TProphet – Page 8

Don’t Be Frustrated By Baggage Friction

December 17, 2017December 17, 2017 TProphet0 comment

Until recently, the majority of airlines had baggage transfer agreements (with the notable exception of Southwest). What did this mean? Provided you weren’t flying Southwest (who did not and does not have agreements with any other airline), you could check in with the first airline in your itinerary and ask them to check your luggage all the way through to the final destination. This was even the case with airlines that weren’t partners (such as United and Delta) and on itineraries involving more than one ticket.

I’m not sure how the airline economics work, but apparently there is some cost involved when bags are transferred between airlines. Over the years, airlines have locked down baggage agreements to the point where the majority of the airline industry looks a lot more like Southwest than previously. The upshot? If your itinerary isn’t all on one ticket, you’re probably going to have to claim your bag and re-check it.

I had to re-check my bag in Phoenix to Seattle

I was just (unexpectedly) bitten by this problem by American Airlines. I’m flying American to Phoenix, and Alaska onward (on a separate ticket) to Seattle. Although American and Alaska are partners, American won’t always check a bag all the way through if you have more than one ticket on the itinerary. Sometimes they will, but it’s inconsistent. In fact, American won’t even necessarily check bags through all the way on their own airline anymore!

How can you be bitten by this problem? It can happen when you buy tickets through sites like Kayak, Momondo or Skiplagged. Many of these sites piece together an itinerary by booking a journey as separate tickets. After all, this can be significantly less expensive. My itinerary is a bit unusual, in that I’m combining an award ticket from Mazatlan to Phoenix with a paid flight from Phoenix to Seattle. However, the award ticket would have been expensive if I’d paid cash (it’s an international flight from Mexico during the shoulder season of a holiday period) and the paid flight was really cheap. It’s the same principle with paid tickets. A ticket from Seattle to Detroit via Chicago might be really expensive if you bought a through itinerary with American, but could be much less expensive if purchased as a Seattle-Chicago and Chicago-Detroit itinerary.

To punish you for saving money (there is really no other explanation I can see when only one airline is involved – if the intent is to charge you two bag fees, they could just collect them up front), American won’t check your bag all the way through. Instead, they’ll force you to claim your bag in Chicago and re-check it. This will require you to clear security again as well. There’s no good reason for this; it just introduces friction that doesn’t need to be there. What’s also odd is that this policy is inconsistent. American will allow you to combine a paid flight with an award flight booked with AAdvantage miles. However, they won’t allow you to combine a paid partner flight with an award flight, and they won’t allow you to combine a paid flight with an award booked on American through a partner (such as British Airways). And this is what just tripped me up. I assumed that the policy of combining a paid flight with an award flight would cover me, but it didn’t because the paid flight I’m taking is on Alaska Airlines (a partner flight) and the award flight I’m taking (on American) was booked with British Airways Avios.

Also bear in mind that I’m relatively expert at this stuff. Even I get tripped up sometimes. The average person, who doesn’t spend roughly 20 hours a week keeping on top of airline policies like I do, doesn’t have a chance.

What can you do? The only way to be (probably) sure that you’ll be able to check a bag all the way through to your destination is to book directly on an airline’s Web site and to book a ticket directly from your origin to your destination (without manual connections). Otherwise, build time into your schedule to claim and re-check your bags and re-clear security in connecting cities. It’s annoying, but not surprising. Full service airlines have been removing almost every last vestige of differentiation between themselves and low cost carriers. It’d be interesting to see low cost carriers go the other direction; when major airlines are creating so much friction that doesn’t need to be there, it stands to reason that they might see an opportunity for differentiation.

And of course, the other option? Travel light. None of this applies if you only have a carry-on bag!

Using Award Travel For Boring Trips

November 7, 2017 TProphet1 Comment

It’s November, and I need to take a trip to frigid Minneapolis next week. It’s a boring trip to a cold, boring city. I wasn’t particularly excited about going in the first place, and was even less excited when I saw the price. For the times of day I needed (it’s a tight schedule), I was looking at paying more than $600.

I need to fly out in the morning, fly back in the evening, it’s over a weekend – so I’m breaking all the rules of getting a cheap ticket. Cheap flights are the ones nobody wants to take, but if you want to take a flight at a good time of day it gets expensive in a hurry. Given that I went all the way to Fukuoka, Japan for under $600 it was pretty galling to see that the price for the schedule I wanted cost over $600!

The outbound cost over $316… adding insult to the injury of a 6:45AM flight.

…and the return cost almost $300!

Less desirable schedules were possible for considerably less money, but in this case “less desirable” meant flights where I’d lose two entire days on the ground. This meant that I’d have to extend my trip to frigid Minnesota in exchange for a lower fare, which to me was a non-starter.

