Airlines removing lifevests

Just heard that Air Canada's regional carrier Jazz is removing life vests from the planes in order to reduce loads carried. Since Jazz is an airline that does not fly over the oceans, it is reasonable safe. However, they do fly over the Great Lakes, which are not your backyard ponds. So just relying on the seat cushions as flotation aids if your plane is forced to land on water in Lake Superior may not be fun. Life vests add about a pounds of weight per piece, so the regional planes are expected to reduce their loads by about 50 lbs each. But then, the probability of water landings is fairly low, so it is a reasonable decision. However, this still adds a question marks against the safety guarantee on Jazz planes. It remains to be seen if other airlines also follow suit on domestic-over land only- flights with this type of policy. Airline safety is one of the best established industry practices and fairly well regulated compared to many industries. Air Canada, the larger airline group, however will retain life vests on its planes which fly over the oceans of the world to different continents.
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Finding Low Airfares Day of the Week

I saw a recent article at the Middle Seat blog that talks about Wed morning probably being the best day to find cheap airfares. Some credibility is given to this notion by at least two of the major airlines that do publicize their sale fares starting Tuesday "e-fare sale" (United) and "Net SAAver" fares (American) on Tuesday afternoon.
If this leads to other airlines scrambling to match fares, then Tuesday night/Wed morning does seem like a good time search for fares. Of course, in today's algorithmic world, you do not need to sit in front of the computer the whole time. You can set up your preferences on sites like Yapta, Farecast or other airfare tracking websites and just wait for the good news in your email box. Then you need to act quick and snag the fare. I have had positive experiences with Yapta helping me get into a fare that went down for a week or so. I bought it then, to see it go up afterward. I have nt had an occasion of an airline fare going down in price or going into discount. In such cases, you could apparently get vouchers from some airlines, like United or Alaksa/Horizon Air, but not with some others like US Airways and others, which charge 'change' fees from 50-150 dollars, wiping out any savings.

Magsformiles update 2008

Info on getting magazines for Airline frequent flier miles can be found in this post. If you are looking for paid subscriptions (from a trusted vendor), please use this referral link:

Magazine Subscriptions From Amazon

Partial List of Airlines sites that allow redemption of award miles to magazines

American Airlines: https://americanairlines.mpmvp.com/magazine/
In my personal opinion, issues like The Wall Street Journal - 230 and Conde Nast are good deals. But then I like that stuff!

• Barrons, Conde Nast Traveler, Fast Company, New York Magazine, Wine Spectator and several others are great choices for leisure or useful (read as "forming money making ideas") reading.

Continental Airlines (link fixed now): http://www.continental.com/web/en-us/content/onepass/rewards/other/default.aspx

• Seems to have magazines as well as some kind of discount deal (50% off) on merchandise. Check the prices, do the math and then use it. I have not reviewed this as I have never earned Onepass in my life. ( I can't believe none of the 30-40 people who clicked the above link told me it was pointing to American airlines, oh Geez!)
  

Delta Airlines (may need to log in): https://delta.mpmvp.com/magazine/choose.asp

• Comparable to the deal you get with AA miles (probably same provider)
  

HAWAIIAN AIRLINES
http://www.magsformiles.com/hawaiian


Northwest Airlines: https://nwa.mpmvp.com/magazine/choose.asp

• Same deal as AA or Delta miles (plus it is going to merge with Delta soon, yes? New website is pretty "fancy")
  

United Airlines (zip code needed) http://www.newspaper-miles.com/readermiles.asp

• Penn State (only WSJ newspaper -but the deal is sweet) http://www.newspaper-miles.com/n_p_list_readermiles.asp?fzip=16801&source=ual
  
  
• On the west coast, in Santa Barbara you get LA times or WSJ (no comment on deal) http://www.newspaper-miles.com/n_p_list_readermiles.asp?fzip=93117&source=ual

US Airways
For US Airways, one needs to visit this link:
http://www.usairways.com/awa/content/dividendmiles/usemiles.aspx
You will see two listings under

Subscriptions for miles

Newspapers (via Points.com only)
Magazines (via US Airways itself)
(NOTE: A window will pop up so turn off your pop up blocker on US Airways website)
Points.com (portal to manage airline miles and points and swap):

• By the far, the steepest conversion losses will be incurred here. BUT, you have some additional flexibility. For one, you can convert miles at rates ranging from 0.8 cent/mile, which is lower than my threshold of 1c/mile to as low as 0.4 cent/mile (bad).
  
