A quicker post today on how to maximize IHG Rewards points, I get more Amex Membership Rewards Points, Delta is at it again pushing the knife deeper because…they can, joining BA was a joke, we then travel to Norway and Africa, and end with some awesome personal finance articles.
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MILES/POINTS
5 Tips for Maximizing Earning of IHG Rewards Points – Travel Is Free I could not find anything else as of right now…hope I find something else as this is getting tiring you guys 🙂
Amazingly, just a week after I received an 100k offer for the Business Amex Platinum card I received another offer for a no annual fee for the first year Business Gold Rewards Card for 75k Membership Reward points! Looks like the floodgates have opened, hooray!
Not amazingly, Delta is increasing already the $$ Elites are required to spend to stay…Elites! For those losing count, that was reason #465,999 to hate Delta!
Not much is happening…I need to find time to burn!
I can’t believe people fell for the “I am joining Boarding Area” joke!
TRAVEL
A Timelapse Adventure Through Norway – The Adventure Blog I can not get enough of Norway timelapse videos. Wow alert!
10 Amazing Photos From National Geographic’s 2014 Photo Contest
An American Is Documenting His 4-Year Tour Of Africa With Incredible Photos
PERSONAL FINANCE
4 Things Millionaires Have In Common, Backed By Research – Barking Up The Wrong Tree Good read!
Picking the ‘Right’ Hedge Fund Involves More Than Looking in the Past – New York Times No one has a crystal ball that works every time!
5 401(k) gotchas to avoid – US News & World Report Excellent advice in this article.
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First!
I’m #2! I’m #2!!!
Second… TBB, you had me going for a while… Bloody Hilarious!!!
Third is the word.
Bluebird is the word! Slow news day… no mention of flyforpink?
Buzz, Chris Elliott and The Points Guy are joining forces at BA and coming out with a CC tool that will recommend 11 credit cards every time. The Points Triplets! This ‘joke’ was just done to gauge reader reactions.
… Of course NOT… He wasn’t trying to gauge reaction, he was taking a page from the Titan Playbook and creating a little MC … “Manufactured Controversy” … LoL
I claim 1st…from the future!
Woooooooooo….it’s Oct 10 8:14pm here…wooooooooo
Shame on you for playing tricks on your readers!
@ Miles Math: First First? Wow!
@ Tiff: You may be Number 2 but you are always Number 1 to TBB!
@ Mr. Nice: Umm, that would be third actualy 🙂 I think the joke went off very well as many fell for it!
@ will: Fourth. Press refresh button before you comment 🙂
@ Oliver2002: Oh more lets copy everyone. These things like bucketing and now posting boarding passes bore me to boliviion 🙂
@ Kenny & Mr. Nice: Well, eleven would sure beat the dough from the ridiculous FTG credit card “Tool” that recommends to newbies to apply for seven cards at once! You will likely see soon Elliott pitching plastic…
@ DiffPaul: Lol, good one! As long as you are not last 😉
@ Nick: Thanks for the inspiration!
I saw this tweet last night from Lucky that I found to be astounding, https://twitter.com/OneMileataTime/status/520419894622306304. For a guy who travels as much as Lucky does he seems incredibly oblivious to the world around him. I’m beginning to wonder if the only time he leaves his hotel suite is when the limo takes him to his first class seat on his next flight.
Rom chimed in with a horribly tragic circumstances (http://freemattandgrace.com/) with some family friends in Qatar, of course zero response from Lucky. After Rom’s tweet, Lucky did respond to another reader later that he would be even more excited if it was One Direction. I really wonder what it is like to travel with this guy, I can’t imagine it is very fun. One living in a bubble experience after another.
Sorry about the rant. George, you’re right, it is very therapeutic.
We were in the same hotel once, the W in Santiago, Chile. That was before I started blogging. I tried to connect with him but he wasn’t very forthcoming to the idea and I sure was not going to stick around and keep ourselves away from exploring Santiago! These trip reports take so much time, I am not sure the dude ever leaves his room. I bet the money is worth it I guess.
What a tragic story about that couple, OMG!
Yes it is very therapeutic indeed letting it all out here, my favorite part about blogging 🙂
Lucky is pathetic on so many levels. To be all teenage girl giddy about the head of a regime that persecutes people for being gay is not something I think is appropriate from someone who is gay.
On the one hand, that’s a terrible story. Qatar should be avoided by conscientious people, and more attention should be paid to their terrible human rights record.
On the other have you seen the inside of their new A380s?? OMFG! Swoon! It’s a business class seat to be
detained in prison without due process/diesell out for!Wish it was One Direction? The teenage Boy Band?……………………………………..that’s sick.
