1. Delta has a SkyMiles award sale for flights to and from the US booked by tomorrow night:

    – Mexico and the Caribbean: 11,000 miles round-trip
    – Asia and the Pacific: 70,000 miles round-trip

    Both of these are economy prices, and only the first is competitive relative to other programs. For Diamonds with global upgrade certificates, Premium Select fares are also pricing lower than typical, but still too high relative to other mileage programs.
  2. You can now book flights on Taipei based Starlux Airlines with Alaska MileagePlan miles. Flights are decently priced (or “collapsed economy cheap” compared to Delta, see above):

    – 20,000 miles each way to Asia in Coach
    – 40,000 miles each way to Asia in Premium Economy
    – 60,000 miles each way to Asia in Business

    (Thanks to DDG)
  3. Aeroplan now lets you change an itinerary online. I think you’re in exactly one of two-camps about this news:

    – Boring (If you’ve never called Aeroplan’s call center)
    – Fan-freaking-tastic (If you have called Aeroplan’s call center)

    Currently it only works with bookings that don’t involve vouchers or credits, but my assumption is that’s the majority of your Aeroplan bookings.

Delta’s inspiration for SkyMiles premium cabin bookings.

  1. American Express has new offers for 20,000 Membership Rewards after $4,000 in spend in six months for new employee cards, limit five per account for Business Golds and Business Platinums at last year’s generic links:

    – Business Gold
    – Business Platinum

    The POID on these is K4IY:9976, and the offer has been alive for several weeks (first discovered by reader Jon via MEAB slack), but just hit mainstream yesterday. It’s also been out long enough that American Express customer service confirmed that the offers are properly attached.
  2. Southwest has an airfare sale for flights to, from, and within California through the end of day today using promo code 29OFF. The sale:

    – $29 fares one-way with requisite asterisks within California
    – 29% off of fares on flights to or from California, also with asterisks

    Travel is valid between August 15 and February 14, 2024 for the continental US, and there’s some availability early next year for Hawaii too. For bonus points, do some schedule research and parlay this sale into Thanksgiving travel.
  3. JetBlue has $25 off of one-way flights and $50 off of round-trip flights using promo code FALLTRAVEL booked by this evening for travel between September 6 and November 15. Of course this one has a few asterisks too, because capitalism.
  4. Yes, earlier this week we reported that Kroger would have a 4x fuel points promotion on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. That wasn’t incorrect, but Kroger is laughing up at us from hell by having an overlapping 4x fuel points promotion on third party gift cards and fixed value Visa and Mastercard gift cards between today and August 8.

    If you’re playing this game with AmExes, just watch out for certain purchases to avoid points clawbacks; remember it’s them, hi, they’re they problem it’s them.

The cable industry learned their asterisk game from the airlines.

  1. Alaska and American’s shopping portals now have spending bonuses to match United and Southwest’s:

    – Alaska: 1,200 bonus miles for $600 or more in spend through August 14
    – AA: 2,000 bonus miles for $700 in or more in spend through August 13

    For AA Loyalty Point hunters, remember that portal bonuses don’t become Loyalty Points but regular spend does, often even when it shouldn’t.
  2. Alaska Airlines has a great promotion for flights between Kona, Hawaii and the continental US with promo code KONABOGO: Buy one, get one free tickets booked by this evening for travel between August 13 and October 31. There are day-of-week requirements but they’re not too onerous. Given Alaska’s route map, this should be extra exciting for best coasters west coasters.

    Word on the street is that the BOGO isn’t actually coding properly in the buyer’s favor, don’t be afraid to experiment.
  3. Alaska also has a 10% off flights to and from other Hawaiian cities using the same promo code, KONABOGO.
  4. American Express Offers has new Delta airfare statement credits:

    – $75 off of $250 or more
    – $150 off of $500 or more

    The absolute simplest way to game these is to book a non-basic economy flight, wait more than 24 hours, then cancel it. You’ll have a flight credit valid for a year, effectively locking the offer in for later. That concludes offer gaming 101. Now, study for 201 and 202.
  5. Everyone seems to be really excited that American Express Fine Hotels and Resorts bookings can now be changed. I guess it’s not unexciting, but personally I think that the true hack this could unlock won’t actually work. Go ahead AmEx, prove me wrong.
  6. In theory American Express has targeted more people at last year’s link for the Personal Gold card with 100,000 Membership Rewards after $4,000 in spend in three months; I haven’t been able to independently confirm this one though. (Thanks to DoC)

Happy Tuesday!

American Express is out there playing 1D chess to outwit our puny 2D chess playing, FHR booking brains.

  1. Staples has a fee-free promotion on $200 Visa gift cards running through Saturday, limit eight per transaction. On a related note, there have been rumblings that Staples has been rolling out $500 variable load gift cards for the last month or two, and it seems like they may have finished that rollout. Those aren’t fee-free, but they are another option.

