Tuesday, December 30, 2008

2008 Year End Miles/Points Summary and 2009 Plan

Here is my miles summary as of Dec 30st,2008

Airline:
United-1K: 300K
American Airline-Executive Platinum: 270K(still owe me 40K from Year end online mall)
Delta/Northwest-Gold(will drop to General Member next year) 745K(still owe me 255K)
US Airways-General Member: 90K
British Midland Airways-Gold: 150K
British Airways-20K
Czech Airline-General Member 40K
and more 200K in various airlines in China

Next Year Goal:
United-Plan to drop to Premier Executive
American Airline- plan to keep Exe Plat
Delta/Nowthwest-plan to get to Platinum
BMI-plan to keep Gold
All other programs will be remind as General member


Hotel:
Starwood-Platinum: 150K
Priority Club-Platinum: 500K
Hyatt-Platinum: 20K
Hilton-Gold: 350K
Choice Hotels-60K

Next Year Goal:
Starwood-Keep Platinum
Priority Club-Keep Platinum
Hyatt-Plan to get Diamond back
Hilton-Plan to keep Gold and working toward Diamond

All other programs will remain as General Member

Others:
80K Thankyou Network Points
$3400 AA Credit
2 SPG free weekend nights at any Cat 1-5 hotels
1 SPG free weekend at selected Asia Hotels
1 SPG free night at any Le Meridien
7 Unused Marriott nights at any Cat 1-5 properties
4 Hyatt free nights

Monday, December 29, 2008

Hilton up to 50% off sale

Must book by Jan 31st, 2009 for stay up to Aug 2009, up to 50% on weekends. the link is here

US properties are excluded from this offer.

Also, don't forget double points offer

Few more Hilton Resorst will be opened and some top Starwood hotels are heading to Hilton Chain

According to this website, Hilton will open 2 properties at French Polynesia in Feb 2009, one is Hilton Bora Bora Nui and another one is Hilton Moorea. Since there is no word of new construction of Hilton Properties, these two hotels most likely are taken over from Sheraton Moorea Lagoon Resort and SPA and Bora Bora Nui Resort and SPA.

Hilton has no blackout redemption like SPG chain and require much less points on these two properties, so this is actually a great move. However, I am sure New Hilton Bora Bora Nui will have similar retrictions on Elite benefits like Conrad Maldive when you reedem points, but it still a better value compare to SPG catergory 7 redemption. In addition, if you want to pay for the night, Hilton can get u to their Diamond tier by amount of spending($10000 in a canleder year), so a better option than SPG, where only nights/stays counts toward elite status.

Also, If I remember correctly, both hotels+St.Regis Bora Bora are owned by same person, so sooner or later St.Regis maybe rebrand to Hilton Family Hotels too.

Along with these two properties, the Westin Versailles in Paris will leave SPG and join Hilton as Waldorf=Astoria brand. It looks like Hilton is expanding its top chain to compete with others by offering lower Franchisee fees.

Start saving ur Hilton Points, you will have more better properties to use them.

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Hilton, Marriott, Intercontinental, Starwood and Hyatt 2009 promotions are here!

Hilton Double Base points Q1 2009:

Earn double points btw Jan 6 and Apr 6th,2009 at participating properties worldwide, must register here.

Marriott Mega bonus Spring 2009:
Offer valid between February 1 and April 30, 2009, you need to login your account to see which one you got, no need to pay with Visa card Here are some of them
  • 2500 for each paid stay, beginning with the second stay. Max 25000 points
  • 35K for 20 nights up to 50K total for 25 nights
  • 25K for 15 nights up to 40K for 20 nights
If you are Gold member or above and do not like the promotion you received, you can call Marriott Reward desk to switch, as do it before promotion ends.

Intercontinental Priority Club up to 30,000 bonus points or 10,000 bonus miles:

From January 12 to April 30, 2009, earn 3,000 bonus points or 1,000 bonus miles for every 3rd qualifying night you stay, up to 30,000 bonus points or 10,000 bonus miles.

Starwood Night after Night:

Registration will be available on Jan 7th,2009. From Jan 7th to Apr 30th,2009. Earn 500 bonus points per night, and 5000 extra bonus for every 10th nights, no need to be consecutive and no upper limit for bonus.