I didn’t expect that, with barely more than a week until travel, I’d be able to find a good value traveling with miles. Airlines have gotten pretty good with revenue management and these days, they give away far fewer seats (one reason why using an award booking service like ours is worth considering). However, this trip illustrates that it’s always worth checking! The Delta flight that cost over $316 was available for just 12,500 SkyMiles in economy class. And the Alaska flight that I wanted was available for 12,500 Alaska miles in economy class.

On its own, this would have been a pretty good deal, delivering about 2.5 cents per mile in value for the Delta flight (more than double what The Points Guy says they’re worth) and about 2.4 cents per mile for the Alaska flight (a nice bump above the 1.9 cent per mile valuation). However, I was able to get even better value than this by using British Airways Avios to book the Alaska flight. I scored a massive haul of these earlier in the year, and the Avios award chart prices flights by distance and number of segments.

Minneapolis to Seattle is a nonstop flight (which is important, because British Airways Avios charges per flight to calculate the cost). And clocking in at 1,399 miles, this trip costs 10,000 Avios based on distance. I was able to net nearly 3 cents per mile in value for my Avios points, which I think is exceptionally good. It’s exactly double what Avios are commonly considered to be worth.

These tickets are in economy class. This isn’t some theoretical valuation based on a premium cabin ticket I’d never buy, it’s a flight I would have bought with cash (although in all fairness probably at less convenient times, on different airlines, and involving connections in order to save money). On the airlines I’m flying, I’ll be able to take advantage of credit card benefits to check a bag, and award tickets aren’t considered “basic economy” fares so I’ve been able to select my seats in advance. More importantly, though, I have been able to choose exactly the schedule that minimizes the amount of time I have to spend in Minnesota in November! And that’s the very best savings of all.

How To Use Miles To Escape From Irma

September 5, 2017September 5, 2017 TProphet0 comment

If you live in Florida, you’re probably looking at Irma and wanting to get out. However, a lot of other people already had the same idea and now flights are looking like this:

Southwest is sold out

Or this:

It’s available… if you can afford it

So what can you do if you want to escape the hurricane? Look at some other options.

For all flights, American Airlines is honoring its “last seat” pledge and making seats available to AAdvantage members at the “standard” price. These awards are very expensive, at 20,000 points. Normally I’d never recommend booking one of these, but this is actually solid value for an “hurricane flight” at over 2.7 cents per mile in value. As of this writing, there is still one seat available to each of Dallas and Chicago on 9/6/17.

Alternate airports

While most flights out of the primary South Florida regional hub of Miami are booked, there are still a few seats available on flights from Fort Lauderdale.

Non-US Locations

Another option to evacuate south Florida with points is with jetBlue TrueBlue points, but you’ll also have to leave the country. TrueBlue points can be redeemed at a fixed value toward flights. While most jetBlue flights are sold out, there are a few seats left on their Fort Lauderdale to Mexico flight. Don’t have any jetBlue points? They transfer instantly from American Express Membership Rewards.

When you need to leave the country immediately, jetBlue has you covered

Cash Deals

Last-minute walk-up fares are pretty expensive for international flights, but jetBlue is duking it out for supremacy with Aeromexico. Both forgot to raise their fares on this route during the hurricane crisis, so you can book the closely timed Aeromexico flight out of Miami for a little over $300 right now. This is one of the cheapest ways out of the region.

Another good way to fly is to look for codeshares on international carriers. Air Canada has a codeshare on a United flight from Fort Lauderdale to Los Angeles via Denver. If you can find it (I use Momondo for my searches) you might be able to get out for about $200, instead of $2,000.

Bank travel portals (for spending your bank points) aren’t a good way to get out right now. They are showing prices even higher than the airlines. It’s best to just pay cash if you want to get out and can’t use points another way.

General Advice

Look for routes off the beaten path. You might need to get creative with routings and look at places like Panama City, San Salvador or even Madrid as possible evacuation points. It’s already tough to get a ticket at all, so don’t waste time booking.

Airports are going to be a complete zoo so show up many hours before your flight. Don’t expect the airlines to be able to re-accommodate you if you’re late. They won’t have any flights. By this weekend, everything will be shut down.

How I’m Maximizing Distance Based Awards In 2017

August 30, 2017September 1, 2017 TProphet2 Comments

For a long time, most US airlines charged 25,000 miles for a saver level domestic round-trip award in economy class. This is a number that stayed the same for literally decades. Airlines cut availability of saver level awards, introduced additional higher level pricing tiers with more availability, and made one-way awards available, but one principle remained the same: with few exceptions, the price was–more or less–12,500 miles whether you were flying from Seattle to Portland, Oregon or Portland, Maine.

