discounts on their luau and cabana rental) that weren’t especially useful to me. Golds receive a lesser set of extra benefits, such as 10% off at the spa.

I especially appreciated the discounts, and wish more properties would offer similar benefits, because it creates a way to be reminded of your loyalty throughout the stay. Too many hotels either upgrade you or they don’t, and if they don’t have a lounge then Platinums really feel as though they’ve received zero benefits for their status. Little extras on a daily basis provide for continued elite satisfaction.

The resort food was fine but uninspired. We did find a close-by, inexpensive local spot called Aloha Mixed Plate. The most expensive option on the menu was about $10, the food was good, and the setting was right on the water (and those tables were actually less popular, because the restaurant isn’t permitted to serve alcohol in that area).

Much farther away, in Kihea, we had an excellent meal at Café O’lea — good food and a good value, my short ribs for instance were $20.

 

 

There are 18 open first class seats on the seatmap of a mid-day 757 (the flight shows F9).

It’s within the 1K upgrade window. It’s within the Premier Executive upgrade window. There were no upgrade seats available before the 1K window, and there still aren’t. Do they really expect to sell possibly 75% of the cabin in the next 3 days?

Sometime around August of last year United just about stopped making advance upgrade inventory available on its flighs between Washington-Dulles and California. There’s the occasional flight with a solo upgrade seat, the occasional redeye with more than one, but advance upgrades on transcons seem to be a thing of the past to and from DC.

Connecting flights, e.g. Dulles or National to the West Coast via Chicago or Denver, are much more confirmable in advance.

Choice Privileges is offering complimentary gold status just for signing up, plus 500 bonus Delta miles with your first stay.

Gold is their first tier of elite status, usually obtained after 10 nights in a calendar year, and isn’t particularly rich in offers (though it’s easier to redeem Choice award nights as a Gold).

I’m not particularly keen on staying at Choice properties most of the time, my own personal preference, but a hat tip to the lovely partner hotel redemptions that they offer.

Wyndham’s generous best rate guarantee, offering a free hotel night when you find a lower price for one of their properties on a competitor website, is ending March 31. Apparently beginning April 1 they will only give you a 10% discount.

Goodbye meaningful best rate guarantee. I wasn’t a big Days Inn and Ramada free night guy myself, but I know that many benefited greatly from this program.

Now their offer is pretty toothless, more or less on par with competitor chain offerings (some of which are a little richer, offering choice of points instead of a discount – useful when staying on someone else’s dime).

Upgrade: Travel Better has the story on my local airport authority run amok. They don’t like consumers choosing airport hotel ‘park and fly’ rates, they lose revenue, and so they’re going to require the hotels to pay to pick up and drop off passengers at the airport.

The authority will hold two public hearings next month on a proposal to adopt, “with the full force and effect of law,” a requirement that area hotels pay a $2.50 fee every time a hotel shuttle picks up passengers at Ronald Reagan National or Washington Dulles International airports.

The reason for the fee:

“In effect, by offering competitive off-airport parking and providing courtesy service to the airport’s primary curbs, local hotels are diverting a portion of revenue that would otherwise be received by the Airports Authority through either the public-parking operation or taxicabs’ services,” the report states.

This is eerily similar to GM going to the federal government for a bailout (“you wouldn’t buy our awful cars, so we’ll make you pay for it anyway.”). Hotels offer a competitive product that travelers actually want, instead of paying the airport. So the airport wants its money anyway and will use “the force of law” to get it.

Driving a friend to the airport also takes money away from airport parking lots, and shouldn’t they be legally entitled to that revenue? They need it, after all! So by force of law drivers should have to pay a toll to get onto the airport property if dropping off or picking up passengers.

The airports authority does claim “The hotel shuttles are the only ground-transportation providers at the airport that are not charged a fee currently.” suggesting that increasing fees is ‘fair’ rather than questioning the underlying fee itself.

