Can you book or change flights into a weather advisory?

One of the blogs I've read most faithfully over the years is Delta Points. Like René, I'm more or less hopelessly in love with Delta as an airline, and have more or less hopelessly given up on Skymiles as a loyalty program (as opposed to a convenient way to travel the world for next to nothing).

One of the things I admire about René is his dedication to booking "low"-level Delta award tickets, and willingness to do anything and everything to get flights, dates and routings that work for his schedule.

And that's why I thought of him when contemplating today's question.

Delta's proactive approach to developing weather situations

Until René started blasting his Twitter and RSS feeds with every Delta weather advisory, I had never paid much attention to the little box on the bottom of Delta's homepage notifying visitors of strikes, unrest, and weather disruptions:

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New York City and Philadelphia are affected by inclement weather

As it happens, I'm headed to New York City tomorrow for a long weekend visiting family and friends, and while my outbound ticket is nonstop, my inbound flight connects in Detroit. Yesterday afternoon, I called in to Delta to request my upgrade (my upgrades are sometimes not requested when I book through Delta.com), and thought I'd ask if the inclement weather would allow me to change from my current, indirect, flight to a direct one.

Unfortunately my return flight on the 15th falls outside of the window of affected dates, June 11-13, so the representative wasn't able to help me.

But then I got to thinking.

Can you book or change flights into a weather exception?

I got to thinking because I'm a Platinum Medallion with Delta, which I regularly claim is the best Medallion status because it gives you free award changes and cancellations. That makes it easy to lock in "low"-level availability when it's available, even if you can't find availability on every leg right away. Plus you can make backup reservations hoping that revenue ticket prices will go down before you actually need to fly.

As the storm advisory helpfully explains:

"Even if your flight is not canceled, you may make a one-time change to your ticket without fee if you are scheduled to travel to, from, or through the following destination(s) on Delta, Delta Connection®, or Delta-coded flights during the specified time periods listed below."

Since I'm a Platinum Medallion, I wondered if I could change my return flight to a low-level flight during the affected dates, then take advantage of the weather advisory to change my ticket back to the original date — but now on a nonstop flight.

Unfortunately, when this occurred to me I was already within the 3-day window when online changes are impossible, and I didn't really feel like trying to convince a phone representative to let me game their system.

Conclusion

I am still curious, however, so next time a weather advisory pops up more than 3 days out, I'll be giving this a shot.

Do any of my readers have experience either deliberately or accidentally taking advantage of a weather-advisory-related change to improve a reservation, without actually changing your plans?

What's a Travelocity hotel gift card?

Moving house is always a stressful experience, but as a travel hacker there are particular advantages and disadvantages to moving to a new community.

The disadvantages are obvious: back in New England I had a group of well-trained cashiers at all my local haunts. That streamlined my daily routine and saved me time and stress convincing each cashier to try transactions that I already know will go through.

However, there are advantages to a move as well. For example, my routine in New England was limited to the small set of stores within walking distance of my apartment. The amount of money I was spending on a daily basis might arouse suspicion, and the longer I continued using the same store locations, the more likely a cashier was to start to connect the dots.

The biggest advantage is the one I wrote about here: a new locale means new store types, different products, and new opportunities.

I'm already excited by some of the options available in my new community, but today I want to write about a product I spotted just yesterday that may or may not be lucrative for some readers: Travelocity hotel gift cards.

$25 off 2-night stays

Like all good scams, Travelocity hotel gift cards are needlessly complicated. The card I found at a local gas station cost $25, and offered $50 off stays of two or more nights, as long as the price before taxes was $150 or more. In the ideal use case for these gift cards, you would get a $25 discount on a two-night stay that cost exactly $150 before taxes. Assuming taxes of 10%, you'd pay $140 for a $165 stay, for a discount of about 15%. Naturally, the more expensive the day, the smaller your discount will be.

Since you have to book your stay through the Travelocity Incentives website, you won't earn hotel points or elite night and stay credits for your reservation. Since hotel stays are by far the least efficient method of earning hotel points, this isn't the end of the world, but be aware of the issue.

Worth it?