Some “hacks” were available, but they were limited. For example, British Airways Avios offered (and still offers) a distance-based chart that charges per flight. For short-haul flights of 650 miles or less, they charged just 4,500 miles (this award tier has been eliminated in North America, and now all flights up to 1,150 miles cost 7,500 miles). This is still great value, but it only applies on non-stop flights. Flights with a connection will cost you at least twice as much.

A nonstop flight from Seattle to Las Vegas costs 7,500 Avios. However, connecting in San Francisco will set you back 15,000 points!

Well, a lot has changed in 2017. Delta got rid of its award chart entirely, and there are now some great values on it if you know where to look (along with some terrible values too). Alaska massively revamped its award program, but was much more transparent with the changes than Delta. American got into the game by introducing a new short-haul award, and even United has an anemic offering in its award program.

Delta

A couple of years ago, I ended up with a massive haul of Delta points through a promo they ran with American Express. The only problem was using them. The Delta SkyMiles program has been much maligned over the years, and deservedly so. Delta was historically stingy with award availability, making it hard to use SkyMiles. Then they introduced an insanely complicated award chart with as many as five different pricing levels. Awards went from being almost impossible to obtain to available, but incredibly expensive.

Eventually, Delta got rid of its award chart entirely. Most people assumed that it would result in a price increase for most flights, and for awhile, that was true. While prices have gone up for many flights, they have–surprisingly–come down on a lot of flights too. There doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of rhyme or reason to it, but short-haul flights can be priced from 5,000 to 7,500 miles when booked in advance.

What’s more, the pricing may be loosely based on the revenue fare, but also seems to be based on demand for the flight. Seattle to Anchorage is a $140 paid flight, so redeeming SkyMiles yields a value of about 1.8 cents per mile.

Anchorage is a mid-haul flight of 1,449 miles – but it’s only 7,500 SkyMiles on select dates.

I am using my bank of SkyMiles for flights to Alaska (I recently redeemed 7,500 SkyMiles for a flight to Juneau) and for flights to Los Angeles (I just redeemed 5,000 points for a flight to LAX). In all cases, I have realized an equivalent cash value of over 2 cents per point, which is very good for SkyMiles.

American

American’s AAdvantage award chart is largely theoretical because there is so little award availability anymore. That being said, short-haul flights of 500 miles or less to the US or Canada are allowed for 7,500 miles.

If you’re stuck with a lot of AAdvantage miles and want to use them for short-haul flights within North America, focus on Canada. 500 miles can get you from most of the East Coast to Toronto or Montreal. These would often be very expensive flights otherwise. Given that American allows you to take a connection en route to your destination (while BA charges you per flight), this might be a better option if you can hold the overall distance traveled to under 500 miles.

United

United has, for many years, offered a short-haul award of 10,000 Mileage Plus points for up to 700 miles traveled. However, this just isn’t much of a savings over the 12,500 mile level for longer flights. Since the difference in cost is so small, the calculations really don’t change substantially versus a 12,500 mile saver level award. Generally speaking, United short-haul awards are poor value.

Alaska

Alaska Airlines revamped their award program at the beginning of this year. There was a lot of breathless coverage at the time along with a lot of silly hacks people published taking advantage of loopholes in the pricing engine (which have since been closed). While some of the changes were negative (the biggest being the loss of Delta as a redemption partner) others were largely positive, such as the move to a distance-based redemption chart. This exposed some sweet spots that have largely escaped the attention of mainstream travel blogs, but they didn’t escape my attention.

As good as short-haul awards are on Alaska, I haven’t personally been using them. First of all, they’re hard to come by because Alaska’s chart is variable. Although in theory, you can find awards at the lowest level published, in practice they’re hard to get:

Although you can find Alaska awards at the lowest levels, it’s not consistent.

For example, it’s under 700 miles from Seattle to Ketchikan. Good luck finding an award at the 5,000 mile level though. I did find a couple – on December 23, for example. Merry Christmas! These awards do exist, but a more common redemption level is 20k which is more in line with what flights to Ketchikan cost.

Unlike most programs, Alaska allows a stopover on a one-way award. This is such a valuable benefit that I always try to maximize it when using their program. However, adding in a stopover seems to consistently drive the price up to 12,500 miles (and this is guaranteed to happen when a partner is thrown into the mix). Accordingly, given my usage pattern and the flying I like to do, it really only makes sense to redeem Alaska miles for long-haul domestic awards in economy class or long-haul international awards in business class (with some exceptions; partner awards on American are also particularly good value off-peak).