But of course there aren’t that many different types of ground-transportation providers at the airport, and taxis at Dulles are granted a service monopoly along with their fees (a whole other problem, the company with the monopoly contract is terrible).

Big thumbs down to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority.

Northwest Worldperks is offering (registration required) 1000 miles for shopping through their portal if you haven’t done so in the past 3 years. Any single purchase made through March 31 should qualify, so either make a purchase through them that would have otherwise been made or find yourself a truly inexpensive ($1ish) item, or buy a gift card with free shipping for something you’ll spend on later.

Purchases from FTD, Teleflora’s Flower Club, 1-800-FLOWERS.COM, Bose, Sealy, 1-800WINE.COM and Vinesse do not count towards the bonus.

If you aren’t sure whether you’re eligible because you don’t know whether you’ve made a purchase through the Northwest mileage mall during the past three years, don’t worry. Northwest knows — if you aren’t eligible for the promotion it won’t let you register. So go ahead with the registration, you’ll soon find out.

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 could be searched online, but it cannot.)

One frustrating website glitch I’ve recently learned about, though, is that the Starwood Preferred Guest website doesn’t seem to accurately display cash and points award availability. In my recent experience with several hotels in Asia, the website said cash and points was unavailable but a quick call to Starwood confirmed that the availability was there and I had no problems making the booking.

Cash and points awards are always a better deal than the comparable points-only redemptions. Take for example a category 4 award comparison. An award night is 10,000 points. A cash and points award is 4000 points and $60. The difference then is cash and points $60 to save 6000 points, you are buying back your points at 1 cent apiece. Starwood points are worth much more than that.

While standard award nights are available (or are supposed to be!) whenever a standard room is available for sale at a hotel, cash and points awards are not. A hotel receives roughly the same overall compensation for both types of award nights, but with a standard award if the hotel’s occupancy exceeds 90% for the redeemed night then Starwood Preferred Guest has to pay the hotel it’s average daily room rate for that night instead of the discounted award rate. (That gets expensive, and is why higher occupancy rates at hotels had been driving up Starwood’s costs over the past few years.)

Starwood Preferred Guest, on the other hand, does not increase a hotel’s compensation on a cash and points award night when the hotel turns out to be full. As a result, hotels only try to make cash and points award nights available when they expect occupancy for the night to be light.

Cash and points award nights have limited availability, are a better deal, and can be searched online… Sometimes. Until this glitch is corrected, it’s worth calling Starwood whenever you’re looking for a cash and points night and the website says it is unavailable.

Frugal Travel Guy reports that effective April 2, American Express travelers checks will no longer earn miles. May she rest in peace.

Back at the beginning of March, Hilton.com had several Carribean and South American properties pricing out at full rate for New Year’s Eve but then at $0 for all nights booked thereafter. It was a glitch, and one that folks at Hilton apparently didn’t realize existed for at least a couple of months. Not long after booking the rates corrected on the Hilton website, with the $0 rates being replaced by the originally-intended full prices.

The deal was flagged for me by a co-worker, and I made the commitment not to share it broadly such as posting it on my blog or on Flyertalk. He was taking the trip for his anniversary and I didn’t want to jeopardize the deal.

Two and a half months after booking the Hilton Barbados (among other possible properties were San Juan and Caracas), I got an email saying there was a mistake and they’d be unable to honor my rate as booked — but that they would extend a single free night (others who booked longer stays got 2 or 3 free night offers).

I e-mailed back a firm but polite note, suggesting that this it was months after I made my Hilton.com booking I should reasonably be able to rely on it. And I had been in e-mail contact with the hotel as well, which suggested my reservation was fully in order. On the phone with the G.M. of the hotel, she subsequently offered me 50% off for the stay. That’s actually not a crazy price, to be sure, but I wasn’t going to make the discretionary trip to take advantage of it.

My New Year’s Eve rate for a King Oceanfront Executive Floor room was $559/night plus tax (it was only incrementally more to confirm an ocean view, and only incrementally more than that for an executive room — but boy New Year’s pricing is expensive there for a standard Hilton!). 50% off would have meant $280/night plus tax, a deal for someone looking to book over New Year’s there, but not enough to fly to Barbados just for the deal.

