Tag Archives: American Express

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My Unlikely, But Entertaining 2018 Travel Predictions

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Greetings from Uyuni airport in Bolivia.  I have a few minutes before my flight, so I wanted to get this post published.  Sorry for the delay in posting this list, my crystal ball was in the shop for a tuneup. As you can tell from my 2017 travel predictions, I am wrong 99% of the time, so take these predictions with a grain of salt (that I took from the Salar de Uyuni salt flats in Bolivia).  Here are some of my highly unlikely, but entertaining travel predictions for 2018.  Enjoy!

Airlines

  • After the Virgin America merger, Alaska Airlines will add new routes to Mexico, Canada, and the Caribbean
  • Delta Airlines will introduce cash and miles award tickets, then American Airlines and United Airlines will follow suit
  • Southwest Airlines will increase their Transfarency by automatically keeping track of travel funds in each account
  • JetBlue will add new routes along the West Coast and maybe to Hawaii
  • Singapore Airlines will allow you to book United Airlines awards online
  • British Airways will bring back the 4,500 Avios award price in the United States

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Hotel Review: Bellagio Fountain View Room Upgrade & Fountain Music Channel

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Good morning everyone.  This past weekend, my girlfriend and I made a short trip to Las Vegas.  During the weekend, we visited 4 lounges (the SFO Centurion Lounge once, the LAS Centurion Lounge twice, and the OAK Escape lounge).  When we were not in a lounge, we spent most of our time at the Bellagio Hotel (there are a few MGM AMEX Offers ending soon, like $50 off $250).

During the online checkin process, I was presented with a few upgrade options from our standard”Run of House” room.  One of the upgrade options was to a Fountain View room for $50/night.  Since the Bellagio fountains were a big reason why we stayed at the Bellagio, I decided to surprise my girlfriend by upgrading us to a Fountain View room.  Our room was on the 20th floor and left of center looking at the fountains, Las Vegas Blvd and Paris Las Vegas across the street.  In this post, I will show you how to get the most out of your Bellagio Fountain View room in 5 easy steps.

Step 1: Rearrange the furniture (couch or chair) in the hotel room to get the perfect view of the fountains.

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American Express Cards Will No Longer Earn 2x Membership Reward Points on Uber Rides (Effective February 1)

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Updated 11pm PT on 1/4: This change affects all American Express cards, not just the American Express Platinum Card.

Good evening everyone.  I was reviewing my American Express Platinum Business Charge Card statement this afternoon and spotted this announcement.  Effective February 1, American Express Platinum cardholders will no longer earn 2x Membership Reward Points on Uber rides.  I believe this change affects all version of the Platinum Card.  I think this change has to do with the new Barclays Uber Visa Credit Card which earns 2% cash back on Uber rides.  A few months ago, Tonei wrote Lesson Learned: International Uber Rides Do Not Earn 2x Membership Reward Points, but international Uber rides haven’t earned 2x Membership Reward Points in a long time.  I looked all over my statement but could not find any more information about this announcement.

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Most of my 2017 Travel Predictions Were Wrong (Who Could Have Predicted That?)

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Good morning everyone, happy almost New Years Eve.  Earlier this month, Doctor of Credit wrote how bad travel bloggers are at making predictions (I came in last at 33% correct), but he only reviewed our credit card predictions.  I made a lot of other predictions in January 2017, so let’s see how good or bad my predictions were.  I covered airlines, hotels, credit cards, and MS.  I will put my thoughts in bold at the end of each prediction.

Airlines

  • Southwest seems bent on making the Companion Pass very difficult to get unless you fly Southwest every week.  I believe credit card signup bonuses will no longer count toward the Companion Pass and Southwest might kill the whole concept of the Companion Pass entirely or switch to a certificate program similar to the Alaska Airlines companion fare or Virgin America companion ticket.  Southwest Airlines did eliminate hotel transfers counting toward the Companion Pass, but credit card spend and sign up bonuses still count toward the Companion Pass.  I am also the proud companion on my girlfriend’s Companion Pass.
  • Other airline credit cards will adopt the Alaska Airlines companion fare (you pay full price and your companion pays up to $120) or the Virgin America companion ticket (you pay full price and your companion pays full price minus $150).  No, I don’t think any other airline added a companion fare as a credit card benefit.
  • American will introduce a basic economy fare class to compete/copy Delta and United.  Yes, I got this one right!
  • Alaska Airlines will introduce a new level of elite status (maybe MVP Gold 100K?)  No, Alaska Airlines MVP Gold 75K is still the highest elite level.
  • More airlines will get away from the 12,500 one way domestic ticket and start to introduce 5,000, 7,500, and 10,000 mile awards.  Yes, I think Alaska Airlines announced cheaper awards on shorter flights.
  • British Airways will kill the 4,500 Avios award band globally and possibly remove one of their lower award tiers.  No, 4,500 British Airways Avios tier is still available outside the US.
  • Singapore Airlines will allow us to book Star Alliance awards online, rather than calling in.  Partially true, but not rolled out completely.
  • Hawaiian Airlines will get bought by a low cost airline, Southwest Airlines or JetBlue.  No, no one bought Hawaiian Airlines.
  • We will see 1 or 2 more mileage matching promos, this time from a big legacy airline.  No, no mileage matching promo like the JetBlue / Virgin America match last year.
  • My ~20,000 Spirit Airlines miles will expire and I won’t care.  Sort of, my Spirit Airlines miles did expire, but I still shed 1 tear.

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Award Wallet Feature I Wish Existed: Keep Checking for Account Balance Changes

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Good afternoon everyone.  I dreamed this up a few days ago and thought it was worth sharing to see if anyone else would find this feature useful.  If you guys like this idea, I will share it with my friends Howie and Alexi at Award Wallet (sign up for your free Award Wallet account here).  Here is an example use case:  I needed to book a Singapore Airlines (SQ) award ticket for travel on United Airlines (UA).  I needed 35,000 SQ miles, but only had 744 SQ miles in my account.  Luckily, I have plenty of transferable point currencies, so I decided to transfer 25,000 Citi Thank You Points and 10,000 American Express Membership Reward Points to my Singapore Airlines account.  As I wrote in July 2015, transfer times from Chase UR, Citi TYP, AMEX MR, and SPG to SQ are not instant – most take ~24 hours to complete.

With that said, I made the transfers from Citi Thank You Points and American Express Membership Reward Points and then occasionally checked Award Wallet to see if the SQ miles posted.  Insert cheesy infomercial “THERE HAS GOT TO BE A BETTER WAY!”  Here is what the process currently looks like:

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