Southwest

The Southwest chart isn’t distance based, but it’s worth pointing out that it can be highly competitive with distance-based airline award charts. Southwest awards are based on the price of the flight, not the distance traveled. However, for some flights, this creates a sweet spot. For example, flights from Seattle to Tucson are over 1,200 miles which would push an award into the mid-haul Avios chart (at 10,000 points required). However, Southwest regularly offers sale fares between the two markets and you can sometimes redeem Rapid Rewards points for much less. The same is true with flights to Phoenix and Los Angeles. These are very competitive markets and the fares are low, sometimes as low as $59 each way. With Rapid Rewards holding a pretty steady value of 1.7 cents per point (sometimes more, sometimes a bit less) it’s always worth comparing Southwest to an economy class short-haul distance based award. You may find that Southwest offers better value.

Combinations

One “sweet spot” I have found is also a risky one: combining multiple short-haul award flights. I’ll explain how I did this with my friend Boris on an itinerary to Mazatlan this December.

I am always on the lookout for new routes (since this often means award availability) and American Airlines (a British Airways partner) has recently increased their flying to Mexico via their regional partner Compass Airlines (which, oddly enough, has its roots in Delta-acquired Northwest Airlines). It’s 1,046 miles from Los Angeles to Mazatlan which puts the LAX-MZT flight in the 7,500 mile band with British Airways Avios. American’s flight from Mazatlan to Phoenix is also in the 7,500 mile Avios band, at 789 miles. So both flights are right in the “sweet spot” with the Avios program.

What’s more, these are expensive flights to a popular beach resort at a busy time of year. It’d cost over $500 to buy the tickets! Granted, there is quite a bit of tax built into the fare (which you have to pay in cash when booking with miles) but you can realize about 2.3 cents per mile in value when booking these flights in economy class.

Availability is always tough with American but Boris and I found two seats outbound from LA on December 8th. On the 16th, there wasn’t availability for two from Mazatlan to LA, but there was for one person, and there was another ticket available from Mazatlan to Phoenix (for one person) leaving an hour later. Boris was returning to Los Angeles, but I can connect back to Seattle just as easily through Phoenix so we agreed to split up on the return. So, here are what my flights look like, for just 15,000 Avios:

These short-haul flights cost just 15,000 Avios. They would have cost over $500 in cash.

Of course, I’m not starting my trip in LA, and I’m not ending it in Phoenix. I needed to book connecting flights. Unfortunately, there weren’t any available on the day of travel that would get me to Los Angeles in time, so I ended up flying a day earlier. For me, though, that’s actually fine. I have a lot of friends in LA, so I was happy to schedule an extra day there.

How did I do it? Delta. There was a 5,000 mile nonstop award between Seattle and LAX. This flight would have cost $106, so I got a very solid 2 cents per point.

For the return, I initially booked a Southwest award at a very solid 1.8 cents per point in value based on a $130 fare. However, this ultimately wasn’t great value, because Alaska Airlines put a flight on sale leaving at almost exactly the same time. I had a $75 e-certificate that was due to expire, and using this brought the fare down to under $25 in cash. Considering that I’ll earn 1107 miles on this fare, and I can regularly get 2.2 cents per mile in value from Alaska miles, the ticket is actually free–it’s actually a better deal than using points.

3,896 miles of flying–for just 20,000 points redeemed.

What’s the risk with a “hack” like this? The biggest one is on the return. If anything goes wrong with my flight out of Mazatlan, I could technically be stranded in Phoenix. This is because I’m traveling on two separate tickets. American only owes me a flight to Phoenix, and Alaska only owes me a flight from Phoenix to Seattle at the scheduled time. If I don’t show up for it, they don’t owe me a flight home. Additionally, American isn’t technically required to check my bags through all the way from Mazatlan to Seattle, even though I’m flying with their partner Alaska.

However, in practice, it’s sometimes possible to arrange bags to be checked through. And in practice, Alaska will usually put you on the next flight out if you misconnect, even if it’s not their fault. I’m leaving on the last flight of the day, but my family has a place in Phoenix, so I wouldn’t be sleeping on the airport floor overnight. I have a couple of friends in Phoenix, so can probably lean on someone for a ride. Ultimately, the best deals sometimes require taking a bit of risk, and my worst case scenario is burning some points to get out of Phoenix.

By optimizing my redemption of short-haul awards in economy class, I was able to achieve some very solid points valuations, all over 2 cents per mile, with hard-to-use points. And I got tickets to Mexico roundtrip from Seattle for just 20,000 points.

