Tag Archives: Singapore Airlines

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My Experience Cancelling 2 International Business Class Awards: Avianca LifeMiles & Singapore Airlines

Good afternoon everyone, I hope your weekend is going well.  A few weeks ago, I had to cancel a few international business class awards due to a scheduling conflict, so I wanted to share the various cancellation processes, timelines, and fees involved.  If you find yourself in a similar situation, you will know what to expect from the process.  In this post, I will cover my experience cancelling award tickets with Avianca LifeMiles and Singapore Airlines.  You can read about my experience cancelling award tickets with Delta, Korean Air, and Air France / KLM.

90,000 Avianca LifeMiles for Air India Business Class (SFO-DEL): San Francisco, CA -> Delhi, India

I tried to cancel the award ticket on the Avianca LifeMiles website on April 2, but couldn’t find a cancellation page, so I called the LifeMiles customer service number (1-866-919-0081).  The rep informed me that there was a $200 cancellation fee.  Once that fee was paid, the 90,000 Avianca LifeMiles would be refunded within 72 hours and the taxes/fees would be refunded within 30 days.  Instead of paying with a credit card over the phone, Avianca sent me a link to pay with the subject line “Payment Instructions for your order” from the email address do-not-reply@worldpay.com.  I clicked the link and paid the $200 cancellation fee.

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Have You Read My Top Blog Posts from 2018?

Good morning everyone, happy New Year’s Eve!  What a crazy year it has been.  Based on Google Analytics numbers, here are the top 10 blog posts written in 2018 and the top 10 blog posts of the year (written before 2018).  If you have a favorite post of the year that is not listed, please let me know in the comments.  Without further ado, here is the first top 10 list:

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1: PSA: Do NOT Use Zelle or Venmo to Pay People on Craigslist, eBay or Strangers Online

I’m surprised my Zelle / Venmo PSA post was so popular, but I’m glad that the word got out. It’s important to know what kind of scams exist and how to avoid them. Learn from these mistakes to keep your money safe.

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How to Add Redemption Nominee to Singapore Airlines Account

Good morning everyone, happy Friday!  By the time you read this post, I will be flying down to La Paz, Bolivia for the start of my Central / South America trip.  A few weeks ago, I booked a flight for my brother to Maui, Hawaii.  The flight is in mid April and the cost of the ticket was kind of pricey ($500+), but luckily I found United Airlines award space for the flights he wanted.  Unfortunately, United Airlines charges 45,000 miles + $11.20 in taxes/fees for a roundtrip flight in economy.  Luckily, Singapore Airlines only charges 35,000 miles for the same roundtrip flight in economy to Hawaii.  In this post, I will show you how I easily booked an award ticket for my brother using Singapore Airlines miles and how adding him as a redemption nominee made the process even easier.

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

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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Singapore Airlines Partner Award Chart for Alaska Airlines Flights (Sweet Spots to Hawaii, Canada & Mexico)

Buenos dias everyone. As first reported by Scott at Travel Codex, Singapore Airlines’s Krisflyer loyalty program has released a partner award chart for flights on Alaska Airlines. It seems confusing at first, but once you understand the full picture, it makes more sense.

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Alaska’s route map is split into five zones:

  • Zone 1: West Coast
  • Zone 2: Mountain West and Canada
  • Zone 3: Midwest
  • Zone 4: East Coast, Southeast, Cuba, Costa Rica, and Mexico
  • Zone 5: Alaska and Hawaii

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