Tag Archives: Alaska Airlines

Tonei’s January Credit Card App-O-Rama Results

Posted on April 19, 2017 by Tonei Glavinic. 18 Replies

Buenos diás everyone. I’m not usually one for credit card App-O-Ramas, typically preferring to apply for credit cards one at a time when they have high bonuses, but at the end of January, I decided to throw caution to the wind and apply for five new credit cards in one day, from three banks: Banco Popular de Puerto Rico, Bank of America, and Chase.

Banco Popular de Puerto Rico

I finally decided to jump on the Banco Popular de Puerto Rico 60,000 Avianca LifeMiles offer that Grant wrote about in December. Like Grant, I also got instantly approved with a large credit line.

Image of the front of an Avianca LifeMiles Vuela Visa card with "Mr Grant Thomas" on the front. The numbers have been blacked out.

My card looks just like this, but it doesn’t have Grant’s name on it.

I paid my annual fee in February and made purchases on the card in March and April, but my LifeMiles balance is still zero. I emailed customer service to ask about it but got an automatic reply to call for assistance – when I did so, the representative (who I could barely hear) just said it takes 6-8 weeks for miles to post and that I should keep an eye on my balance at lifemiles.com. I’ll also email LifeMiles customer support and see if they can check whether I might have a duplicate LifeMiles account. Continue reading →

What’s on my Mind: Tucson, Orange County, San Diego and my March App-O-Rama Results

Posted on April 6, 2017 by Grant. 30 Replies

Good morning everyone, happy ~~Friday~~ Thursday! I’ve had a pretty busy week this week: Monday I was watching NCAA March Madness Final (bummer the Zags lost); Tuesday I went to see Bassem Youssef (the Egyptian Jon Stewart) speak at UC Berkeley; Wednesday I got $202 loge/mezzanine tickets to see Hamilton in SF; and tonight I am flying to Tucson for a wedding this weekend. Even though I haven’t had much time to write this week, I have a few blog posts brewing in my mind. Before I get to what’s on my mind, I wanted to share some travel plans for the rest of April.

Tucson, AZ (Friday-Sunday April 7-9) for a wedding. Anyone have any recommendations for restaurants, bars, hikes, or other activities that are close to Tucson?
Orange County, CA (Friday-Sunday April 14-16) for Easter weekend. I will do an OC miles and points meetup on Saturday afternoon, stay tuned for more details.
San Diego, CA (Saturday-Sunday April 29-30) for fun. I am seeing my friend/writer Shelli and organizing a SD miles and points meetup on Saturday or Sunday, stay tuned for more details.

A few weeks ago, I wrote Which 10 Credit Cards am I Considering for my March App-O-Rama? In that post, I shared the credit cards I was considering and you guys gave me some good feedback. I don’t have all the credit cards in the mail, but I have a good idea of which credit cards were approved and which ones were denied. Continue reading →

Which 10 Credit Cards am I Considering for my March App-O-Rama?

Posted on March 23, 2017 by Grant. 33 Replies

Good morning everyone, happy Thursday. My last App-O-Rama (where I applied for several new credit cards at the same time) was back in mid December 2016. I usually wait 3+ months between App-O-Ramas, so the time has come to start my next round of credit card applications. I am going to list the credit cards I have in mind in the order in which I will probably apply for them. If you have any feedback on my strategy or think I am missing or applying for the wrong credit cards, please leave a comment below. Without further ado, let’s begin…

1. American Express SPG Business Credit Card – 25,000 SPG points after spending $5,000 in 90 days and an additional 10,000 SPG points after spending $3,000 in 120 days. No annual fee the first year, then $95 in the second year.

With the impending merger with Marriott, this might be my last opportunity to apply for the SPG business credit card. I can’t pass up this opportunity. 35,000 SPG points are worth ~$700 in hotel nights and airfare (and possibly much more).

2. Bank of America MERRILL+ Credit Card – 50,000 points after spending $3,000 in 90 days. No annual fee.

Doctor of Credit reports that you can apply for this credit card over the phone. 50,000 points is worth $500 cash or up to $1,000 toward airfare. Continue reading →

Comparing the Alaska Airlines $120 Companion Fare Code vs. Virgin America $150 Companion Discount Code

Posted on March 21, 2017 by Grant. 5 Replies

Yesterday, the news broke that you could now redeem your Alaska Airlines companion fare code for flights on Alaska Airlines and Virgin America. That is great news, especially if you have 1 or more companion fare codes and if Virgin America serves the routes you want to fly. I’ve written about the Alaska Airlines Companion Fare Code a few times:

The overlooked part of the news from yesterday is that Virgin America has their own less-than-amazing companion discount code. No one ever talks about that code, but I am going to compare the Alaska Airlines companion fare code to the Virgin America companion discount code and show you which code is better.

First things first, if you have the Bank of America Alaska Airlines Visa Signature Credit Card (personal or business version), you will get the companion fare codes. To locate those codes, log into your Alaska Airlines account and click Valid under Discount and Companion Fare Codes. You will see all the companion fare codes listed, their expiration date (travel must be booked by that date) and the terms and conditions of the companion fare code.

Continue reading →

Google Flights Price Tracking, WOW Air KEF-SFO & JPMorgan Chase Ritz Carlton Travel Credit

Posted on March 9, 2017 by Grant. 11 Replies

Good morning everyone, happy Thursday. I just wanted to give a quick shoutout to everyone who attended the SF Travel Hackers March Meetup last night. I gave a presentation about my recent trip to Iguazu Falls, Argentina. I will work on getting that presentation turned into a blog post “soon”. In today’s post, I will show you how I used Google Flights to track a WOW Air flight from Reykjavik, Iceland (KEF) to San Francisco (SFO). I’ve always been interested in Iceland, and even more so after reading Whitney’s posts (Iceland & What I Wish I Had Known Before Going – Part 1 and Part 2).

I’ve been planning a trip to Iceland for the last few weeks and knew the dates I wanted to travel, but I just had to wait for the price to go down. One of the many great things about Google Flights is that you can track specific routes on specific days, and you can even track specific flights on specific days. I received the following email from Google Flights that the WOW Air flight I was tracking dropped from $469 to $263. Granted, this is not the cheapest possible WOW Flight I have ever seen, but the price was right for me so I jumped on the deal.