While at first glance a $25 discount, even given the stay and price requirements for use of these cards, seems like a no-brainer, especially for non-chain properties or stays at chains you don't pursue status with (Best Western, anyone?), there is an additional problem: once you're willing to forego hotel rewards by booking through an online travel agency, you have other options.

For example, the Welcome Rewards program of Hotels.com rebates 10% of your pre-tax hotel cost in the form of a free night after 10 nights booked through them (with the value of the free night capped at the average nightly rate for your 10 paid nights). For many stays, that rebate will be worth more than the $12.50 per night discount offered by Travelocity on stays of exactly two nights.

If you're willing to work a little harder at it, Priceline's Name Your Own Price engine can still offer huge discounts on opaque bookings (where you don't find out the hotel until you pay). 

Conclusion

While it may have limited appeal for the reasons given above, I wanted to bring these gift cards to my readers' attention for those cases when, while making a two-night reservation, you realize the nightly rate happens to be exactly $75. In such circumstances I'd strongly consider popping down to the gas station and picking up a Travelocity hotel gift card.

American and US Airways award discounts

As I've mentioned, in January I was approved for both the Citi Platinum Select / AAdvantage World MasterCard and Barclaycard US Airways MasterCard. Having met the minimum spending requirements for both cards, I paid them off and stuck them in a drawer.

Of course, now I've got all those miles on my hands! Since I have an expensive domestic roundtrip coming up in March, I thought I'd check out what kind of award availability the airlines had on the dates I needed (hint: not much!).

That got me to wondering about the award discounts offered by the two airlines to their co-branded credit card holders. I found it intensely confusing, so I thought I'd throw up a quick summary in case any of my readers recently signed up for the same cards.

American Airlines: 10% mileage rebate & reduced mileage awards

There are two kinds of discounts you get as a Citi / AAdvantage cardholder. First, there's a 10% mileage rebate on all the miles you redeem out of your account each calendar month, up to 10,000 total miles (on 100,000 in mileage redemptions). Second, there are "reduced mileage awards" which are offered to a changing list of (domestic) destinations throughout the year. That program is clearly decided to be as difficult to take advantage of as possible: you need to look up the eligible cities for each month, copy down the code, and input it when making your award reservation.

Oddly, the terms and conditions of the 10% rebate program don't even require these redemptions to be for flights, so if you find a good redemption for hotels or car rentals, or if you redeem your miles for an Admiral Club membership, you should receive the rebate on those redemptions as well (I don't know how this works in practice).

Finally, for bookings made through February 27 for flights through April 4, there's another active promotion whereby non-stop MileSAAver economy award flights between Los Angeles and cities in the continental United States, and all MileSAAver economy award trips between Las Vegas and cities in the continental United States cost 10,000 AAdvantage miles each way, instead of 12,500. The 10% mileage rebate should apply to the final (post-discount) cost of each flight.

US Airways: 5,000 mile award discount

When you're a Barclaycard US Airways cardholder in good standing, you are designated "Dividend Miles Select." As far as I can tell the only benefit of that "status" is that you receive a flat, 5,000 Dividend Mile discount on all US Airways-operated flights.

I'm not going to lie, I've been messing around on US Airways' website for the last hour and I cannot for the life of me get the 5,000 mile discount to apply to any award tickets. Presumably if I actually wanted to book an award I could call in and have a phone agent apply the discount.

Analysis

The added wrinkle in all this is that starting a few weeks ago, you've been able to use American miles to make award reservations on US Airways, and vice versa. That means that it's possible to receive a 10% discount on US Airways award reservations by making the reservation through your American AAdvantage account. So when deciding which account to make a reservation through, you need to ask yourself the following questions:

• Have I already received 10,000 miles through the AAdvantage rebate program this calendar year? If so, you won't receive any additional discount this calendar year.
• Is this award ticket operated entirely on US Airways aircraft? If not, it's not eligible for the 5,000 mile discount.
• If it is operated entirely by US Airways, is it more or fewer than 50,000 Dividend Miles? If it's more, you'll be better off using AAdvantage miles. If it's fewer, use your 5,000 Dividend Mile discount and save your rebate headroom for a more expensive redemption.