$99 Beijing Flights – With A Dangerous Catch

August 5, 2017August 7, 2017 TProphet34 Comments

A startup called Airmule has recently made a big splash by offering $99 flights to Beijing. Obviously there’s a catch. The catch in this case is that you have to give up one of your checked bags (they appear to book you on carriers that allow two checked bags), and your other checked bag is a courier shipment. So, sharing economy, right? Seems like a perfect opportunity for a startup to move fast and break things. Most people don’t check two bags anyway so why not leverage this opportunity to make shipments of up to 50 pounds at low cost, with the fastest delivery possible?

Plus, you really have to love the founders of this company. I mean, as a startup founder myself, I’m rooting for them. One is a hardcore gamer, the other is a former backup dancer for Gucci Mane, and the third loves beer more than you do. I’m not making this up–this is what they say about themselves on their Web page:

These guys totally have you covered.

So, despite the obviously strong qualifications in air cargo handling and logistics possessed by the founding team, the reason why I’d personally pass on this is that there’s a really big catch–one so serious it could potentially make you the star of an episode of “Locked Up Abroad.”

When you pass through Customs–particularly Customs in Beijing–you are personally responsible for everything that you bring into the country with very few exceptions. One of those exceptions is to be the authorized representative of a “common carrier.” These are companies like FedEx, UPS, or DHL, or the airlines themselves. Common carriers are considered by governments to be transportation carriers only. They aren’t held responsible for the contents of the shipments they carry; full responsibility lies with the people sending and receiving the shipment.

If you’re acting as an air courier, you may not have any of those protections. You could be fully liable for what you carry through Customs. So, that suitcase of apparel you’re supposedly carrying for a fashion show? If it’s loaded with heroin, that’s on you, and the penalty for that in China is death (no ifs, ands or buts). The suitcase full of baby formula? If you didn’t know that it’s illegal to bring it into China, it doesn’t matter: the massive fine is all yours if you get caught.

Airmule takes a bunch of reassuring-sounding security measures. For example, they participate in a TSA inspection program which verifies that shipments are safe for air transportation. You do too–by letting the TSA inspect your bag when you check it in (although in all fairness, there are some additional security measures cargo companies comply with, and Airmule says they do this). Airmule claims that they inspect shipments as well, and I think they probably do. However, while this provides reasonable assurance that whatever you’re carrying won’t cause the plane to crash, it doesn’t provide as strong an assurance that what you’re carrying is actually legal to carry into the country where you’re carrying it.

I reached out to Airmule to ask them to clarify who is liable for shipments. Just like the Airmule FAQ, I got an answer that sounded reassuring while skirting the question:

This answer wasn’t reassuring.

So, I pressed for a clearer answer, and got one that is, to me, as clear as mud. I’ll leave it to you to draw your own conclusions:

I think this is a roundabout way of saying “No”

I lived in Beijing for 3 years, so know that there’s a legitimate demand for this sort of thing. There are a lot of goods that are imported into China through Customs gray areas: they can’t be imported commercially, but they can be imported in personal quantities. One example is certain food items. You’re allowed to hand carry quantities of foodstuffs that are in line with personal consumption or gift-giving, even if importers aren’t allowed to bring in these goods. Similarly, you can bring in bottles of alcoholic beverages that aren’t available in China using your personal Customs allowance. And baby formula is another popular item. You can bring in a limited quantity (the regulation is fuzzy and seems to currently be “as many cans as you can convince Customs is yours”) of foreign-made baby formula for personal use. Every time I left the country, I’d be deluged with orders from new mothers in my office–this is a very popular item given ongoing scandals about tainted milk powder sold in China.

Other stuff is less gray area and more considered to be smuggling. For example, Apple products cost about 40% more in mainland China than they do abroad, so they’re popular items to smuggle in luggage. Even something as innocuous as books could be a really major problem in China. Books and literature are closely controlled in mainland China. That suitcase full of Chinese-language books you’re carrying might actually be hardcore prohibited political speech that could get you in a huge amount of trouble. How good is your Chinese?

And then, there’s the issue of drugs. All you need to do is watch “Border Security” to see all of the inventive ways that drugs can be concealed. If the courier company you’re working with doesn’t figure out that the shipment you’re carrying is actually drugs, but border guards do, your cheap vacation could turn into the last flight of your life. China doesn’t mess around–drugs equal the death penalty and given their history of the Opium War, being a foreigner will get you zero slack. In fact, you’ll get less than a Chinese person would.

Being able to fly for steep discounts as an air courier isn’t a new thing. This is something that has been around for decades. It just hasn’t gotten very popular, because usually you’re going to places where express courier services aren’t able to operate easily (such as Burkina Faso). And there are all kinds of shipments, to all kinds of locations, where hand carrying an item makes the most sense–whether it’s transplant organs, life-saving medicines that require refrigeration, aircraft parts, or other critical shipments that just need to be delivered by the fastest route possible.