Hyatt More Than a Bonus:
Between January 9 and April 30, 2009, up to 20000 bonus points

Stay two nights and earn 2,000 bonus points/miles
Stay four nights and earn an additional 4,000 bonus points/miles (totaling 6,000 bonus points)
Stay six nights and earn an additional 6,000 bonus points/miles (totaling 12,000 bonus points)
Stay eight nights and earn an additional 8,000 bonus points/miles (totaling 20,000 bonus points)

Registration link is not ready yet.

Thursday, December 18, 2008

UA 50% bonus to Hawaii on UA

This promotion was published on United.com few days ago, then they removed it because they decided not to do it. However, You can still register it by call United Airline Mileage plus customer Service, not reservation line.

Mention promotion code MPD698,

Offer valid for booking and travel btw Nov 13th to Jan 31st,2009 with blackout on Jan 2-5 and Dec 20th.

More discussion on this topic here

Hertz Free weekend day rental deal

Saw it from Gary's Blog, use PC code 127595, offer valid on Thursday, Friday and Sat until March 31st,2009.

No min days requirement. I just 1 day weekend rental at SNA for $4 total.

New York City, Hawaii, and Florida are excluded

Saturday, December 13, 2008

More reasons to drop UA from my first choice

I am in Flight from JFK-SFO on AA and using Gogo Inflight internet. With the promotion code they hand out, it only costs me less than $10 for entire Transcont flight. The speed is fast enough to do anything. Serivce is avaliable on flight JFK-SFO/LAX/MIA.

Delta will offer this service soon and Virgin America already launched service on most route.

With no Powerports, no internet service, no dish network TV and massive increase in award redemption level, it's hard to keep UA anymore.

Although UA are changing some of their International Business seats to 180 lie flat will be eventually on all flights, services to mainland China still use Old 747.

One more thing to add. although UA has elite bonus, it is only for travel on UA, US and LH transatlantic flights. DL, NW elite earn elite bonus on all Sky team partner flights, and AA elite earn bonus on almost all one world partners except BA and JL.

Double BMI miles on Hertz Rental is back

Book your car before 31 December 2008 for hire before 31 March 2009 and you can earn double miles, giving you 3,000 destinations miles for each Hertz car rental.

We'll give you 3,400* destinations miles for every Hertz booking you make through flybmi.com and you'll soon see the miles add up.

The problem is lots of US location is not working with PC #127186, you can give a try, it may work at ur Location

BTW, you can not have ur Hertz Gold attached on the booking in order to get bonus

Northwest New service Bonus from DTW-PVG

Current Financial Crisis and Economy Slowdown has made many carriers delayed their new service schedule or reduced frequency, but Northwest decide to launch DTW-PVG on time.

Nonstop service from Detroit to Shanghai begins March 28, 2009

You need to register here by May 31, 2009 and travel between March 28 and June 15, 2009.

Thursday, December 4, 2008

My marriott to Delta tranafer posted today

As I mentioned earlier, Delta said they will honor the bonus for MAX MILES promotion for whoever registered before Nov 21st. I transferred 235K Marriott points for 7 nights at Cat 1-5 hotels and 120K delta miles in addition to 40K SPG points.

The bonus will be posted 8-12 weeks after Dec 31st, so it is a waiting game now. Once all transfers and bonus posted, I will have close to 1 Million in my Delta and NW accounts. Enough for many trips abroad.

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Skyrocket to Sextuple SkyMiles-Earn 6 times Delta miles per Hilton stay

you need to register first, then stay before Feb 29th. 2009, every stay must be two or more nights at participating Hilton Family hotels worldwide.

It is a Great promotion if you stay two nights per stay and NOT at Hampton INN properties or your stay is a very expensive, otherwise, stay with BMI miles would be a better option.

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Transfer your Membership Rewards points to Virgin and earn 15% bonus.

transfer before Jan 31st,2009 and Earn 15% bonus on Virgin Atlantic.

British Airways Hotel Transfer Bonus

British Airways launched this promotion again this year,transfer your hotel points by 28 February 2009, and receive 30% bonus BA Miles.

Marriott, Hilton and Hyatt are on the list, but no starwood this year