    These are Metabank Pathward gift cards so have a liquidation plan in place before you buy too many.
  2. Kroger will have a (probably) final summer weekend 4x fuel points promotion Friday, Saturday, and Sunday on third party gift cards and fixed value Visa and Mastercard gift cards.
  3. Costco is selling $500 Alaska Airlines gift cards for $449.99, limit five per member. (Thanks to GCG)
  4. Airfrance and KLM’s FlyingBlue program now allows stopovers on award tickets for no additional charge, either one-way or round-trip, which is an amazing opportunity for travel hackers, especially if you’re able to talk your way into multiple stopovers on a single itinerary, which may or may not be permitted. The quick overview:

    – The length of the stop-over can be between 24 hours and 365 days
    – Different airlines can be combined on a single itinerary

    You currently can’t book these online, so you’ve got to call FlyingBlue directly. In my experience FlyingBlue representatives are some of the most competent out there despite their reputation, the main downside is a typical 10-30 minute wait to talk to one, even as an elite. (Thanks to FM)
  5. PSA: American Express’s sign-up bonus system has been having teething issues for a little over a month. Previously sign-up bonuses on most cards would post within two business days of hitting minimum spend, but recently it’s taken between 7 and 10 days. When it does post, it’ll be back-dated to the day after hitting spend, so it can be hard to track if you’re not watching carefully.

    With AmEx, it’s like a middle-school breakup – it’s not you, it’s them.

Happy Monday!

A text message exchange extracted from American Express’s phone in 7th grade.

There was an isolated group of shutdowns on a relatively lucrative play yesterday, the details don’t matter much for the sake of today’s post but the mechanics matter a lot. The gist is that there was a rash of\ shutdowns that all could be explained as guilt by association, and we saw non-shutdowns where there was no clear association. (Yes, we’re dealing with another obtuse MEAB post, sorry.)

There’s a natural dichotomy in miles and points where one side tugs toward sharing and scaling as a group, and another side pulls at isolation and keeping something in your own pocket. Of course sharing is key for scale and trust is paramount to sharing; but when a bank can link you and someone else on the internet, you’ve got a decent shot at becoming collateral damage when the ban-hammer drops.

The takeaway? Isolate your financial transactions to maximize a play’s longevity (to the extent that such a thing is possible), but trust and share details in your inner circle as long as a bank can’t link you.

Have a nice weekend!

That’s one way to maintain plausible deniability.

Editor’s note: Oopsie on yesterday’s grammar 🤦‍♀️. The good news is that I’ve fixed it and now there’s no google-indexable evidence. Take that robot overlords!

Today’s quick hits:

  1. Kroger is running an in-store 4x fuel points promotion on third party gift cards and fixed value Visa and Mastercards for the second weekend in a row, valid Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

    Fuel points and gift card resale markets continue to climb with more supply bringing new demand from the sidelines back into the game. (Thanks to GCG)
  2. Chase Offers has an offer for 10% back on up to either $500 or $750 spend at Marriott Hotels through July 31. Yes, it’s easily gameable.
  3. American Express offers has two airfare offers:

    – 17,500 Membership Rewards after $1,000 or more in spend at ITA Airways
    – $250 back with $1,250 or more in spend at Qantas Airways

    Both are gameable, but might be a little bit of work.

Happy Thursday!

MEAB switches from blogging to street painting with stupendous results.

One of the tenets around here is that you should always keep your points in flexible currencies like Ultimate Rewards or ThankYou Points until you need to book something. Basic, I know.

In the current era of fee free cancellations for (non-basic economy) award tickets though, there’s a strategic reason to hold an airline’s miles directly: they make a great floating backup plan in case your original trip is delayed or cancelled because of massive wildfires, falling inflatable emergency exit slides, or a lost aircraft.

Whenever I have a trip booked, I also book a backup award ticket at a later time in case everything goes United 328. (I also set a reminder in my phone to cancel the backup at my original flight’s departure time.) That means I need to have enough miles in an airline’s program as necessary to support my existing bookings with backups, at least for the next month or two of flights.

Which miles and how many? The first depends on which airport is home and which airline gives you the most options, and the second depends on how many existing bookings you have and how far out your backup plans go. I guess we can borrow from some rando named Einstein, “as few as possible, but no fewer”.

Happy Tuesday!

“It’ll prolly buff out, no need for the backup booking here.”

  1. Walmart has been rolling out new self-checkout software terminals for a little over a year, and now there’s even a new-new self-checkout terminal being rolled out. Each terminal has different uses and what works at one version doesn’t necessarily work at another. Always be probing. (Thanks to Justin)
  2. Southwest has a tiered shopping portal bonus with 2,000 Rapid Rewards points on $500 or more in spend at the top tier. If you could do only one, yesterday’s United portal is almost certainly a better deal. But, why could you do only one?
  3. MGM is getting together with Marriott in a rebound relationship after the Hyatt breakup in an epic love story that’ll be chronicled in Taylor Swift’s new album “From Bad to Worse” (probably).

    All that remains to be seen is how Marriott #bonvoys the relationship. The possibilities are endless, but they’ll certainly fit the “From Bad to Worse” theme.
  4. Costco is doing a thing. These can be quite lucrative but you really better know exactly what you’re doing before you dive in, and don’t forget that you’re also subject to market price fluctuations.
  5. American Express Offers has $250 back on $1,250 or more in airfare with Qatar Airways. It is gameable.

Happy Wednesday!

A sneak peak of “From Bad to Worse” by Taylor Swift, as imagined by Stable Diffusion.