Today’s the last day for Amtrak’s 50% points bonus on purchases of at least 5k points.  Even at the normal point prices, purchasing points for an award is cheaper than a cash fare–especially for last minute travel–on some routes such as the Northeast Regional and Amtrak’s special routes for 1k awards.

There’s been a TSA policy of asking passengers to say their name at the ID/boarding pass check for a few  months now.

I went through the checkpoint at JFK Terminal 7 tonight, I finally got a taste.  The TSO asked every passenger in the elite line to say their name, myself included, prompting me to remind him that it was on both my US passport and boarding pass.  Faced with a DYWTFT situation, I said my last name, but he was unhappy with my pronunciation.  He wasn’t happy with my first pronunciation so he had me say it again along with my first name.

I asked why and got the response “Don’t you want to be safe? Someone could be using someone else’s ID.”  While there’s been some discussion that it’s to catch users of fake IDs who don’t bother to know the name on it, the alternative ID hypothesis is probably similarly implausible.  “There’s a lot of dumb criminals,” he went on to say.  Rather than invoke the fact that the 9/11 hijackers used their actual names in an airport, I moved forth to receive my grope as Terminal 7 consistently has the backscatters on.

There’s another mourner:  Seth at The Wandering Aramean.  The loss of both the 2% cashback and no foreign transaction fees have left me searching for a new primary credit card.

The Wall Street Journal discusses how “20-Somethings Rack Up Frequent-Flier Miles to Take Far-Flung Journeys; Flying to Fiji for Lunch” in its Middle Seat column.

FlyerTalk hypothesizes that the Audience Rewards Trivia Contest for US Airways miles might count as a hit.  It takes a moment and the answers can be readily found on the Internet.

Airfare Watchdog points out Air Canada’s 15% off coupon (FLYDEC15) for US/Canada travel through December 15, booked by midnight September 25 and a world-wide discount (FLYFEB29) booked by midnight September 25th.

UA Insider announced next year’s changes to Mileage Plus on FlyerTalk, on MilePoint, and United’s website.

To first cover the issues… The rumored speculation about revenue requirements never came (To quote UA Insider, “Heard any good rumors lately?”).

• For Gold (50k) and Platinum (75k) elites, the redeemable mileage bonus is being cut to 50% and 75% respectively.
• “Complimentary premier upgrades” now work anywhere that there is non-premium, “domestic” equipment with the exception of transpacific, HNL-GUM, and TYO-SIN/BKK nonstops.  Since the domestic routes for p.s. (JFK-LAX/SFO) and BusinessFirst to Hawaii (IAH/EWR-HNL) are considered superior to ordinary domestic cabins, these routes are not eligible.
• Regional premier upgrades (former CR1s) continue to work on p.s. and are evidently expanded to include BusinessFirst to Hawaii.
• Full/nearly-full fare economy tickets clear for upgrades before instruments; instruments (including miles) clear before elite upgrades.  Companion upgrades have gone the way of United’s policy (e.g., advance clearance with the elite).
• Silvers (25k) have had their baggage allowance cut to one free, 50lb bag and cannot access Economy Plus seats until check-in.
• Lifetime million-mile status will be assessed by butt-in-seat miles as United uses.  Since Continental used EQM for its calculations, United intends to do a one-time adjustment of United lifetime balances to account for EQM.  The respective targets at 1, 2, 3, and 4 million miles are Gold, Platinum, 1K, and Global Services.  This marks an official path to GS qualification outside of the steep (>$50k/yr) revenue requirements.
• Platinum and 1Ks get their Global Entry fee ($100) paid for by United.

Historically, the “island hopper,” a domestic CO737 making 4 or 5 stops on HNL-GUM, has been eligible for complimentary upgrades (and by my reading of the rules, it still is).  Consequently, it’s possible to fly from New York to Hong Kong in (essentially domestic) First for the price of an economy ticket (EWR/NYC-ORD/LAX/SNA/SFO-HNL-GUM-HKG)

Since there are no Saturday night redeyes from Denver to the New York-area, I caught a 7PM flight from Denver to Los Angeles to connect to the LAX-JFK p.s. redeye.  As a reminder, Gogo has a sponsored 30 minute window of free wifi on p.s. flights for the remainder of September.