After some back and forth, the G.M. agreed to honor my originally-booked rate (pay first night at $559, get the rest of the stay free) as long as I consumed the stay outside of their truest peak dates of December 23 through January 6.

The problem was in actually making the booking. This was all arranged by early June, but I kept making every possible attempt to contact the General Manager (a total of at least seven times) — who was the one that agreed to the rate, was the only one who could put it into place for me, and who stopped replying to my messages altogether.

It took getting Hilton corproate involved a couple of times, one of which resulted in the group sales manager contacting me to let me know the G.M. was out of town. But at least at that point I had another person to prompt to get the G.M. back in touch with me.

Finally, my stay with specific dates was booked. Only this wasn’t reflected properly on the Hilton website and I had nothing in writing to reflect the agreed-upon rates. Much more prompting and another phone call from the GM and things were set.

I booked a couple of business class awards on American Airlines. Not the best use of points, perhaps, but pricing over the December period was quite high so an award made some sense and I had no desire whatsoever to make the flight down in coach. Availability really wasn’t bad, though oddly the hardest segment to secure was the outbound flight from DC to New York-JFK, fortunately inventory management opened that up for me so I didn’t have to buy the segment or head up to New York the night before. (On the whole I’ve found American’s award inventory on its own flights to be the best among US carriers, though I find Star Alliance to have better availability than oneworld generally, though I have had quite good luck with British Airways.)

A 6 a.m. departure out of National Airport, including checking bags, and I arrived at 4:30 a.m. The airport was a zoo, with check-in for American wrapped around the terminal. Fortunately I was flying in a premium cabin, and I’m a lifetime elite in any case (thanks to American’s policy of counting all miles ever earned in an account, not just flight miles, towards million-miler status). There was only one person checking IDs at the TSA station, feeding into several x-ray machines for the pier out of which American operates. So the line to get up to a scanner was long. Past the screener and up to the lounge shorlty after it opened at 5 a.m.

Flight up to New York was uneventful, as was the AAdmiral’s Club at JFK except to say that the lounge was expansive, had computers, and perhaps the worst tasting coffee that’s ever been brewed. Flight down to Barbados was utterly uneventful as well, though I still find American’s premium cabin food to rank towards the bottom of the major carriers. United’s is better, which is truly saying something.

Another American flight arrived at much the same time as ours, parked just farther from the terminal than our aircraft did, and their passengers were bussed to the immigration hall — just beating us as we were instructed to walk. This created a bit of a line, and the immigration folks were in no hurry to process, still we were cleared through immigration in about 20 minutes. And we then proceeded to wait more than an hour for our bags. Mental note not to check luggage into BGI ever again if it’s possible to avoid it (as a bit of careful packing on this trip would have allowed).

Cab out to the hotel, and efficient check-in. The cab driver said the Hilton was his favorite property on the island, remarking impressed that “you don’t even have to carry your luggage!” I guess he’s never driven anyone to Sandy Lane, though perhaps with the new Four Seasons he’ll manage a new favorite property.

We were checked in right after a bevy of British Airways crew, given keys to our ocean view room and told about the Executive Lounge’s offerings. (I could have checked in at the lounge, but didn’t yet know where to go and this was just as easy.) Given a tour to the room by the bellman taking our bags, he proceeded to describe literally everything about the room, fretted that the ironing board was missing and promised to bring one right away! I assured him that wouldn’t be necessary and we were finally in Barbados, in peace.

The beach is at the hotel was nice, and relatively uncrowded for a December weekend. There was a hotel attendant available to help set up beach chairs, and once set up you find yourself looking out at water a lovely turqoise.  The beach is the highpoint of the property. The room furnishings and décor are not really to my taste, but then it’s a Hilton and it could have been just about anywhere in the world.

