Frequent Flyer tips

With no published award-price charts to refer to, members of Delta’s SkyMiles program don’t know when award prices are higher or lower than normal. That’s because there is no baseline to use as a reference point; there is no normal. Or rather, normal is whatever Delta chooses to publish as the price for an award ticket on a particular flight.

We knew it was coming some time this year, but not exactly when. Now we know.

The Starwood Preferred Guest credit card, issued by American Express, has long been the darling of the miles-and-points set. But with the pending merger of Starwood with Marriott, the card’s future is in doubt.

Today’s announcement that Southwest has a new marketing relationship with a rideshare company was no surprise. As rideshare services have become an ever-larger part of the travel landscape, such tie-ups have proliferated. It won’t be long before every airline and hotel loyalty program has a rideshare company on its roster of points-earning partners.

IHG Rewards this week released its latest list of PointBreaks hotels that are available for booking for just 5,000 points per night.

This week, on March 22, American’s new AAdvantage award chart takes effect, the first in a two-step devaluation of the oldest and largest airline loyalty program.

Following is our regular summary of the latest travel news and best frequent traveler promotions reviewed during the past week.

Need a pre- or post-flight nap, or just a little quiet time in the midst of the airport’s hustle and bustle?

It’s been awhile since Hyatt’s last systemwide bonus promotion. That will be remedied beginning next month, with a new offer that, at least for high-frequency travelers, will have been well worth the wait.

To seasoned travelers, the words “program updates” are the ultimate buzzkill, foreshadowing a raft of customer-unfriendly changes to the loyalty programs they’re invested in.

In a big win for Uber, the ride-sharing service today announced a new partnership with American, the world’s largest airline. “The companies will work together to provide customers faster service, better airport navigation, rider promotions and mileage promotions.”

It’s a fact of loyalty-program life: Airline and hotel programs periodically adjust their award prices. Of course, those adjustments amount to price hikes more often than not. And, all things being equal, higher award prices amount to an overall devaluation of the program.

While the Marriott acquisition of Starwood closed in September, the two companies’ integration is far from complete. In particular, Marriott Rewards and Starwood Preferred Guest continue to operate independently, although members may now link their accounts, transfer points, and have their status matched.

In 2014, at the behest of Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), the DOT’s Office of Inspector General began an audit of U.S. frequent flyer programs, and the DOT’s monitoring thereof, with a particular focus on unfair and deceptive practices (summary, with a link to the full .pdf report, here). The audit results were published this month, with the following headline: “Improvements needed in DOT’s process for identifying unfair or deceptive practices in airline frequent flyer programs.”

Bad news for the airlines often translates as good news for travel consumers.

As changes to hotel-program award prices go, the latest for InterContinental’s IHG Rewards are decidedly modest: Prices for award nights at 400 hotels will change by either 5,000 or 10,000 points, half moving up, half moving down. If it were just that 50-50 split, Rewards members might dismiss it as a wash and count their blessings. After all, “It could have been worse.”

Hilton’s durable HHonors program has a new name: Honors. The second “H,” which stood for Hilton, was deemed unnecessary and apparently caused confusion when it came to pronouncing the program’s name.

You may remember the 100,000-mile bonus for new British Airways credit card sign-ups in 2010.

Starwood’s systemwide “Triple Up” bonus-points offer ends on July 31, and to date there’s been no word of a successor campaign for late summer and early fall stays.

Best Western isn’t known for its generous loyalty-program promotions. The rewards tend to be low value, and the offers have been hobbled by niggling restrictions.

Following is our regular summary of the latest travel news and best frequent traveler promotions reviewed during the past week.