I really don’t want to come off as sounding unsupportive of startups, or of this team. I really love innovations that will help people travel and see the world for less. I am the founder of a dating startup myself (one where we’ve had to make some really tough decisions about the trade-offs between usability and security for our users–we have gotten it right so far, but I know it’s only a matter of time before we have a bad day). That being said, there is a massive amount of risk that 20 year old backpackers may be accepting in order to score a cheap holiday, and they probably don’t know that they’re undertaking this risk. As an air courier, you are–in a literal sense–putting your life in the hands of a courier company, and trusting your life and freedom with the integrity of whatever you are carrying for them. Take this seriously, check out the shipment yourself, ask lots of questions, watch a ton of episodes of “Border Security” to find out how inventive smugglers can be, and if you aren’t 100% sure…

…just walk away. A cheap ticket isn’t worth it.

UPDATE

One of the co-founders of Airmule isn’t happy with this article and disputes the facts as I described them. Since the facts about his service came from his own tweets and email I’m not sure where the dispute is, exactly, but I’m happy to correct the record if anything I have written is factually incorrect.

Here’s the email I got from Airmule answering my questions

Rory had the following to say on Twitter:

Notwithstanding the tone of the response–which is arguably justified if the facts are wrong–I have offered Rory and Airmule (and will offer the entire air courier industry) an opportunity to respond to any facts that I got wrong. Thus far, this hasn’t happened. Since calling me “unprofessional” and “lame” doesn’t really help to correct the record should any facts be in dispute, I do hope we can have a facts based conversation going forward.

EPILOGUE

Airmule ultimately didn’t dispute any of the facts in this blog post. In fact, their Terms of Service explicitly places full Customs liability with the person carrying the suitcase (many thanks to the helpful reader who pointed this out). NOTE: Airmule has stealth-edited their Terms of Service, the original is here.

Rory also claimed that the Terms of Service was out of date. I’ll leave this to the interpretation of the reader:

I’m not sure how to read this, but….

Would I personally do this? Not on my life! The risk is definitely not worth it.

Don’t Over-Optimize Yourself Out Of An Award

July 16, 2017April 3, 2019 TProphet2 Comments

I book a lot of award travel – not just for myself, but for a lot of other people. It’s at least 10 tickets per month, and usually more than that, so I have gotten a pretty good sense for what is a good award and what isn’t. I have also gotten a good sense for when people get themselves into trouble. One of the biggest problems I see is that people try to over-optimize their award booking to the point of losing the opportunity to fly with points altogether. If you see a good deal, you need to book it right away. Just get the ticket and figure out the details later. This applies to all airline tickets, not just award tickets. Book first and ask questions later.

Sometimes I just want to…

What is over-optimizing? It’s going into an award booking knowing the fundamental bargain (or having been advised of it): airlines give away the seats they don’t think they’ll sell. Those seats aren’t the good seats on nonstop flights with perfect schedules. Instead, you’re flying cross country on a regional jet connecting to another regional jet in Columbus, or traveling on Ethiopian from Los Angeles to Dublin. In Seat 31B, and you’re lucky if it is anything other than that. And yet, even though you know this, and I briefed you, and you agreed to it, you just dither and dally and tweak and fiddle and try to get a perfect itinerary in Cathay Pacific first class instead of a perfectly good (and entirely reasonable) itinerary in Air China business class. When I say “If you want to go, you really need to book this right now before it’s gone,” you say “I need to ask my wife” and disappear for a day or three while you try to search for something better on your own.

Even though you hired me to help you. Trust me, although I’m not much of an expert at anything, I’m genuinely an expert at this.

Here’s how it ends, all too often. All of the available options evaporate in front of your very eyes because–against my advice (which you have actually paid for)–you don’t immediately book the one highly reasonable option that is available for your travel dates when it becomes available and when I urge you to book it. Traveling around Christmas and New Year? That’s why there was only one option and that is why that option wasn’t a nonstop (which you can almost never get anyway). It was a good option. An option you totally blew. And that is also why there isn’t likely to be another one. At all.

I think this is because people read too many blog articles and develop unrealistic expectations. You’ll never hear hype from me on Seat 31B, unless it’s about an unusually good economy class seat. However, other travel blogs so over-hype certain airlines and their business and first class products that literally everyone tries to book them and it means award availability is very limited. Here’s some tough love: You’re not likely to secure those “aspirational” awards at all, and you’re especially not likely to secure them over holidays, and extra especially when you show up 6 months after the booking calendar opened. Full-time bloggers have schedule flexibility where they can literally book and fly the same day, giving them access to last-minute inventory you can’t reasonably use. They all have relationships with the airlines and often fly on complimentary “industry” tickets. You don’t have any of that. Instead, you signed up for a few Chase cards and got a few hundred thousand points just like everyone else did this year, and they’re all chasing the exact same seats on the exact same dates.