On the eve of the tenth anniversary of 9/11, my TSA experience couldn’t have been better.  The TSO administering the patdown was a physics student and consequently empathized with passengers who opted out of the naked-scan.

I had the chance to spend some time in one of United’s A320 simulators as part of a charity auction on behalf of the Captain Jason Dahl Scholarship Fund.  Jason Dahl was captain of United 93 on September 11, 2001.  The Dahl Fund provides aviation scholarships to students.   While I won’t post my simulator photos here at the request of the volunteers who helped out and made the opportunity available, I did come across a copy of a 1938 United Airlines advertisement by artist Arthur C. Radebaugh:

We stayed at the Grand Hyatt Denver.

The Diamond amenity was three pieces of fruit from a family-run, local orchard.

On Saturday, my subtour group visited Wings over the Rockies, a local aviation museum built on the site of Lowery Air Force Base.

The passenger security fee might be going up as part of Obama’s deficit reduction program.  Matthew at Upgrd reminds us of the bits of the TSA we don’t need:  whole body imaging.

I arrived at the airport with enough time to visit the Air Canada Maple Leaf Lounge in the US-side of Montreal Airport.

In addition to seating, the lounge had a small snack area and self-serve bar.

Our charter aircraft was parked at YUL overnight and had to be towed to our gate.  Conveniently, it went past the lounge.

At the gate:

A ranking of North American airlines’ award availability was produced and is discussed at the Frequent Flier blog.

There are a few issues with assessing award availability.  The inclusion of Southwest and Jetblue, airlines whose frequent flier programs fix award prices according to the revenue cost of the ticket, puzzles me.  How does one fail to find a Southwest RR2.0 award (assuming a sufficiently large point bankroll)?

For the trip from Chicago to Montreal to Denver, StarMegaDo3 was on a chartered Continental 737.  Continental assigned us its 737 in its retrolivery:

My legroom on this flight gave me a reminder to be thankful for my exit rows, economy plus seating, and first class upgrades:

Participants packed into the United Red Carpet Clubs to kill time while waiting for our flight:

The Hyatt in Montreal left a bit to be desired:

Even with 160 Diamond members running amok, I was disappointed that I wound up on the 5th floor (out of approximately 15).  With the exception of its RFID-operated doorlocks, the hotel disappointingly showed its age despite having the highest room rate amongst the three StarMegaDo3 Hyatts (189 CAD/nt base).

Air Canada held a reception at the near by Westin in Montreal, gifting each of us with a Air Canada 777 model:

I didn’t return straight to New York from Kahului.  Instead, I ventured to Chicago via San Francisco and Las Vegas to pick up the start of StarMegaDo3.  My upgrades to First Class cleared for OGG-SFO-LAS-ORD, making the redeye from Kahului substantially more bearable.

Since I had the same aircraft and cabin crew for the LAS-ORD segment as I had for SFO-LAS, the flight attendants were understandably confused when they saw me get back onto the A320 to sit in the same seat in first class.  The routing ended up being a quirk of pricing:  The cost of OGG-SFO-LAS plus LAS-ORD was lower than the comparable OGG-SFO-ORD fare.  With a few minutes to kill before boarding commenced, I snapped off a picture of the welcome sign near the United gates:

The first night for StarMegaDo3 was at the Hyatt Regency Chicago O’Hare.  Because Hyatt had gifted Diamond status, the top-tier with the Gold Passport rewards program, it was difficult for the hotel to deliver substantial upgrades.

The Hyatt Diamond amenity, normally a choice of either a snack or 1k points, was restricted to just the snack.  It was delivered to our rooms while at the StarMegaDo reception at the Park Hyatt downtown.

While the reception at the Park Hyatt was too dark for my camera to capture well, the two Tulip-branded, United wine classes that we were given as swag survived my trip around North America long enough to make it back to New York with me… and to be photographed:

I applied for and was approved for an Amex PRG card in August.  After getting my card, I activated it and then called in to apply code 6661.  On that day, the agent informed me that I was eligible, the code had been applied to my account, a notation had been made, and that I would likely need to call in to see the points post after reaching $1k in spending

My last purchase to reach $1k in spending this morning, so I called Amex MR.  The agent told me I was not targeted and consequently ineligible.  She then transfered me to a supervisor.  The supervisor informed me that while the agent I had spoken to had, in fact, made a notation in my account and given me the T&C of the promotion, American Express would not be honoring the promotion because I hadn’t been targeted.  While the agent in August was speaking with me, he had contacted their “operations manager” who had notated my account to indicate that I was not eligible for the promotion while I was on hold, yet the agent returned to the phone to tell me I was eligible.