The staff is all friendly, but this is the Carribean so service isn’t great and certainly not fast. Lunch by the beach meant extremely slow service, they didn’t bring everything I ordered, forgot to once I asked for it, and only felt empowered to comp me a drink by way of apology (manager took my entrée off the bill without my asking, once he came out).

The executive lounge is too small considering the number of people with access. The top three floors of my tower, and top two of the other tower, all have access. The complimentary breakfast spread is nice, but the lounge is busy. I much preferred taking my breakfast downstairs, you can do the full buffet for just a US$10 upcharge over the complimentary lounge breakfast. And the coffee is very good, perfect for sitting outside and relaxing over a long meal.

One feature of the executive lounge is complimentary wireless internet. They give you an access code and it’s valid for 24 hours, and they tell you it only works in the lounge — which is true, if you first use the code from the lounge. But if you take a code down to your room it will work there, giving you complimentary in-room internet which otherwise requires payment. Each day I asked for a code for myself and one for my wife so that I had a few extra codes to bring back to a colleague who would be visiting the property a couple of weeks after me.

Breakfast was the only decent meal on property, and even the buffet was far from outstanding. The food by the beach wasn’t just slow, it was mediocre. They seem to serve the same food as room service, and draw from the same kitchen. So it’s best to go off property for meals. We had an inexpensive ‘fried bar food’-type meal one evening at the Waterfront Café, and also a dinner at Daphne’s.. which was absolutely beautiful, right on the beach, truly top notch service… The food was almost very good but always seemed to just miss, such as my foie gras which was ever so slightly burned.

I was certainly happy here for the price, I paid about $100 a night for an oceanview room with lounge access. So ultimately no complaints for sure! But it was hardly the perfect experience.

Off to the airport, I discovered a lounge airside that I hadn’t been aware of. It’s shared by several airlines and I walked upstairs and asked how I might have access. They ran down their list of associations, and stopped at Priority Pass and I quickly produced by card. The lounge was rather stylish, the automatic latte machine provided good coffee, and the reading material was ample. Food was limited, and it was a morning flight, I didn’t sample any of the mid-shelf liquor.

 

 

 

The world economy is in a tailspin, travel is down all over, and in Thailand in particular after the Suvarnabhumi airport shutdown from end-November. But if the govenrment of Thailand can only develop a new alcoholic drink, sure, that will solve everything.

Cuba’s got the Mojito. There’s the Singapore Sling and the Manhattan. Thailand hopes a newly created drink called “Siam Sunrays” will enter the world’s cocktail lexicon and help draw tourists back to the country.

The Tourism Authority of Thailand unveiled the drink Thursday, calling it “Thailand in a glass — the new punch in Thai tourism.”

The cocktail consists of a shot of vodka, coconut liqueur, a dash of chili pepper and sugar, lime juice, a few slivers of lemongrass and ginger — shaken not stirred, then strained into a glass — with ice and soda water.

It’s the latest strategy to revive Thailand’s key tourism industry, which was battered by political protests last year that culminated in a weeklong shutdown of Bangkok’s two main airports.

Though I suppose, if monetary policy hasn’t done the trick… and it’s at least as likely to help as a stimulus package…

Frugal Travel Guy wants to make a political statement, buying tea online and sending it to the White House — while earning double miles for doing so.

Starwood has announced new redemption categories for the coming year, effective March 2nd.

Each year Starwood recategorizes its hotels based on prior year average daily room rates, and the category that it places a hotel in determines the number of points required for redemption.

On the whole — as expected — more hotels went down in category than went up. Specifically, according to the Flyertalk thread on the subect, 82 went up in category and 156 went down in category.

Some of the more interesting ones to me, the Thailand properties appear not to change though I know that their occupancy is hurting tremendously. They were really hit late in the year with the occupation of the Suvarnabhumi airport, and their real downturn afterward likely came to late to sufficiently effect room rates for the whole year. Several Japanese hotels are going up in category, a reflection perhaps of the strong Yen (since average daily room rate is calculated in dollars).

