Recent Activity Timeline

*A doesn't have an alliance-wide seating benefit for elites. So, you'll have to pay for seat assignments (extra legroom, bulkhead, exit, "preferred," regular, etc.), regardless of status. There are a few exceptions. UA GS and M&M HON have a few expanded perks on UA/LH Group, including preferre...

@jimmys-travel-report-2 Unfortunately, over the last year United has started offering essentially no business awards to partners like Avianca. Your best bet now is to book this kind of award directly with United as a card holder. Interesting related note, if you have trouble getting approved or do n...

There is an actual airline in Australia by the name of Alliance Airlines and they are not aligned with Star, oneworld, or Sky Team. So I am guessing you’re not getting seats assigned there. It seems you are flying Air Canada and want to use your UAMP/*Gold status to get preferred seats assigned for ...

This is sadly not a Star gold benefit and they are not open to booking for free for non AC elites. The only thing I would recommend is do online checkin when it opens and try your luck. The alliance benefits are slowly being hollowed out and the focus on own elites and in some cases partners is cl...

We went in March. We found AA DFW-AKL for 83k pp on the new 787-9P (grabbed the first row suites as well). Could not find anything for the way back but was lucky enough to see AKL-LAX on Delta One for $2400pp so I bought those tix, helping us with DL status renewal as well.

@gp_7676 I was going to suggest the same, but via HNL. HA and NZ operate the service. Getting to Hawaii from Seattle is the easy part.

@jjspring It's a great question, especially as the major hotel groups become increasingly less compelling (in terms of execution of elite perks, award redemption values, etc.). The truth is that there are so many programs nowadays offering elite-like perks for stays at luxury properties, like Virtuo...

Ben- So many hotel posts (across the blogosphere) are focused on the top 4 chains. What are some of your favorite smaller chains that offer elite-like benefits when booked correctly?