Finally, consider checked bag fees. The US Airways MasterCard famously does not include free checked bags, while the AAdvantage card does. American's website currently has the following helpful information:

"Q: Do the First Bag Checked Free Waiver and Group 1 Boarding (or Priority Boarding) benefits on select Citi®/AAdvantage® cards apply to US Airways flights?

"A: Not at this time. These benefits will not be available for travel on any US Airways flights, including any codeshare flights."

That means that if you're deciding specifically between American-operated and US-operated flights, booking the American flight with a 10% discount may be more economical than booking the US Airways flight with a 5,000 mile discount; it depends on whether the difference in miles is worth more or less than the $50 you'll pay roundtrip per first checked bag and $70 per second checked bag on US Airways.

Confused yet? Me too. Let me know in the comments if I'm missing anything obvious.

In all fairness: a successful Marriott LNF claim

Having written a perhaps-too-strongly-worded condemnation of best rate guarantees in the past, based on the fact that hotel chains are too slow to respond and are relentless in their quest to disqualify seemingly-eligible claims, I feel that I owe it to my readers to report on a successful "Look No Further" best rate guarantee claim I recently made with Marriott.

The Challenge

My mother e-mailed me a few days ago, saying that she had booked a cancelable, week-long reservation at a Courtyard Marriott in Portland, OR through Travelocity, since it was about $51 cheaper than the flexible rate she found on Marriott's website. She wrote me to ask whether she would earn points for the stay.

I told her she wouldn't earn Marriott Rewards points since the reservation was made through a third-party website, but that the amount she was saving was worth much more than the points she would earn on an eligible rate. Meanwhile, I sprung into action.

To make a Look No Further claim, I first made a refundable reservation on Marriott's website at the $169 (before taxes) Best Available Rate. After confirming the $118 Travelocity rate was still available, I then submitted a Look No Further request through Marriott's website.

The Problem

Looking through the cancelation policies for the two rates, I immediately noticed a problem. As I wrote to my mother:

The trouble is that that [Travelocity] rate has a cancellation of 4 pm February 7, while the “best available rate” at Marriott has a cancellation of 6 pm February 8. That’s the kind of difference that they typically use to deny a best rate guarantee claim.

So I told my mother to hold onto her Travelocity reservation while I waited to hear back from Marriott.

Success!

Imagine my surprise when about 5 hours later I opened my e-mail to see this message from Marriott:

We have reviewed your claim and have made the following modification to your reservation:

Rate: $88.72

That rate reflects the 25% discount Marriott gives on successful Look No Further claims.

Conclusion

I still think the best you can say for Best Rate Guarantees is that there's no harm in making a claim.

Be sure you make freely cancelable, non-prepaid reservations, and do your best to find rates that are as similar as possible with respect to room type and cancelation policies. Then, submit your claim and cross your fingers.

But don't rely on these guarantees being accepted, since there are still far too many ways the hotel chains can deny a claim, and you won't have any recourse if they do – except booking through the cheaper, third-party booking channel!

Changes to Ultimate Rewards Mall earning

Last April I wrote about one of my favorite double dips when purchasing paid airline tickets:

If you have a Chase Ultimate Rewards-earning credit card, you have access to the Ultimate Rewards Mall, which allows you to earn bonus Ultimate Rewards points on purchases made through online travel agencies, or OTAs.  You can earn 1 bonus point per dollar spent at Expedia, Priceline, or Orbitz and 2 bonus points per dollar spent at Travelocity or Hotwire.

Unfortunately, both Travelocity and Hotwire, the two online travel agencies I cited as earning 2 bonus Ultimate Rewards points per dollar, have decreased their earning rate to 1 point per dollar, at least through my Chase Freedom and Sapphire Preferred Ultimate Rewards portals (the different Ultimate Rewards portals can have different earning rates at the same merchants, although it isn't that common).

