point fu

In late 2023 I subscribed to a new service called Seats.aero that constantly scrapes airline websites looking for real, bookable points and upgrade deals. They have a slick United PlusPoints upgrade finder which I quickly discovered also finds instantly-bookable Mileage Upgrade Awards (MUA). Given how expensive it is to make 1k and get a basket full of PlusPoints, this discovery was a game changer.  Ideally we always want to have our upgrades confirmed at booking time. Given work schedules and holidays we sometimes have book a flight without confirmable upgrade space and hope for the best when flight day comes. Tim and I have both had instances where, despite being 1k and using PlusPoints, we didn't get an upgrade because all the seats were sold or they were given to people with higher status. The big downer of my new strategy is that in these instances, we'll be even further down United's elaborate upgrade pecking order (i.e., a 1k requesting a MUA will lose the upgrad...

DoC is saying that Chase is launching a Chase Private Client-exclusive card above the Sapphire Reserve. Given that my husband and I just became Chase Private Client customers (thanks First Republic bankruptcy!), I'm intrigued.  Are they going to try and compete with the Amex Centurion (aka Black) card? Or will they aim for a spot in between the Platinum and the Centurion? I'm trying to imagine what they might offer on this new product given the clientele it's aimed at… Chase's new lounge at Laguardia is quite nice, so maybe they'll give this card line cutting privileges. Or a private seating area with better booze? Oooh, or will they give you free/discounted access to the private suites in the lounge ?  Will it give you Gold status on an airline like the Centurion? Given their partnership with United, this could be Complicated™. I mean, it'd be awesome if it just came with Emerald OneWorld status… Will it offer NO bonus categories like the Centurion? Will it h...

LOL sorry but anyone who didn't see that coming is nuts. I've really enjoyed the bloggers the past few weeks gushing about the new extra bougie lounge that Delta is opening to compete with United's Polaris lounges.  The preview pics look cute but we've all seen the insane lines to get into Delta's existing lounges, so I had a sneaking suspicion this wouldn't be the calm, Missoni-designed oasis people were hoping for.  The chatter on FlyerTalk and Reddit is amusing -- lots of "team Delta" and "team United" fanboys throwing all kinds of shade over these lounges and it's just like... why? All the carriers have their strengths and weaknesses and the trick is to take advantage of the former while avoiding the latter. For the record: United's onboard Polaris food has gotten better recently but it's still bad. The mattress pad on ultra long haul flights is nice. I wish the seats had doors and bigger footwells. ( Hint: The long haul tomat...