No More Access to Many International Lounges for Delta Elite Medallion. By Will Run For Miles. And you thought Delta was done, huh? Reason #1,012 to hate it! In a typical weasel like mode, Delta changed the wording to hit its Elites hard by not allowing them entry to 3rd party operated lounges around the world. You are Gold, Platinum or Diamond Medallion Elite and you want access to all these lounges? You must be flying on a Business Elite ticket suckah! Drum roll, please. How many insults can these people take? I even started a Twitter hashtag #deltarage . Best blogger reaction was this post by Jeffsetter, must click.
Hilton Deathmatch: Conrad Rangali vs. Hilton Bora Bora vs. Conrad Koh Samui. By The Selfish Years. Great reviews of all three Hilton properties in one post.
A very painful article about United’s computer issues three years after the Continental merger. Come on guys, isn’t it time you figured it out by now? Assigning flights to dead pilots, really? (HT View from the Wing and Loyalty Lobby)
American Airlines Offering Easy Platinum Status Trials. By Hack My Trip. If you did not get one, you can contact AA. I am so glad I no longer play this game…It doesn’t hurt as much with Elite benefit devaluations any more lol.
Excellent sign on bonus credit card newbie guide for eco-tourism (or not) by Miles to the Wild. There is nothing free dear newbie, you need to put some work into this. The more effort you put into it the better you will get at it and you can spot the phonies from miles (pun intended) away!
5 Hong Kong Travel Tips for First Time Visitors. By Food, Wine and Miles. Well, I saved this into my Evernote files as I am thinking about it. I hope I get to it some day…
The Saverocity Empire is done! Big Habitat, coming out of way left field, backed up by a huge number of private equity and mysterious hedge fund types, shocked the blogosphere by acquiring Saverocity in a spectacular Reverse Acquisition ( I took a look at the prospectus and I got a headache…we are talking a diabolical combination of reverse stock splits, straddles, derivative structuring that can give you nightmares, you know…stuff like that 🙂 ). My readers are screaming “NOT fair” as the consensus was that Nick at the PFDigest was winning handily the “mock” feud between him and Big Habitat. And now what? No duels, no anagrams and pretty soon the word in the (blog) street is that the awful PFDigest graphs will be enhanced…I was about to scream SELLOUTs to you guys but I do not want to traumatize Chasing the Points because we all want him to keep chasing. In a serious note, I think the fit and synergy is coming together well at Saverocity and best of luck to you! And thank you for putting the reader first!
You can earn Bitcoins if you book a hotel at PointsHound according to this post by The Wandering Aramean. WTF PointsHound, bitcoins? Did you do that for the media wow effect or what? You can enroll in PointsHound if you use my link…not! Unless you email me you really want to 🙂 I just have not bothered with this outfit and Rocket Miles. By the end of this year one or both won’t be standing.
My friend Bikeguy has been putting together the Ann Arbor Art Fair DO for ten (wow!) years. And he just announced the 2014 DO. Drew of Travel is Free going to speak. Well, less than 24 hours and it is already sold out! If you want to come you better get your name in the wait list NOW! The entry fee is $99 and you get a free massage along with a free one on one session on credit card churning, manufactured spending, etc. Just kidding, no money ever charged, this is a labor of love for some you know…proudly! I have only missed one of these as they are in my back yard (and I had a good excuse). Please check the FT thread for updates. Post #1 is the announcement, #2 will be the schedule and #3 is the attendees.
Some of my #deltarage tweets below, please feel free to join and let’s all laugh together while this company is sticking to us you Delta Flyers.
Hey @Delta, how about u paying me $29 per head to kick my wife & kids out of the lounge to reduce overcrowding huh? #deltarage
Is it Friday yet? You know Fridays are #deltarage days!
I guess no more business meetings in SkyClub lounges. We will do it in the food court, they have better hummus & buy $29 worth #deltarage
Reader question:”Is it too early for #deltarage on Sunday morning?”. Answer: No, it is not. Actually, you should feel #deltarage 24/7 like me
A friend gave up trying and booked 4 award tickets Detroit to Orland for 50k each. She was happy, I felt #deltarage overtake my body…again
More stunning pictures, this time from flickr: “The Best Design And Architecture Photos of 2013″.
Beautiful piece on Darren Booth of Frequently Flying by his former employer at CNBC. And I love his picture. RIP Darren.