I’m fortunate to be able to rebook the W Seoul as a category 4, since I currently have it reserved as a category 5. The changes go into effect on March 2, so I’ll be making my call on that day. It’s worth checking any of your upcoming award reservations, you can of course rebook future awards at a lower price point if the hotel has gone down in category.

Meanwhile, this is also a wonderful window of opportunity if you were planning to book any of the 82 going up in category — the increases don’t go into effect until March 2, so make your redemption plans now! (And I wouldn’t wait until March 1, it’s possible that the changes could begin rolling into place a day or two early, or at least my recollection is this has happened in the past.)

Several New York properties drop in category, with the Westin Times Square, W New York, and Le Parker Meridien falling from Category 6 to Category 5. (The Four Points SoHo even drops to Category 4.) The nice thing there is I was considering redeeming my platinum award gift of a free weekend night in New York, and this means I don’t have to stay at the Sheraton New York or even worse at the Sheraton Manhattan.

The other big change is that Starwood Preferred Guest is eliminating “peak season” extra points requirements (where category 5 hotels become 16,000 points instead of 12,000… category 6 become 25,000 instead of 20,000.. and category 7 become 35,000 instead of 30,000), except for the (3) Sardinia properties Cala di Volpe, Hotel Pitrizza, and Hotel Romazzino. They say peak season is eliminated for 2009 so one imagines it may be back when hotel rates generally recover, perhaps next year, although this remains to be seen.

Good news, as expected. Part of me thought the reductions would go further, given the overall condition of the hotel industry, but two factors are at play — first, the tremendous deterioration in hotel occupancy really took hold late in the year, perhaps too late to make such a big difference, and second, the specific average daily room rate levels that Starwood Preferred Guest uses for each category is proprietary and we don’t know whether it changes in any given year. I suspected that they altered the dollar figures for each category, pushing several hotels up in category as a result, a couple of years ago. I have no reason in particular to suspect this, but it’s possible that they’ve made some adjustments at the margin here again and that this would serve to keep several hotels in categories when they’d have otherwise fallen a level.

As the newly combining Northwest and Delta adds fees and reduces elite bonus miles, Continental seems to be moving in the opposite direction.

Continental will still permit the old, higher-level elite bonus mile accumulation for elites with their premium co-branded credit card, and Continental is actually taking away fees on award redemption. Changes made by all members more than 21 days in advance of travel will be free, as long as the original and destination remain the same. (Platinums remain exempt even within 21 days.) The neat thing about this is it isn’t just date changes that are fee-free, you can change times, airline partners, and even routing without incurring a fee.

This makes sense. As it breaks off its partnership with Delta/Northwest come the end of October, its frequent flyers and the frequent flyers of its soon to be former partners will be making decisions about which carrier to stick with moving forward. Drawing a contrast makes good sense.

Meanwhile, United continues to block its members from booking award seats being offered by United’s partners. Informally, Continental has suggested that it will not engage in this practice. Also a good move, making the airline potentially the preferred Star Alliance carrier within North America. (Continental certainly has a better domestic premium product, it lacks economy plus, and international upgrades are harder though United is introducing Continental-style co-pays as well — United’s only real advantage will be Systemwide upgrades for 100,000 mile flyers which are increasingly difficult to use in advance.)

It remains to be seen the details of how Continental’s partnership with United will work, and how it will handle Star Alliance awards, but Continental does seem to be moving in a positive direction.

Alaska’s $50 companion certificate which comes with the Bank of America co-branded Visa remains one of the best deals in travel, since it can be used on any fare — from the cheapest up through full fare first, without capacity controls.

Onboard meals have gotten better. Last night’s cod was rather tasty, and the dressing that came with my prawn salad was quite flavorful. And they still serve ice cream sundaes.

The crews are uniformly friendly. That’s just always been an Alaska Airlines thing, and it remains so. But they’re not the most nuanced. This is not a refined product, it’s transportation.