Whether this changes your flight-booking calculus depends on your situation:

• If you book your paid tickets through Travelocity using the Barclaycard Travelocity Rewards American Express card, that's still probably your best bet since it earns a 6% rebate on purchases made through Travelocity, and the 1 Ultimate Rewards point is just icing on the cake;
• If you don't have a Travelocity Rewards credit card, then you may want to book through Expedia, who operate their own rewards program. Unfortunately, that program is not very lucrative;
• Finally, now that all the online travel agencies earn just 1 bonus Ultimate Rewards point, you may want to consider booking using the Ultimate Rewards booking engine. While you'll still only earn 1 bonus Ultimate Rewards point per dollar, you're much more likely to actually receive that point without having to fight Chase for it.

That last point is worth considering if you've had trouble getting bonus Ultimate Rewards points to post correctly, as I have occasionally in the past when clicking through to Travelocity.

Reminder: Alaska's Baggage Service Guarantee

I've written before that I think most hotel "best rate guarantee" policies are a hoax: as great as they sound in theory, in practice the hotel has every incentive to respond as slowly as possible, almost always ensuring (in my experience) that the better rate is no longer available. When it is, they'll comb through the rate details to find minor differences in room type or cancellation policy.

I say that just as preface to the fact that today I had the chance to take advantage of Alaska Airline's Baggage Service Guarantee, and it was a really great customer service experience. Flying into Boston's Logan airport this evening just ahead of the winter storm crashing down on the East Coast, I headed to baggage claim and waited for 10 or 15 minutes with no sign of our bags.

Remembering that upon arrival in Lihui back on December 23rd the flight attendant had announced that our bags were guaranteed to be on the baggage carousel within 20 minutes of arrival, I checked the Alaska Airlines iPhone app to see what our official time of arrival was. We had been recorded as arriving at 6:11 pm, and since 6:31 had just ticked by, I walked over to the Delta baggage services office (which also handles Alaska Airlines baggage issues at Logan), and asked the woman behind the counter if she handled Baggage Service Guarantee cases. She said yes, checked the flight's arrival time, and handed me 2 vouchers, each good for a $25 Alaska discount code or 2,500 Mileage Plan miles (I took the miles, natch).

Now, because of the inclement weather, I wouldn't have been at all surprised if the baggage services attendant had refused to give me the vouchers, since the terms and conditions state:

Alaska Airlines reserves the right to suspend the Baggage Service Guarantee in the event of airport baggage system malfunction, severe weather, or other conditions out of the airlines' control that prohibit timely baggage delivery.

So I thought it was terrific that she didn't make a fuss about handing them over. When I returned with them in hand my travel partner told me, "now I understand: travel hacking is just knowing stuff other people don't know."

One last note on these vouchers: I was able to redeem both my own and my partner's voucher for miles into my Mileage Plan account, so you aren't restricted to one voucher per person, per qualifying event.

More free Gogo inflight wireless

Back in June Blackberry sponsored a promotion  offering free inflight internet access to their customers on Gogo-equipped flights. It was a really useful promotion, since they verified you were a Blackberry user based on your browser's "user agent," which is easily spoofed.

Well, Gogo is back at it again, this time with a promotion sponsored by Allstate. They're offering 30 minutes of free in-flight internet on weekend flights on users' "mobile devices," i.e. smartphones. I have to assume this promotion applies on a per-flight basis, so you should be able to get 30 minutes of wifi per flight, not per weekend.

If you are actually using the internet on your mobile phone, then enjoy! There's no need to hack this promotion.

However, I believe that they're almost certainly verifying your device type this time the same way they did during the last promotion: based on your browser's "user agent." That means if you want to enjoy 30 minutes of free wifi on your laptop, instead of or in addition to your smartphone, you should be able to use the same technique as last time to "spoof" a smartphone browser and get your 30 minutes of access.

I'm taking my next Gogo-equipped flight on October 11, and I'll post an update when I land verifying that this hack works.

Buying points: when it makes sense

My regular readers know I have a pretty straightforward approach to miles and points valuation: the least valuable point is the one you don't use. That's why even though I earn hundreds of thousands of points through credit card signup bonuses and manufactured spending, my points balances are often embarrassingly small. 