For misrepresenting my eligibility, the supervisor told me that the employee would receive a “verbal warning.”  The supervisor understood my concern with the bait-and-switch, but could not provide any gesture of goodwill (even a single MR point) because of the operations manager’s directive.  As a bit of background to her denial, the supervisor informed me that while historically, Amex has happily honored promotions for nontargeted cardholders who call to apply them, they would no longer due to a “blog post” which attracted “attention.”

Since hanging up and calling again is a tried and true strategy for dealing with customer service, I called back tonight and the agent and her supervisor I spoke to had the same story (and noted that there was a record of my call earlier today).

From my six Starwood stays during the earlier promotion, I had two free resort nights that I used for my stay at the Westin Ka’anapali Ocean Resort Villas, a Category 6 Starwood hotel that normally retails for a minimum of $329 (base) per night or 20k Starwood points.

After parking my rental car, I ended up in the main lobby to find that I was booked for the neighboring north complex:

At dusk:

The hotel lobby:

Under the free resort nights promotion, stays booked into the least expensive room on the property:  A “Deluxe Island View Studio Villa.”

While not necessary for my stay, the couch also serves as a double bed.

Since this property is actually a timeshare resort, it came with a kitchen for extended stays.

The bathroom featured a whirlpool and a closeable window out to the main room.

As is custom, I offer my unexciting TV picture.

Each of the complexes is built around open pool and lounge areas.  There’s a Koi pond in the foreground.

The hotel has an extensive beachfront:

“The problem in defense is how far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without.” – Dwight D. Eisenhower

The USA Today reports “at least five…flights were disrupted Sunday because of security concerns.”  Racial profiling is alive and well.  It’s a sad sign of the times when not filing charges for suspicious behavior is newsworthy.

Sadly, national calamities have been better handled without long-lasting disruption to civil liberties.

For my hop from Honolulu to Kahului, I was an a United-marketed codeshare operated by Hawaiian Airlines.  HNL is an open airport:

Hawaiian uses Boeing 717’s for its inter-island flights.  They feature a first class as well, but for a 100 mile trip, I’m skeptical of the value.

My codeshare meant that I wasn’t able to check-in online or at a kiosk, but it fortunately turned up an exit row seat.  I didn’t feel like paying for Internet access while waiting for my flight and Hawaiian doesn’t indicate that its seats are exit rows on the boarding pass, so I almost walked past my seat when boarding.

To reach Honolulu, I flew on United 421 from Newark to Honolulu with a stop in San Francisco to change planes from an A320 to a Boeing 777.  Since United’s domestic non-p.s. first class is rather uniform, I’ll omit the standard photo of the seat and legroom for brevity.

United flights to Hawaii have a “Halfway to Hawaii” game sponsored by Hilton.  The prize is just a CD; previously, the prizes had ranged from wine to Hawaiian-produced nuts.

I stayed at the Sheraton Princess Kaiulani.  While the hotel felt old and dated, the prepaid rate of $69 (after a $40 discount from American Express) seemed decent for a hotel on Kauakana Avenue in Waikiki.

The room could have used a bit of work on its view:  The parking lot.

I attended StarMegaDo3 last week.  To position myself for the start of its North American portion in Chicago, I trekked from from New York via Honolulu and Kahului.  Plotted with gcmap, my routing looks like:

In lieu getting my photos online of my trip out of New York to Chicago (via Hawaii) or of the events themselves, I offer the Wall Street Journal’s coverage (for the time being).

The Gogo company representative on FlyerTalk announced that passengers on United’s p.s. service (JFK-LAX and JFK-SFO) will have 30 minutes of complimentary internet access during the month of September.

Depending on how well publicized this is to passengers actually on board these aircraft, service quality should range from normal to a true tragedy of the commons.