At least they make announcements reserving the forward lavatory for first class, and they use the curtain, but that doesn’t stop passengers from streaming forward and of course the flight attendants don’t say anything.

I like the new generation dig-E-players, but it’s not a replacement for a stable seat-based entertainment system since it can be annoying to hold onto the dig-E-player and watch a movie while the tray table is occupied by.. a meal. And why oh why does Alaska always collect these things with 30-40 minutes left in the flight??

Alaska’s first class seats just aren’t meant for transcon flying. After a long day, followed by 5 hours in that seat, mighty uncomfortable.

Seattle can be a mess. Long lines for first class checkin, a crowded and disorganized checkin lobby, and multiple lines for most passengers to wait in to first check in and then to check bags. Not to mention long security lines, Seattle is one of those airports with hugely variable waits for screening, almost to the extremes of Vegas. I’m no expert in such matters but some airports just seem to handle the same volume of passengers so much better than others.

Lucky is no longer an Intercontinental Royal Ambassador. I’m not either. He’s fine with it. So am I…

I’ve been the fortunate recipient of a Jimbaran Bay Suite at the Intercontinental Bali, the Diplomatic Suite at the Intercontinental Bangkok, a Terrace Suite at the Mark Hopkins, many 1300 square foot suites at the Willard, suites at the Intercontinental Atlanta, and on and on.

Sadly the program is being reined in a bit. Royal Ambassador upgrades seem more limited lately as part of an attempt at standardization. The Intercontinental Le Grande in Paris no longer provides club lounge access (the Mark Hopkins long ago stopped). Free Weekend Night certificates are no longer valid when purchasing suites. Sure, the mini-bar is still free, but they’re revisiting the terms of the program in 2010…

This has long been the best elite level offered by any hotel chain. I suppose with downgrades in the program (not to mention in my own status!) the best option is Starwood Platinum. At least there suite upgrades remain in the terms and conditions of the program, though no one offered suites as consistently — or the kind of specialty suties (to use Starwood’s language for the suites that Platinums don’t get upgraded to!) — that Intercontinental Royal Ambassador did.

If I’m missing any ‘special’ programs out there I’d sure love to know.

Through May 14, United is offering roundtrip coach awards to Europe for 40,000 miles. They just upped the price from 50,000 to 55,000 January 1. But times are tough, seats are empty, and United is betting they’ll stay that way at least until the “usually-busy-in-back” transatlantic summer season.

The offer is valid between the U.S. (excluding Hawaii) and Canada and the following cities in Europe:

Amsterdam (AMS), Brussels (BRU), Frankfurt (FRA), Geneva (GVA), London (LHR), Moscow (DME), Munich (MUC), Paris (CDG), Rome (FCO), and Zurich (ZRH).

The award must be booked online and only United flights are eligible.

Last week I reported on the introduction of a new premium Hilton co-branded American Express credit card.

An application for the card and details are now online.

There are several reports so far of existing Hilton cardholders calling American Express and upgrading their current card, sans credit pull. There’s at least one report of a customer service agent denying such a request, saying that a new application is required, though I assume this is a case of “when you don’t get the answer you want, hang up and call again.”

Some otherwise strong cardholders have already been denied the card through new applications, ostensibly because they already hold too many open American Express products (or perhaps they have too much open credit with American Express — though in my past experience Amex would tend to approve a card application and just reallocate credit lines to provide credit to the newly opened card).

It remains to be seen whether folks converting their current card will get the promised bonus (of points beyond what were previously received as a signup bonus) though I assume they will — at least after some prodding.

Meanwhile it is also not completely clear whether any spending retroactive to the beginning of the year will count towards the new credit card’s $40,000 spending threshold for earning Hilton Hhonors diamond status. I assume the spending will not count, contra the advice received from several Amex reps, or at least I would take the cautious approach and ensure sufficient spending to earn the status without reaching back to the beginning of the calendar year for spend. Dimaond status is really the key selling point of the card, which comes with an annual fee and more bonus points for Hilton hotel spend.