What’s the reality? If you’re flying in a long-haul business class, it’s far nicer than economy class on pretty much every airline in the world. The baseline is so much of a step up from economy class that the differences between airlines are only incremental. For example, the difference between Air China and Cathay Pacific is pretty marginal. Slightly different catering, better English skill level with a Hong Kong vs. mainland Chinese crew, a different selection of alcoholic beverages and teas, and better lounges in Hong Kong vs. Beijing. That’s it. They will both get you to your destination safely in a modern lie flat seat, giving you a comfortable ride and a nice meal.

There are marked differences in economy class. You feel these much more. Premium economy is a major step up from regular economy class. And since there is more economy class award inventory, it is well worth favoring one airline over another (all else being equal). This is particularly true when you’re looking at 9-across vs 10-across economy class seating on a 777. This just isn’t the case with business class. If you’re getting a lie flat seat, worrying about one airline versus another is mostly worrying about which wine is catered. Does it really matter so much that you’d risk losing an opportunity to fly in business class for free?

Apparently, it was. You decided to push your luck. Not content with finding an itinerary that met all of your requirements and was really very good, you held out for something better. Except it wasn’t actually there, because airlines barely give away any seats during Christmas and New Year at all, and especially not premium airlines on premium nonstop routes. Instead, someone else snapped up the award you didn’t book. They were happy to have what you were trying to over-optimize. Your opportunity disappeared right in front of your nose. And I know exactly what’s going to happen next.

You’re going to be upset with me.

Want help booking your own award? Visit us at award.cat

Separation Soap Opera – American’s Love Lost For Alaska

July 6, 2017July 6, 2017 TProphet0 comment

You know that stage of a relationship where there isn’t any love left, you’re sleeping in separate bedrooms, but you have kids so you put on a strong public face and stay married for the sake of the children? That’s my view of the relationship between Alaska and American Airlines. It has been steadily deteriorating over time, and while many frequent fliers had a lot of (I think false) hope after Alaska split up with Delta earlier this year, the writing has been on the wall for some time.

If you follow airlines closely, you knew something was seriously awry when American began flying from Seattle to Los Angeles earlier this year. This was the only American hub where American didn’t have service on its own aircraft from Seattle, instead relying on Alaska to provide connecting flights to its domestic and international services. And Alaska is fully capable of doing this. They operate 14 nonstop flights a day between Seattle and Los Angeles, not counting an additional 4 Virgin America flights per day. Absent any rift in the partnership, there was absolutely no need for additional lift in this market–a market so competitive (in between Delta, Alaska, Spirit, United and now American) that fares are often as low as $59 each way. Also, consumer preference almost definitely isn’t in play; American service is inferior to Alaska in just about every way so it’s hard to imagine many consumers going out of their way to fly American over Alaska.

Meanwhile, though, Alaska fliers are the “kids” in the relationship. Despite struggles in the marriage, it has been very good for us with reciprocal frequent flier benefits. Elite frequent flier members have benefited from free bags and priority check-in, boarding and seating. For those of us in Seat 31B, however, the best part of this has been some very cheap mileage fares in economy class when booking with Alaska miles.

This American Airlines partner flight–with a long stopover in Seattle–cost only 15,000 Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles.

There are some particularly good sweet spots on the Alaska Airlines award chart with American Airlines, especially their off-peak flights. I flew to Barcelona on May 14th this year for just 20,000 Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles in American economy class, because Alaska follows the “old” AAdvantage peak/off-peak rules. I also flew from Costa Rica to Seattle, enjoyed a long stopover, and will be continuing on my journey to Las Vegas later this month. This cost only 15,000 miles–also an off-peak award. These are some of the best deals on the Alaska Airlines award chart–and more importantly, these awards are achievable for ordinary people who aren’t flying every week or doing crazy stuff to get miles.

There will likely be howls of protest from the blogosphere, but I don’t think they’re really justified. American massively devalued its own award program more than a year ago. It was untenable for Alaska Mileage Plan members to continue getting a better deal on American awards than AAdvantage members, particularly given that American flyers could easily credit their miles to Alaska. I knew this couldn’t last, and put my money where my mouth is: I have been burning my own miles on the best awards.

What’s next? Well, divorce probably isn’t in the cards, not yet anyway. At the end of the day, American and Alaska need each other–Alaska has very strong service throughout the West that American doesn’t have, and American serves Midwestern cities Alaska doesn’t. So this is the stage of the relationship where Alaska and American are no longer sleeping under the same roof; they are formally separated. But they’ll still put on a brave face and show up at the middle school parent-teacher nights as a couple. All of the changes go into effect on 1/1/18, so you will have until then to earn and redeem at current levels.