An ad about speeding. Very powerful. Please slow down, we all can make mistakes. Be gentle to other drivers, have #deltarage instead of road rage!
New York people. In the Subway. In slow motion. – Stainless, 42nd Street. Adam Magyar. This is weirdly fascinating. I prefer taking the time to link to this here instead of telling you all how to get the Southwest Companion pass 🙂
Did you do that? Who me?
And I leave you with this…
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First.
Second
Or, AKA, first last
First and factually accurate except for Nick winning the feud
Re: Hong Kong – I remember UA flight att’s saying HKG is good for 3 full days of shopping. Hogwash. My wife and I spent 7 days and 6 nights at the Sheraton, and still had 3 days worth of stuff that we didn’t have time to do. Lots to do in the HKG area. By the way, the staff at the Sheraton does speak English. They speak ‘hotel English.’ They will answer your question, but with an answer that didn’t match your question!! By the way, you can negotiate an upgrade. They wanted USD$50 for a view room of HK Harbor. I ended up paying them $25 a night. The evening light show was worth the price.
Re: Ann Arbor Do – I’ve never been, but can say the same for the organizer, BikeGuy, not having joined the BRT (Brooklyn Reality Tour). This is BRT 15, and it’s posted on Flyertalk. I look forward to TBB joining us this year. Anyone else? Sorry for the shameless plug, but I realize readers of TBB know a good thing when they see it.
The problem with HKG is that it’s expensive. Shanghai is the new HKG.
Back to back mentions! Now I feel pressured to put something decent out tomorrow 🙂
@dhammer53 – agree that there’s plenty to do in and around HK besides shopping. My last trip was the first time I actually had some free time (usually just in and out for work)
HelixCardinal in a photo finish, there will be no recount, sorry Miles Abound 🙂
Big Habitat: Spill the secrets, who is backing you? Warren Buffett? Or is it some Saudi Prince? And I am sure Nick has not said his last word. Watch your back, he is coming for ya LOL
dhammer53: Ok, I subscribed to the FT thread. June 14 ouch? Looks like a long shot…It is World Cup time, I have not missed a game since 1978! It just hit me, TBB the blog will likely go on a long sleepy mode during the games. Every four years this is all I do! And I may go to Brazil (even longer shot!). Thanks for the feedback on HKG. I want to burn some miles doing the last big burn on US and UA…but things are crazy around here!
Food Wine and Miles: You are on a roll! If I go to HKG I will not stay more than a few days so your post was ideally suited to me. Quick trip experiencing some F “products” because it could well be the very last time…
“The Saverocity Empire is done!” ? Were the Brits ever done expanding the empire? As I recall, the sun never went down in the empire. Isn’t it time that you join the dark side as well? Your financial skills would fit as well.
TBB is such a gutless coward and just can’t get along with anyone, even British emperors 😉
Plus, it will keep me from getting TBB bought at a higher price than that other site so then I just get bored and start trolling all you guys 😉
I am kidding of course.
Never say never. For the moment, I like doing my own thing and being accountable only to myself.
Just Do It!!!
Was that an affiliate ad for Nike or what? You sold out TOO, come on!
The awful PFDigest graphs will never be enhanced! They’re part of the amateurish charm that keeps people coming back for more.
By the way, I’d like to ask all readers of the Saverocity blogs to be patient as it will take several years to integrate all the blogs’ legacy systems, though once that’s out the way we should realize the desired economies of scale that were given as a rationale for the merger (barring unforeseen events of course).
Sincerely,
Nick @ PFD
Winner of the Great Blog Feud of 2014
You are a weener 🙂
When it comes to every single blogger doing there “Is the Amex Platinum [insert affiliate link] still worth it?” posts, I’d love to see just one blogger who gets affiliate commission for it just give an honest answer along the lines of “unless you’re a frequent solo Delta traveler, probably not”
It’s amazing to see some of the stretching and fuzzy math that some bloggers are using to try to justify having the card. TPG just grew another 6 feet with all that stretching… $100 Hilton Gold (LOL), $100 for Global Entry (without mentioning that it’s $100 over the course of 5 years, so really only $20), $200 FH&R even though it’s only marginally better than Virtuoso etc.
It is pretty simple. If you are a frequent Delta flyer, who usually travels solo, and don’t have Diamond Status, the card is probably worth it. If you are not, you should probably cancel it after your 1st year.
