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This one definitely falls under the category of "if I don't make a note to myself right now, I'm going to immediately forget how to do this next time." It's a super-specific problem:  I have a flight leg with a confirmed 40 PlusPoint upgrade into Polaris.  I need to change this leg to a different day/time.  I know that my new flight has PlusPoints ✅ instant-upgrade seats available. (I used Seats.aero and then manually verified the availability on United.com) I'm using United.com to change my flight and the search results only show me one option: a deeply-discounted fare + 80 PlusPoints to upgrade I would prefer an option with a less-discounted fare that only requires 40 PlusPoints I would prefer not to call United to have them sort this out. (In my case, the Australian United phone center is only open normal business hours, not 24/7) The solution: Change the flight on United.com (from a desktop browser) and manually set the 'Search by Fare class' fiel

As previously discussed , we're doing 3-player mode for 2024 (one of us United 1k, one is Plat, one Gold), but as I'm currently booking travel for July, I'm already thinking about status for 2025.  Status match to Qantas? Tim's work visa for the US is delayed ( sigh ), so he likely won't be moving to New York until mid-2025 at the absolute earliest, so there's still going to be lots of trans-Pacific flying happening. Qantas is supposed to launch their new nonstop New York – Sydney service in 2025 , but that will likely be on an unpredictable time schedule much like Tim's work visa. I mention this because I thought that route might make it worth it for him to do the "secret" status match to Qantas (Oneworld) from United 1k.  But even if all of the economics of that worked out, will that flight even be pleasant? With our current situation, I really don't mind the 14 hours between Sydney and the US West Coast, but having to then immediately get o

I mentioned recently that I made the absolute rookie error of not hitting the minimum spend on a new card. It's definitely the kind of thing I'll kick myself about over and over and over again. But then I'm looking at my statement for a different card I was churning and noticed this:  the big work expense I was using to hit the minimum spend unexpectedly coded as one of this card's bonus categories -- meaning that this single transaction yielded me 88,000 more points than I was expecting. This definitely made me feel a bit better about my stupid mistake on the other card. 

Looking over my account and realized that I never got the sign up bonus for a United Quest card I got back in February.  I called.  The rep looked it over. I'd spent $5060 dollars. "Oh but sir, the annual fee of $250 was part of that $5060, and it doesn't count toward the bonus" %#!@ Of course I knew that.  I even have a blog post here telling people to always overshoot the goal by a decent amount to account for returns and unexpected chargebacks and what-not. Such a rookie mistake and I feel like an idiot. I put in for a reconsideration from their marketing team but I'm sure I'll get a no. It's so hard to keep up with the details when you're in the middle of a bunch of travel. 

Update 27 Sept '23 (six weeks after initial post): my favorite email just arrived! The PlusPoints upgrade we requested for my early November flight from SFO to Sydney cleared! The current price difference between Polaris Business and what I paid for Premium Plus is $4470. So we have an upcoming heap of travel for my friends' wedding in Palm Springs, including legs to and from Australia (where the three of us will spend the end-of-year holidays again). I'm looking at our 2024 travel plans, our elite status, and the results of what that elite status got us in 2021-2023. Long story short, I think we're going to voluntarily pay $13,000 for a round-trip Business Class flight to Sydney to get one of us over the finish line for United 1k status .  It's hard for me to even type that . Yes, one of us has had 1k status since the pandemic, but spending $10k to get through Australia's harsh Covid restrictions was our only option back then. Now that it's voluntary, I wan

Well, last summer we had an amazing moment of the marketing matching reality when United held Tim's SFO-SYD flight so people on his belated Newark-SFO flight could make their connection. Fast forward a year and the very same thing happened but with an odd twist... Tim's flight into LAX from Newark is an hour late. We then (happily) get an alert that the Sydney flight is also going to depart late. Upon landing at LAX they ask all Sydney passengers to raise their hands and tell them they have to make a run for it and everyone else on board should stay seated while they disembark.  They rush to the gate, and... the door is shut, jetway pulled back, and the plane is leaving without them. They head over to customer service to see about rebooking and Tim's handed a new boarding pass for the Melbourne flight that's about to leave and lo and behold his Plus Points upgrade to Polaris (from Premium Plus) survived the rebooking and he ended up in row 12 behind Tyra Banks.  Not su