  The approximate conversion rate to amazon.com gift certificate value* is discussed here. Currently points.com sign up seems to be free.
  
  I converted some about to expire 13,000 US airways miles from my mom's Dividend miles account to some my Amazon cash. Of course I gave her some gold jewelry as a gift so it evens out.

Reference "Something for Nothing" is from the US Today Article located online at: http://www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/miles/2004-09-03-askrandy_x.htm

* This is equal to getting "store credit" at Amazon.com, you need to have an amazon.com account or need to create one for this purpose.

Converting Airlines Miles to Amazon Certificates

This post explains some conversions of airline miles (AAdvantage, US Airways etc), on the miles swap website points.com (details true as of Aug 19, 2008 when logged in from US for my account). If you are completely new to Points.com, make sure you use the "Start Here" link in the green menu bar at the top of the points.com site.

For info on magazines for miles go back in time.


Your actual conversions might be different. Briefly, it seemed to me that AA miles convert better than US Airways for getting Amazon cash.

Points.com does give you flexibility in terms of coverage from Aeroplan, US Airways or America West miles, Frontier, Delta, American Airlines, Amex Membership pts, IcelandAir, Midwest, Hawaiian and a few others.


As you can see in the image above (click for larger size) you can convert points on points.com to a variety of gift certificates with Avis or Macy's or Amazon or Gap, TJMaxx etc.. Each have their own conditions and restrictions but it might be worth converting free miles that you got somewhere.

But when it comes to converting any of these to something that you want, be prepared to lose 50, to even 70-80% of the value at times. But hey, if you earned all the miles through credit cards or paid business travel, why not just spend them and stop worrying about expiry.

One way to convert obscure miles in random amounts (like 6000, 11345 etc) to something useful is the Amazon Gift Certificate option. You seem to get a good deal from AA, No deal from Delta and a stingy deal from US airways miles. I did not review other programs as I don't have any miles in them.

For example let us try to swap a hypothetical 30000 miles Swap 29,882 AAdvantage® program miles for a $127 Amazon.com gift certificate,

In contrast, check how much devalued US Airways Dividend Miles are: swap 29,412 Dividend Miles® miles for a $25 Amazon.com gift certificate

This is on top of the fact that, when you get any Dividend Miles Credit Card** you have to pay the Annual fee ($85) from the first year itself. (the post diverges here to talk about credit cards)

In my opinion, the Dividend miles card is NOT WORTH IT Go for some cash back cards instead if you really need a rewards credit card. However I did end up using some 15,294 Dividend miles for a $13 Amazon cert. Hey otherwise those miles were going to expire and go waste.

The only other option I had was to donate it to Make a Wish Foundation, but I had already done that to 5000 American miles before so I didnt want to do it again so soon.

Note that the 30,000 miles on AA can get almost free ticket to Latin America or Puerto Rico from US. (off peak of course).

25000 on US Airways may get you a free ticket or maybe not. Depends on the route and your luck and the temperature in Wisconsin (I made that up, but there is no way to figure out Airline FF awards, haha).

** Link to Dividend miles card information: Card Info

Value of Airline miles and credit cards

While going through yahoo finance and looking at Mastercard's stock price, I came across this article on mileage credit cards. This article several points that have always been running through my head and a few more, so I decided to 'repost' a small portion of it here. I will not be posting the entire article as you can see it on Yahoo or in New York Times. (log in might be required on NYT site).

?? To Keep an Airline Credit Card or Not ?? Ask yourself these questions (Bullet points modified a little from RON LIEBER's article in New York Times.

DO YOU CARRY A BALANCE? If you don’t pay your bill in full each month, you’re excused from this discussion. No credit cards for you actually. Well maybe you can try to snag a 0% APR, but remember you do have to pay back at sometime.