I think the $100 for SPG Gold was worse than the valuation of Hilton Gold. Sad to see how all the major bloggers are in Amex’s pocket.
You’ve inspired me. How’s this?
http://saverocity.com/pfdigest/amex-platinum-still-worth/
I nominate that post for TBB’s next “must read feature post” installation
Doing some simple math, the average MMS post is about 140,000 words long. Maybe about 10-11 posts a week on average? I think that’s a reasonable guesstimate
So you’ve managed to say more in 24 words than MMS says over the course of the 1,500,00 words he writes in a given week
THIS.
Amex platinum is valuable to me (mostly leisure traveler, Kayaker/Hipmunker, family of 3) only insofar as
a) I can get a 50K MR sign-up bonus for $475 less the $400 sunk cost of airline gift cards / peripherals.
b) I can give an extra card to a friend who lives near SFO and travels for work, so that she can use the forthcoming Centurion lounge. (We qualify for the MStanley card – ugh, don’t ask – so extra card is free.)
and Th-th-th-th-that’s all folks!
I think the return protection benefit is way under rated, I value it at $350 minimum 🙂
I think I have enough for another TBB post tomorrow…
Credit to Andy on his FTG piece
Not because the piece helped me all that much. Not because I thought the piece was some “wow” piece that you have to bookmark for future reference.
So why?
Because he actually did a de-facto “travel CHALLENGE” (i.e. trying to find overwater bungalows at as reasonable a rate as possible), and actually did research on it, rather than just fill out a template with a city name and some credit cards
It wasn’t a puff piece meant to pimp a lot of credit cards – it was an actual “challenge” on getting readers a dream trip for as reasonable a cost as possible and without fuzzy math, incorrect information and “if you just open these 12 credit cards…” used-car salesman tactics
This is what the Travel Challenge feature SHOULD look like
Diversion. The cha ching moment came with the next post about which credit card to use for gas 🙂
Which of course was written by “FTG Staff”. Because none of them want to have their names attached to those kinds of posts
Hypocrisy example #4,000,000 from Ingy:
For a guy who spends a lot of time criticizing George and others for their “anonymity”, he sure seems to have a lot of posts on his site without a name attached to it….
Steve, you are a persistent adversary but really dumber than a post. Let me help you with this again:
“on HIS site without a name attached to it…..”
Let me try again: It is NOT my site. I sold it on January 20th 2012 to a company called Internet Brands. I am not FTG staff. When I contribute you will see my name in the byline.
Sometimes I think you are as slow and stubborn as George is. As long as people here are going to be critical of others, I will continue to troll you and this site. It was refreshing to see George quit slamming others, for the most part, but you just don’t seem to understand.
Get back to that paper route buddy.
Who is the “guy” being referenced in “Frugal Travel Guy”? Batman?
You Steve. You and everyone else that plays the game are the Frugal Travel Guy or Gal.
Is this really all you have to do between your paper route and mowing lawns? Go shovel your neighbors walk and increase your productive time.
Your anger is now passing into obsurdity.
If you’ve sold FTG, then why does your linkedin profile still list you as owner? Answer that one chief.
http://www.linkedin.com/pub/rick-ingersoll/12/353/638
rick ingersoll
Independent Travel Consultant and Writer
Savannah, Georgia Area | Internet
Current: Owner at Frugal Travel Guy
Wow, you got me. I am so embarrassed. The scandal is now in the open. heaven forbid. The reason I’m still listed on LinkedIn as owner is: are you ready?
I forgot to take it out.
Haters gotta Hate 🙂
TBB I’ll do my best to use you’re Amazon link and share it with my classmates. Keep up the great work.
Thank you, very much appreciated.
Thanks George, glad you liked it! This is why I made the reference post of all travel credit cards last week. In next Sunday’s post, I will address intermediate ways of using the list, then the following week will be advanced ways.
BTW, I totally agree with staying independent. I can see the value of joining a blog network but I wouldn’t want to have to answer to anyone else (meaning owner of the network). I wouldn’t be a good fit for a network anyways, I’m just TOO niche to appeal to the general population.
I agree. But everything is evolving in this space. Who knows where we’ll be six months from now.
I am amazed I am still doing this…I still have not broken three digits in revenues. But the entertainment value and adding value to readers has been…priceless.
You mean you broke 2 digits? I’d be glad for that! I’ve sold 1 field guide to birds of Indonesia since I’ve had my Amazon.com links over a year. I pretty much gave up!