We love Montreal. So much good food and drink. Here's a few of our favorites: FIRST off, we love that LOTS of places are BYOB-only and they'll even give you an ice bucket. The state-run liquor stores are called SAQ. (there's also SQDC for recreational cannabis) Fairmount Bagel . Montreal style bagels are a different animal than NY bagels. Comparisons are tiresome. Just enjoy the difference.  Kem Coba ice cream Wilensky's light lunch. C'mon half-sours and a pineapple soda.  St. Viateur bagel Smoked meat ("Viande Fumée") poutine and sandwich at Schwartz 's Summer fireworks festival viewed from Sky Bar Pizza bouquet   Foie Gras poached eggs at Le Passé Composé   24/7 poutine at La Banquise Reuben pizza at Amelias!  pastries from Mamie Clafoutis Crepes (and beautiful produce  and unpasteurized cheese ) at  Jean Talon  market if you couldn't score a table at Joe Beef, you can still eat their amazing food at Liverpool House Cafe Chez Teta has amazi

We're still waiting on Tim's green card (fingers crossed for sometime in Autumn of this year...), but until that happens there's still a lot of back-and-forth happening. Prices to Australia are still sky-high (north of $10,000 for Business) and award seats are still incredibly scarce. I usually search on United.com using Tim's account because he has 1k status, and I noticed this: A bunch of very-discounted fares from SFO and LAX to Sydney and Auckland. Given that the Saver level for Polaris is now 200,000 points each way, this was a steal . I had a few Chase points to transfer in, but I needed to buy points to top off my account.  So, for $2031 and 168,000 miles, I'm going round trip to Sydney in Polaris and spending the depths of winter enjoying Sydney's Vivid festival and Hobart's Dark Mofo . While making notes to myself for this post, I saw that this deal is no longer exclusive to 1k members , so if you're looking to get out of American summer and hi

Other than the middle eastern carriers, the international First Class of the 90s and 00s has largely vanished in favor of lie-flat Business Class.  Lately we've seen some airlines installing a few extra-special Business Class seats that they can sell for a premium (eg, JetBlue's Mint Studio , Virgin's Retreat Suite , Singapore's A380 couples seats ).  Taiwanese luxury airline startup Starlux decided to do this on their new planes, but branded this one row of seats "First Class" and are asking 3 times the price for them versus their normal Business seats. (For real, $19,000 round trip LAX-Taipei versus $6000). I rolled my eyes. No amount of Krug and caviar could justify that. Furthermore, they aren't comping people into the seats or offering discounted upgrades to them if they're going to go out empty.  But then i saw this nugget:  Now this is a seldom-seen perk that sounds amazing – never having to enter the normal airport terminal at all . Having e

I signed up for the BILT Mastercard because I found out that you can pay HOA dues with it, and it has no annual fee. The one downside is that has one of those annoying "you have to make a minimum of 5 transactions per billing period" rules and I didn't notice that until AFTER I'd gotten the card. Still, it's 25,000 United miles a year that I wouldn't earn otherwise, so I'll keep it. They try really hard to make it very Apple Card-like – high design, very App focused, very Apple pay – but they still mail you a physical card. Mine arrived yesterday and they definitely took Apple's clever design energy when they came up with this packaging.  If you want to start earning points paying your rent/HOA dues, I'd love it if you used my referral link . 

We're back from our Japan and Taipei trip and even though it took a lot of finagling , the actual travel was really smooth and pleasant. We've taken this 15 hour flight before, back in 2017 , and it was largely the same.  PROS EVA Air seems to be pricing one ways at half the cost of round trips Espresso onboard! They have new, very nice pajamas and the XL ones fit me now They kept the cabin at a reasonable temp this time (was super hot before) Dual jetways and very orderly boarding Great lounges in Taipei with showers and hot food Super attentive and helpful staff Extensive online menu for pre-booking meals NEUTRAL The flight didn't get any shorter and the plane didn't get any faster, so it's still 15 hours in the air ;) Seat-back entertainment didn't have a ton of good options Oddly-timed flight, you take off at 7pm, sleep a ton (if you're lucky) then land at 10pm and sorta need to go to bed again.  CON Krug is gone (but the Laurent Perrier is decent) Wi-Fi