DO YOU HAVE ELITE STATUS? Some airlines — like American, Northwest, United and Continental — carve out additional inventory of free seats at their lower mileage levels for some or all customers with elite status. That inventory, plus the bonus miles that most airlines still offer to elite members, make a mileage credit card more attractive.

ARE YOU A BIG SPENDER? If you’re wealthy, or can run business expenses through your card, you can earn six figures in miles from card spending alone each year. A huge mileage balance gives you the ability to exchange those miles for premium-class overseas tickets, which could cost $10,000 or more if you bought them with cash. Miles are worth a lot more if you redeem them for this sort of travel.

ARE YOUR CHILDREN IN SCHOOL? If they are, you’ll be fighting everyone else who wants to travel at the same time. The airlines, knowing your desperation to get out of town, may make fewer free seats available during school vacations, since the airline will probably sell all the seats on those flights anyway. EXCEPTION: Some cards like United MP Visa, American express with membership rewards and Delta American Express might have some benefit even in blackout date travel because they let you pay for your airline ticket by using the miles/points you earned on the credit card. United calls this " CHOICES", Amex just uses points and DELTA - they have some name, but the concept it similar. Typical cost sonversion is 1 cent per mile (point), not the usual 25000 mile/ticket shill Delta's program is complicated because conversion starts to become profitable only for tickets costing above $100 or better yet, over $250 [not hard nowadays huh?]. So if your ticket costs $350 and you want to apply 25000 miles/points, it will reduce your cost by $250 (in most cases). Amex charges an extra $7 service fee, take note.

The article covers cards that let you earn miles (like United Mileage Plus Visa card, Delta American Express Card, US Airways Dividend Mastercard etc), hotel cards like Starwood American Express ($45 fee but woth it, especially because of Amex's insurance products that come with the card), Hilton Honors Citicard (fee) or Hilton Honors American Express (no annual fee), and general points cards that come from other banks.
I have personally given up on the Citi AAdvantage card because of the high spend requirements and the absence of an AA flight from my area.
Anyway I just thought of this:

Starwood is still good
Amex Hilton is right on
Hilton Citi, please have some pity
With Capital one, I waste time on phone

Ok, the last one is just for a finish, I have never had a Cap one no hassles card so I should not put them down much.

Good luck flying, but keep making sure you pay your bills fully month to month on the credit cards you have!

Then versus now: 2006 to 2008: USA- Education vs Economy

I came across an article on TIME.com that talks about "foreign investment" in USA Inc. At the same it reminded me of an old (2006!) TIME article that I had bookmarked, which spoke more about the lead which US still maintains in technological education. While these two articles do not compare the same issues, but it was still interesting to note the changing perspectives of the writers. The writers of the two articles are completely different people, but when a common man reads it, they are going to be thinking not much about the author, but more about the current state of things. I leave the judgment to you.

Additional note on cross border investments: When it comes to foreign investment in US, some economists seem very concerned that it may not be useful in the long run, but their viewpoint seems to be from a narrow perspective. When you look at the global picture, as long individual is diversified across major economies of the world (through the companies or sectors they own), then the shifts in global currency strengths should even out. One example would be Coca cola (NYSE: KO). Several years back, when KO was investing in India, there was considerable opposition to a foreign company coming in. But, turn the clock forward several years and Indian companies such as Thums-Up happily let themselves to be acquired by Coca cola (because it made financial sense and it would have futile to compete with Coke and Pepsi.

Disclaimer: This is not an endorsement to invest in any of the companies mentioned above. Additionally at the time of writing this post, I do not hold any positions in any of the companies mentioned.

Airlines' Goodwill Gestures towards Active Duty Personnel

Several airlines are waiving the third bag checked fee which was being levied on active duty service personnel. This is clearly a sincere attempt by the major airlines to curtail the negative PR generated by recent news articles. Continental and Northwest, Airtran, United both announced fee waivers on Friday. While this is a generous gesture, (as a potential shareholder in airlines I feel) essentially this amounts to a subsidy to the DOD (Department of Defense of the taxpayers of United States of America). So one important thing that airlines and their individual retail shareholders could do is to write to the DOD to make sure that the DOD reimburse the airlines in some form. One solution would be for airlines to collect vouchers from the soldiers and then forward the same to DOD, which could them reimburse them on a quarterly basis.