A good example of this is my Delta Skymiles account, where I noticed today that I only have about 36,000 Skymiles, not even enough for a coach ticket to Europe! And that's despite the fact that I do about 90% of my paid domestic flying on Delta. How did I end up so Skymiles-broke? Because I aggressively look for opportunities to redeem my Skymiles. In addition to my current 100,000 Skymile business class trip to Prague, in the last few months I've booked a 25,000 Skymile domestic award for Labor Day weekend and a 32,500 Skymile domestic award (outbound low-level leg, inbound medium-level leg). All those tickets offered 1.8+ cents per Skymile, so I didn't think twice about redeeming my Skymiles instead of spending cash.

However, sometimes this puts me in a tough position when a situation comes up where I need more miles or points than I have banked in one program.  For example, on my way back from Prague to the States I planned to stay at the Courtyard Marriott Prague Airport, which is about a 3 minute walk from check-in at Ruzyně (now Václav Havel International Airport), and would let me sleep in the day of my departure. This property is one of the great values in the Marriott system: a Category 2 property, costing just 10,000 Marriott Rewards points per night, that can have a nightly rate of over $150 (although rates are much lower on weekend nights).

Unfortunately, even though in April I received the Chase Marriott Rewards Premier card, I had already used the free night and bonus points at the Courtyard Portland City Center back in July for my brother's wedding. My remaining balance: 6,500 Marriott Rewards points.

Figuring I was getting slightly more than 1.5 cents per point, I transferred 4,000 Ultimate Rewards points from the flexible Ultimate Rewards account I have through my Chase Sapphire Preferred card. And then when I went to book my room, I realized my mistake: Marriott Rewards allows you to buy points at 1.25 cents each: I could have purchased the same 4,000 Marriott Rewards points for just $50, and kept my 4,000 flexible Ultimate Rewards points.

Why was this a mistake? Because flexible Ultimate Rewards points are worth a minimum of 1.25 cents each when used to book paid travel.  When transferred to a program like Amtrak Guest Rewards, where the rewards chart is wildly lucrative, they can be worth from 5 to 6 cents each, and with United or Hyatt they'll usually be worth around 2 cents each.

Instead, I could have paid $50 for 4,000 Marriott Rewards points and emptied my Marriott Rewards account without touching my Ultimate Rewards account. Given the potential value of those Ultimate Rewards points, that was the correct move.

Know your hotel promotions

For those travelers who are truly loyal to just one airline or hotel chain, and those whose booking decisions are made by a corporate travel department, there's not much that can be done to squeeze out the maximum value from paid travel: register for promotions, always give your membership number with your bookings, and if possible, use a co-branded credit card or one which bonuses travel purchases.

For the broad swathe of leisure and business travelers, however, who do have the ability to control or influence which travel providers they use, maximizing the rebate value of the points earned during paid stays is an essential part of the travel hacking lifestyle. And if you don't know your hotel promotions, you will miss out on opportunities for big savings.

Here's an example I ran into just yesterday. Taking advantage of my new Level 3 status with Pointshound , I was searching for an upcoming one-night stay in Pittsburgh.

The cheapest room on Pointshound was a $64.11 Travelodge.  I naturally scrolled down to the first "Double Up" eligible room, which was a $92.75 Four Points by Sheraton, which would earn 158 Starwood Preferred Guest points (2 points per dollar on the $79 base rate, since I don't have elite status with Starwood) and 250 United MileagePlus miles through Pointshound. It's unclear to me whether I'd also earn 79 Delta Skymiles through their "Crossover Rewards" benefit with Starwood, but I wouldn't count on it, since I find that benefit rarely posts correctly.

The point is, this isn't a very tough call: 158 Starwood points are worth maybe $3, 250 United miles are worth maybe $5. But I would be paying $28.64 more in order to earn them! If I were on my honeymoon, I'd splurge for the nicer hotel, but I'm just staying the night in Pittsburgh on a road trip west.

However, before I made the booking, I checked out my Hotel Promotions page to see if there were any Starwood promotions that would change the value proposition. And sure enough, I found that I had written:

Earn double Starpoints on all eligible stays from May 1 through July 31, 2013, at more than 1,000 participating Starwood hotels and resorts worldwide.

