Tag Archives: Travel

Work from Home Diary 1: Cancelling My Ireland & Kauai Trips

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Good morning everyone, I hope your week is going well.  These are very uncertain times and I have difficulty finding motivation to write about anything travel related.  Therefore, I decided to share my feelings in a series of Work from Home Diary posts.  Feel free to share your work from home feelings in the comments section below.

First of all, I am very fortunate that I work for a company where we have the ability to work from home.  My heart goes out to everyone affected in the retail industry, travel/hospitality industry, restaurant/bar industry and many other industries that are affected by the coronavirus.

Last week, my company gave us the option to work from home or go into the office. I decided to work from home the entire week.  I’m used to working from home a few days a week, but working from home 5 days in a row takes a toll (both mentally and physically).  In my next diary post, I will share how I am doing in week 2.

Laura and I were supposed to fly to Ireland last Friday (March 13) for a week for her spring break (she is an assistant principal).  On Wednesday evening (March 11), the Europe travel ban was announced and we decided to cancel our Ireland trip.  I cancelled our Aer Lingus flights booked with British Airways Avios, hotel awards booked at Hyatt and Radisson Blu, Hertz rental car, and a few Expedia activities.  Canceling everything online only took a few minutes and thankfully everything resulted in a full refund, with the exception of the $55 cancellation fees per person charged by British Airways (I called to see if they could be waived, but it was not possible). Continue reading →

Stuck at Home? Listen to Grant on the Saverocity Observation Deck Podcast

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Good morning everyone.  A few weeks ago, I was a guest on the Saverocity Observation Deck podcast.  We talked about my Ireland trip (now cancelled), my British Airways / Match.com love story, and what’s in my iPhone wallet.  The episode is ~40 mins for regular listeners or ~60 minutes if you are a Patreon paid subscriber (you will hear Laura make her podcast debut).  Listen to the episode on your favorite podcasting app or listen online here.  Have a great day everyone.

I Cancelled My Last Minute Trip to Hawaii [Rescheduled for June]

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Reposted on 3/17/20 at 7:30am

Updated 3pm PT on 3/14/20: I was planning on going to Kauai in March but have rescheduled my trip to Kauai for June.  I have cancelled / rescheduled all the reservations below.

Good afternoon everyone, I hope your Friday is going well.  As a sequel to yesterday’s post (I Cancelled My Trip to Ireland), we decided to go to Kauai instead for Laura’s spring break (we went to Kauai 2 years ago for Laura’s spring break as well).  I checked flights from the Bay Area to Hawaii and flights were in the $100-$130 price range each way to all the Hawaiian Islands.  Prices were so cheap that it was a better deal to pay for flights than to book award tickets.

Laura had ~52K Southwest Airlines Points in her account, so we booked 2 roundtrip tickets from Oakland (OAK) to Lihue, Kauai (LIH) using 50,292 SWA points and $22.40 in taxes/fees ($5.60 per person per flight).  About an hour later, I checked the flight prices and saw a price drop.  I immediately rebooked the SWA flight for free and saved 8,174 SWA points.  This morning, I checked the flights again and saw more price drops.  I quickly and easily rebooked those flights using the SWA app.  After the dust settled, our SWA flights now cost a total of 35,087 SWA points (a savings of 15,205 SWA points in ~12 hours).  I kind of feel bad that the prices keep dropping so dramatically (but I will keep checking the flight prices to see if they get any cheaper).

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I Cancelled My Trip to Ireland

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Good afternoon everyone.  Yesterday, after hearing about the Europe travel ban, we decided to cancel our trip to Ireland.  It’s disappointing but life is unpredictable right now.  Thankfully, most of the trip was booked with miles and points, so cancelling was easy.  I was able to cancel my Hyatt award stay and all 5 Radisson Blu award stays since I was outside the cancellation period and the hotel points were immediately redeposited to my accounts.   I cancelled my rental car reservation booked through Priceline.  I had purchased a few activities through Expedia and was able to cancel those as well.  I should receive the credit card refund in a few days.

Lastly, I needed to cancel my round trip SFO-DUB Aer Lingus award ticket booked with British Airways Avios.  Online, it shows a $55 cancellation fee per passenger.  I called BA and asked if they could waive the cancellation fee but was told that the flight is still operating as scheduled and that if the phone agent cancelled the reservation, there would be an additional $25 fee.  I decided to cancel the award ticket online and the BA Avios were immediately redeposited to my BA account.  The cash refund should arrive in the next 1-2 weeks.

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2020 Datapoint: AMEX Airline Fee Credit for American Airlines Posted in 7 Days

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Good morning everyone, I hope your weekend is going well (despite the daylight saving time change).  Last week, I wrote Use American Express Chat to Change Airline Fee Credit Airline Choice (Almost 100% Automated).  In that post, I showed you how you could easily change your airline choice for the American Express airline fee credit by using the AMEX chat feature.  In today’s post, I will share my experience getting the airline fee credit for a few American Airlines seat upgrades.  As you can see by this email from American Express, my airline choice was changed to American Airlines on 10:16am on February 29, 2020.

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