Sadly it is no longer possible to reallocate credit lines on a self-service basis online. I plan to upgrade my existing (free) Hilton American Express to the new Surpass card with the intention of earning Diamond status strictly on spend. However I will need to reallocate some available credit away from my Starwood American Express card in order to do so. (Mind you I wouldn’t put a single dollar over that $40,000 in spend intentionally, although unanticipated Hilton spend would of course continue to go onto the card for the 9 Hhonors points per dollar spent with the brand.)

One Mile at a Time expects full lounge reciprocity between United and Continental, and predicts that’ll mean free drinks in United’s Red Carpet Clubs.

I believe lounge reciprocity makes sense and will happen, I’ve predicted it in the past. But I’m going to part company on the free drinks.

The assumption is reasonable, “If United and Continental have lounge reciprocity, doesn’t United have to offer a quality product closer to par with Continental’s?”

However, if they do have lounge reciprocity, it doesn’t really matter what the United product looks like. People will either buy the lounge membership of the program they’re associated with (lazy consumers) or go with the lower price. Either way, they have access to United’s lounges, whatever those lounges provide.

Besides, if United was going to improve amenities the rational thing to have done would have been to announce the improvements at the same time as the hefty $100 price increase! It makes no sense to raise price and then later offer new amenities. The only way to explain this would be stupidity (which I really can’t bet against).

While it’s certainly possible that United could provide cocktails free of charge in their lounges (and I haven’t spoken with United about — I suppose I really should at least make a call to sniff around before making baseless predictions), I never bet on a product improvement from United, at least given current management.

They launch initiatives to great fanfare and then scale back or delay. The new business class retrofit has gone slowly, and where’s the enhanced soft product we were promised – especially the improved meals? How well has p.s. service between New York-JFK and San Frnacisco/Los Angeles been sustained? (Hint: very very badly.)

So I agree on lounge reciprocity, and hope to be proven wrong but would bet against free drinks in Red Carpet Clubs.

Via Frugal Travel Guy, this FatWallet post shows you how to get 1000 free American Airlines miles for signing up for the AAdvantage frequent flyer program.

1) Become a member/sign-on on www.mycokerewards.com

2) Click on “Rewards and Sweeps”

3) Click on “Browse By Points”

4) Click on “25 and Under”

5) Listed under 0 points, 1000 American Airlines AAdvantage Miles

FREEBIE
=======
1000 American Airlines AAdvantage Miles

check out website for complete details.
New American Airlines AAdvantage Miles Members only.

United has finally posted their response on Flyertalk to the issue of Starnet blocking (for background see here and here, among many other posts — it’s United’s practice of denying members the ability to book award seats that are being offered by its partners, something no other Star Alliance airline does).

United says they spend enough money on partner awards and don’t want to spend more. They provide enough benefits and you should be happy with that, darnit! (I’m paraphrasing, but I think this is actually a fair rendition, read the response for yourself.)

United says their agents aren’t intentionally misleading customers when they explain that such and such airline isn’t offering award seats, rather than United is denying their ability to book the seat that’s being offered. Our agents are stupid and don’t know what they’re talking about when it comes to inventory! Of course no one claims that the agents are intentionally misleading, rather United has told untruths to their agents about what’s going on.

Somehow every other Star Alliance program manages to offer award seats made available by their partners to their members, without any blocking. And United has just massively increased the number of miles needed to redeem for their best awards. Mileage Plus sells these miles — to their credit card partner Chase, to every other entity that awards miles. They take in revenue and they buy seats. They just want the revenue, without having to buy the seats.

United says they have no plans to change this practice. And I’ll repeat my advice that United Mileage Plus is a good program for those who fly 100,000 miles a year. They offer generous upgrades (that of late have been increasingly difficult to confirm in advance). But it makes no sense whatsoever to credit non-flight miles to this program, when other Star Alliance airlines like US Airways and Air Canada offer more advantageous award charts and make all of their partners’ award seats available for redemption.