Plus, get 500 additional bonus Starpoints for each eligible booking made through our spg.com mobile site, the SPG App for iPhone, or the SPG App for Android — and that's at all our more than 1,100 hotels and resorts in the SPG program.

Register here, and find the (long) list of non-participating properties here.

So instead of earning 158 Starpoints on my base rate, I'd earn 316, plus a 500 Starpoint booking bonus. Suddenly I'm looking at about $16 worth of Starpoint earning, plus the Delta Skymiles I'll earn by booking through Starwood. And I was even able to reserve a AAA rate through Starwood that saved me a couple bucks on the reservation (sometimes these rates are also available through Pointshound). If I were on the hunt for elite status with Starwood, I'd also value the elite night and stay credits I'll earn.

In short: hotel promotions can radically shift the value proposition when comparing hotel prices. 

I'll give just one more example. Marriott is currently running one of their regular promotions whereby you can earn a free night after 2 paid stays, and another free night after another 2 paid stays. Those free nights can be redeemed at any Category 1-5 property (details may vary slightly depending on which version of the promotion you are targeted for).  That means that for your first 4 paid stays with Marriott, you have to consider any "premium" you're paying over a non-chain hotel the cost of 50% of a free night. If a stay with Marriott were $40 more expensive than my next hotel choice, I would book that Marriott stay in a heartbeat: $80 all-in for a night at a Category 5 Marriott is an absolute steal (unfortunately the cheapest Marriott in Pittsburgh was $126: only $39 more than the Starwood property I booked, but I'd be forgoing 816 Starpoints and a handful of Skymiles – too high a price for 50% of a Marriott free night certificate.

Know your hotel promotions: it might just save your money. 

How long does it take to get a refund from United?

I have no idea.

Last month I wrote a paean to Delta Airlines in response to Gary's rhetorical question of "who still flies Delta?" and in passing mentioned that,

every flight I've flown on pre-merger Continental and pre- and post-merger United have been absolutely abysmal. The cabins are dim and unpleasant, the flight attendants are apologetic at best and rude at worst. I'm graciously leaving unmentioned the libertarian capitalist fantasies expressed by United CEO Jeff Smisek in almost every issue of their inflight magazine.

Meanwhile, it looks like Gary's on board after all.

Which brings me to the question I asked above: How long does it take to get a refund from United? Back on June 6, I was scheduled to fly to Portland, OR, for my brother's bachelor party. I was connecting in Newark from a Commutair DBA United Express flight, which was blocked at 1 hour 28 minutes, but is actually only about 40 minutes wheels up to wheels down. I was scheduled to have a 30 minute layover in Newark. When I checked in online for my flight, I saw that there were first class upgrades available for $75 and 20,000 United miles. Since flying on United is unbearable, I thought I'd treat myself and splurge for the upgrade.

Cut to me sprinting down Newark's C terminal and arriving at my gate just as the agent closes the door.

Fine; I scheduled a tight connection, I didn't make it. No big deal. After waiting in United's customer service line for 90 minutes, I was given meal and hotel vouchers and checked into economy for the first non-stop flight to Portland the next morning. 

And then I started waiting for my refund. And waited.

According to United's website, 

In some cases, such as a last-minute change of aircraft or an irregular operation, you may be reaccommodated in a seat other than the one you originally selected. In most cases, you will be issued a new boarding pass. If you were not reaccommodated in a seat with similar or greater value, and you were issued a new boarding pass, the fees paid for the seat will automatically be refunded. If you were not issued a new boarding pass, please complete all fields in the form below to request a refund.

After a week of waiting, I completed the refund request form. After another week, I called to request a refund. And today (3.5 weeks after my missed connection), I was told that my refund would appear on my credit card within 3-5 business days.

Great. But what about my 20,000 miles? The agent explained that she only handled the cash portions of refunds; if I wanted my miles refunded, I'd need to call MileagePlus directly. 

Which brings me to my answer: I have no idea how long it takes to get a refund from United. After all, Smisek is trying to run a business, not an airline, and there's no money in giving people refunds!