Your T&Cs don’t prohibit you getting 75,000 Gold Biz card bonus after you pickedup 100,000 Plat Biz card bonus? Just wondering, what offer you got, as sometimes they say all family of cards, sometimes they will allow Platinum Biz as long as you haven’t had only Platinum Biz before. Nice pick up of 175,000 MR points! Considering that you have 3mil+ of other currency, maybe you can get something nice from Home Depot, washer and dryer, fridge, a new stove?
Cheers,
PedroNY
I need to dig in the T&C’s….I just want to make sure I get the 100k from the Plat first 🙂
Actually I should take a look at the washer & dryer sets as the ones we have are on their last legs. I could transfer them out but by the time I get to use them they would have lost over 50% of their current value so…cashing out for merchandise NOW is probably not too bad. If I do such a thing I will make sure I keep quiet because, you know, credibility is an important asset around here hehe.
Oh man… I just rec’d an e-mail from Delta (I’m a hub-captive Plat) about their changes. They’ve got some incredible balls with their spin. The subject line says “A More Exclusive Travel Experience On The Horizon”. Then you open the mail: “When everyone is an elite flyer, no one is. See the new thresholds”.
The body of the e-mail: “THE MORE EXCLUSIVE 2016 SKYMILES MEDALLION PROGRAM.
Let’s face it. When you spend a lot of time and money with us, you should enjoy our top-of-the-line benefits, such as complimentary access to Economy Comfort™ seats, Preferred Seats, and Sky Priority® services.
That’s why we’re adjusting the 2016 Medallion® Qualification Dollars (MQDs) thresholds to add even more exclusivity to the SkyMiles Medallion program.*
And we won’t stop there. We’re working hard to bring you our very best — check out our new premium Delta Sky Club® menu and industry-leading complimentary Delta Studio™ entertainment — as you jet around the globe.”
To a certain extent – I can agree with what they’re doing by rewarding big spenders. I would have hugely benefited in the last decade when I was routinely flying on $5K int’l tickets at least once a month. Now, I’m just an “average” flyer and somehow this feels like my business (and nearly 2mm history) is no longer important. We shall see if this backfires (or not). If the “exclusivity” gave you much more access to low-level awards, it would be worth it, but knowing DL this will not be the case.
You left out the part that says;
“We will continue to increase the MQD’s quarterly until we shrink our elite ranks and we reach a more manageable 7 or 8 total Delta Elite fliers. We’ll then remove all but two business elite seats from our existing aircraft and install more basic economy seating, since there probably won’t be a very high chance of all 7 or 8 of our elite members flying at once.”
“We hope to eventually sell off our entire fleet and purchase Amtrak for the use of our economy passengers, and we’ll one use one 8 seat private jet from our NetJets partner, increasing exclusivity of our remaining 7 or 8 elite passengers.”
Delta – Don’t Ever Leave The Airport.
LOL…this is really funny!
This is typical Delta spin.
Delta Points says it will destruct Skymiles. I don’t think so. What are you going to do, go to UA or AA? I think they are doing the right thing for the bottom line. Gary Leff can keep ranting about this but I think the good old days of mileage running on cheap tickets are about over. The spoils should have been going to the big spenders all along, we just took advantage of the airlines’ inept management for a very long time. It’s a new environment out there now, less airlines, fuller planers, better economy….they can get away with this stuff. I expect UA to copy soon and AA to have a MEGA devaluation when they have progressed on the US integration a little further. I just picked Southwest as my airline with the $200 airline credit for my new Business Amex Platinum 🙂
When do folks in the MS business use airline credits?
Luggage?
Gift cards. To “splurge” for our mothers in law 🙂
Well, till a few years ago they couldn’t track spend so the mileage thing was used. Now they can, so PQD/MQDs are used. Really curious on how they plan to suspend that during the next recession 🙂
The thing that really kills the airline industry during a recession is having one or more carriers in bankruptcy. An operating bankrupt carrier will just about give away tickets to create cash flow. But with only 4 players left standing the can just reduce capacity and not worry so much on pricing. Airline stocks like AAL is taking a beating over the last month but fuel and fuel hedging is going to save them a bundle going forward. I jump on some AAL next week myself.
but I can’t cause I am dead
A lot of the excess capacity has been cut…I don’t think we will see stuff like did over a dozen years ago, no way! Maybe some targeted promos…I guess time will tell.
Hey Louis, met you at a conference once…told you to quit drinking but you didn’t listen to me!
Where is Kumar?
Hope he is okay!