American Airlines Fined for Safety Violations

The FAA has proposed a fine against American Airlines (NYSE: AMR) up to $7.1 million for deferring much necessary safety and maintenance actions on two of its planes. The fine also covers some other violations relating to substance abuse, etc

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - American Airlines, a unit of AMR Corp (NYSE:AMR - News), knowingly flew planes that needed safety repairs, the U.S. government charged on Thursday in a letter that proposed a $7.1 million fine against the carrier.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said the fine, one of the biggest ever, also covered accusations of deficiencies in American's drug and alcohol testing programs and alleged violations of inspection procedures for aircraft exit lighting. Earlier this year FAA had fined Southwest (LUV) about $10 million.
Click Here for More (takes you to an external site).

This action did not seem to have much of an impact on the stock price however because oil prices have been on a downtrend lately. In somewhat unrelated news, but in a bid to bolster public relations, American Airlines announced that it is waiving the third bag fee which was imposed on active duty military members. Although the fee was reimbursable, the effort the military members had to spend to recoup the charges were recognized as substantial by AA and hence they are removing the fee as a goodwill gesture. You can read about it here in a St. Louis newspaper.
American is a member of the Oneworld Airline Alliance.

Delta Nortwest Merger and Frequent Flier Miles

I recently read an article here about somebody's plan trying to book an award ticket next Spring for two people to Hawaii for the cost of $90. My first issue with that is this is a very very risky venture with a low chance of success. Why Skyteam you may ask? Many frequent travelers think that when it comes to award redemption, Skyteam is the toughest. I joined the ranks of those people with a first hand experience in that process recently!

[While the premise of flying free with DL miles is good, the author needs to back it up with past successful results with Delta/NW on getting free flights in this manner or they will get a serious reality check]

Coming back to the issue at hand, saver economy tickets (35,000 miles per ticket on Delta) to Hawaii are the hardest to find because they are gone usually 330 days ahead of time. Or, the opening day of award seat availability for most airline ticket systems. The author's son is planning a trip in next spring, good luck buddy. I really wish you good luck but it's gonna be hard especially after the NW/DAL merger. However, if you ever read this post, make sure you read my story just below this post and make sure you look for availability on delta or continental websites and then call an agent with some probably date ranges - and do it the moment you get your miles in the account!

Additional notes
By the way the cost of $90 for 2 tix is far from accurate. Airlines are already imposing ($25-$50) fuel surcharges, $5 to book online award tickets e.g American, US Airways]. So while the thought is noble in the author teaching his son how to travel at a discount (yes that is what I can call it, not free travel), they need to be made aware of possible sticker shocks which could add up to $50-100 per ticket including surchrages and airport taxes and other fees). Of course this would still be cheaper than the $500-700 per ticket. Also to be noted is that sometimes, to book an award ticket for a relative/friend using your miles, you may not be able to use the website but have to call a reservations agent - which means an automatic $25-30 fee. I don't blame the airlines for the fuel surcharges, but a lot of other fees are the bane of air travel nowadays.
A small tip regarding award travel: to reduce your baggage fees try booking on Continental - it seems to be the one Skyteam airline as of now that is not charging a 1st bag fee. i wonder if this is due to the fact that CO's main market is Houston - where it competes with Southwest - which has not imposed a 1st bag fee yet. Otherwise be ready to pony up $15 to carry your nail clippers and shampoo bottle in checked luggage :).

There is one other option which the author could have elaborated. Even if you cannot book an award ticket directly, Delta might buy back your miles at the rate of 1c/mile if you use the Amer express Delta card and pay for your trip using the miles. This is similar to the Choices program by United. More details behind those links in the fine print. This way, a person could redeem some of the miles earned using the Delta card - note that the Northwest miles which convert to Delta might not work in this process - no guarantees. So given all these hoops one has to jump through it seems like a better idea would probably be to learn value investing or swing trading and make good money and then pay full fare tickets and use the miles to bump to business class. Disclaimer: Risks are a given in stock investing and trading which might include a loss of all your capital and maybe some more. There are also tax issues with capital gains.