Act Fast: More ANA Award Tickets To Asia

July 5, 2017July 5, 2017 TProphet0 comment

Booking good economy class tickets to Asia is always difficult. One of the biggest reasons for this is that many flights arrive poorly timed for onward connections to other destinations in Asia, meaning that you get stuck with long connections and forced overnights. When you’re flying in Seat 31B, you just want to get there as quickly as possible.

It’s always good to see a new Asia route with both good award availability and good timings for onward flights, and ANA is starting one on October 29th. They’ll be adding a third daily flight from LAX to Tokyo (Narita), which leaves LAX at 10:20am and arrives in Tokyo at 3:20PM. This is early enough in the day to allow for same-day onward connections from Tokyo to many destinations in China, southeast Asia, and even India. The timings aren’t really great for origination and departure traffic in Tokyo so this flight really seems geared toward carrying connecting passengers.

ANA offers a solid economy class product including a pillow, blanket and even a pen to fill out your Customs forms. The food is edible and ANA flies newer aircraft. I’d gladly choose them in economy class over most other airlines with service to Asia (Asiana does, however, remain a cut above).

You can book award tickets on this new ANA flight using StarAlliance miles (the most popular are United, Aeroplan, Singapore and ANA’s own program). It’s likely that cash pricing will be very competitive, since this opens up a whole lot of Asian cities to additional competition from LAX, so always compare the price of paid flights to award tickets. If you want to use miles, act fast – this new flight has opened up a lot of award availability to Asia, and it will not last.

Asiana Club Mileage Expiration Extended

July 4, 2017 TProphet1 Comment

Asiana Club isn’t my favorite mileage program, but it offers middle-of-the-road value for StarAlliance flights and does offer credit on some Asiana fares that are hard to credit to other airlines. However, like its fellow StarAlliance partner Singapore, miles do expire on a rolling basis after earning.

Unlike Singapore, whose miles expire 3 years after they are earned (meaning that Singapore defiitely isn’t an airline in which to accrue large mileage balances), Asiana miles expire 10 years after they were earned (or 12 years after being earned for elite members). And although Asiana’s mileage chart isn’t the best, they haven’t devalued as much (or as often) as other airlines. So it’s a reasonable program to consider if you fly Asiana a lot.

I received an email today notifying of “enhancements” to the Asiana Club mileage expiration policy. I usually hate seeing these, because it means yet another devaluation. However, this time, Asiana has actually improved mileage expiration policies in a way that simplifies the program.

The new expiration policy is still more complicated than it needs to be, and is as follows:

The bottom line? You might get up to 11 additional months before your Asiana Club miles expire. However, you really shouldn’t wait that long–it’s likely that if you do, your miles will be worth far less at the time you redeem them.

Tax Day: Should You Pay Your Taxes With A Credit Card?

April 18, 2017April 18, 2017 TProphet0 comment

A reader contacted me and asked a question that a lot of folks are asking on tax day: “Should I pay my taxes with a credit card?” The answer is a strong “it depends” and you need to be careful. Beware of bloggers bearing affiliate links and pushing you to do this.

First of all, any way that you do this, you’ll be paying a fee. That’s real cash that you’re shelling out in return for points. In nearly all cases, if you’re just doing this for the points, you’ll be paying more than they’re worth. Typically, tax services charge around 2% to pay your taxes with a credit card, which is the same thing as buying points for 2 cents each. You can often buy them directly from the airlines for less than this.

If you need to hit a minimum spend threshold, though, this could be an easy way to do it. But it could be an expensive waste too! If you pay the IRS directly (rather than through a tax service) it will almost always code as a CASH ADVANCE which charges interest, fees and doesn’t count toward minimum spend. You will need to pay through a tax service, which will send the money to the IRS on your behalf.

Bank cash advance fees can cost more than a payday loan!

This could also be an efficient way to get enough points to reach an award threshold, especially if the points are more expensive than 2 cents each to buy. Just weigh the real money you’ll be spending in fees versus your ability to earn the points through regular spending (without fees).

If you pay through a tax service or through your tax software then sometimes–though not always–it codes as a purchase. But you need to be sure not only how the merchant bills you, but how your credit card interprets the charge. If they’re billing you in the “tax preparation service” or “software” categories, you’ll probably be fine. Citi, however, is particularly aggressive about coding things as cash advances that other merchants don’t, so be especially careful with them.

Just as with taxes themselves, how you pay your taxes can be complicated. It’s nice to sweeten the deal with a few extra points, but be careful so it doesn’t backfire!