Continental has been one of the few major carriers to consistently turn a profit. They do so not with offshoring their calling centers (ahem, United) but by listening closely to what their frequent flyers have to say.
They still serve free meals on domestic flights, and all call centers are US based. Their airport clubs (Free access with AMEX Plat) are top-notch, offering free wi-fi and alcoholic beverages that most others charge for.
Continental’s Onepass mileage program has been getting more generous of late, and now only trails AA in terms of standard reward availability. It also contains bargains like 70,000 mile coach tickets/100,000 BusinessFirst tickets to Israel. Reward availability is even better for elite members.
Continental has a dedicated employee who takes the time to post online about new initiatives and program changes, and makes sure that any problems reported by flyers online are resolved.
The entire executive team spends a couple days every year meeting up with an online focus group of frequent flyers to discuss the issues and give them a behind the scenes look at the airline.
Odds and ends learned and various program changes that came out of this year’s meeting:
-Ability to standby on the day of departure for International BusinessFirst mileage upgrades. Until now this was only possible to/from Hawaii. They haven’t done this until now due to the fear of phantom bookings, and Continental said they will cancel the program if the system is abused…
-Addition of a million-mile elite club. This will be based on actual flown miles, like Delta and United. It will be retroactive for all previous flown miles.
-There are no current plans to “spin-off” the Onepass mileage program a la Air Canada.
-Mileage rates will be going up later this month for select routes…
-Continental will not have an economy-plus section like United’s.
-Continental will start filling middle seats from the back of the plane towards the front.
-Continental’s 787’s will be 9 seats across in a 3-3-3 configuration and a 17.5″ seat width.
-Continental plans to fly to Sydney at some point with the 787.
-Continental will open the first airline club in Las Vegas, in the 2nd quarter of 2008.
-Air France awards can now be booked online-more Skyteam partners to come.
-Airplane internet access is coming soon. VOIP will probably be blocked.
-You will soon be able to use part of an electronic travel certificate and keep the residual value.
-Priority standby for elites coming soon.
-US Airways exiting Pittsburgh was a major catalyst for the planned 40% expansion of the Cleveland hub.
You must actually have a Wii to get these.
If Nintendo has their way, they will make it impossible to find a Wii console for the next 5 holiday seasons…
Update: SOLD OUT!
Belkin Wi-Fi Range Extender Linky
“This Wireless G Universal Range Extender increases the coverage of your existing wireless network by retransmitting an 802.11b/g signal across a wider coverage area. Designed for easy setup operation, it works seamlessly with most routers and access points, with the push of a button. When used in access-point mode and connected to a wired router, the Range Extender adds wireless capability to an existing network. This allows you to expand Internet access throughout a home or small office without running cumbersome Ethernet cables between computers.”
It’s good for your credit score to have some no annual fee cards that you use just once and can leave open for many years without worrying about an annual fee.
Cards with $0 annual fees and their respective bonuses:
AMEX Hilton Consumer Credit Card: 10K-50K HHonors points
AMEX Platinum Business Credit Card: Pay no interest on all purchases for 12 months!
Chase Freedom Visa Signature: $50 Cash
Chase Amazon Consumer Visa: 1,500 Points
Chase Amazon Business Visa: 1,500 Points
For the following cards you must right-click the link, copy the entire Address/URL, and then paste it in a new tab/browser to apply!
BOFA MLB Mastercard: Free $50 MLB GC
BOFA NFL Visa: Free $50 NFL GC
Citi Professional Mastercard: 10,000 TY Points=$100 GC And 9 Months 0% Balance Transfers
Coinstar change machines always let you trade in your coins for Amazon GC’s without charging any commission.
Until 11/04 if you trade in at least $30 in coins you will get a claim form at the end of the transaction to send in to get an additional $10 GC!
Coinstar Locater Linky (Click “Search for Specific Products” and then choose Amazon.com)
The internet is abuzz with rumors of an upcoming announcement of an AA-El Al partnership.
El Al’s current codeshare agreement with Delta is ending due to Delta’s launching of non-stop JFK-TLV service that will directly compete with El Al.
The agreement would allow AA to sell AA-coded flights from the US to TLV. Additionally it would allow for award redemptions and elite-qualifying miles to be earned on the carrier of your choice.
AA does not fly directly to TLV due to the threat of having their plane repossesed in TLV to pay off debt obligations that TWA left unpaid when they declared bankruptcy and were bought out by AA.
Update: After filing a dispute over the phone, AMEX reversed the $30 charge for the Tmobile phone that I bought because they wouldn’t honor the $30 rebate! Good Luck!
Originally posted: 08/21
Some commenters have reported that T-Mobile has rejected their $30 rebates for the pre-paid Nokia 6030.
The rebate never said that t-mobile.com wasn’t a valid site.
Here is a post that I wrote last year about getting rebates even once they’re rejected. In short-I’ve had great success by contacting my state’s attorney general via an easy online claim form.
Good luck!
Tickets will be given away, first come first served, starting today.
It will be available 10/14 and it will be a Sprint exclusive.
It is currently available for pre-order from the Palm Store.
Reminder: Miles must be purchased by 09/30!!!
Originally posted 09/19
WARNING:
TACA Airlines (aka Take A Chance Airlines) is selling miles this month for half off the normal 2.5 cents/mile rate.
Instead of $50 for 2,000 miles, it is just $25.
They are award partners with Iberia and United Airlines.
What is intriguing about this is there lucrative redemption chart.
You can fly anywhere within North America for just 25,000 miles in the low season (February, March, April, May, October, November) or 30,000 miles in the high season (January, June, July, August, September, December, and Easter season).
Sample low season travel rates when purchasing miles:
NYC-Maui, Hawaii: Via United: 25,000 miles (about $312)
NYC-Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: Via United: 35,000 miles (about $437)
NYC-Australia: Via United: 75,000 miles (about $937)
LAX-Tel Aviv: Via Iberia: (TACA Low season usually includes Pesach/Sukkos holiday seasons!) 75,000 miles (about $937)
Helpful Links:
Buy TACA Ditancia Miles Page Linky
Good Luck! If anyone does use this for a ticket I’d love to hear about it!
If you want some serious optical zoom power in a small package-look no further!!!
Not all devices accept 4GB Mini SDHC cards. Check your manual for more info.
4GB SD Card Linky
Norton Confidential: $14.99 After $30 Rebate!
Norton Confidential Linky
$30 Rebate Linky
Photo Explosion 2.0: FREE After 2 Rebates!
Photo Explosion 2.0 Linky
$19.99 Rebate Linky
$10 Rebate Linky
StompSoft PC BackUp: FREE After $30 Rebate!
StompSoft PC BackUp Linky
$30 Rebate Linky
iolo Search and Recover v.4.0: $8.99 After $20 Rebate! Additional $7 Upgrade Rebate Available=$1.99!
iolo Search and Recover v.4.0 Linky
$20 Rebate Linky
$7 Upgrade Rebate Linky
AA is the only remaining airline that still counts all mileage activity towards lifetime elite status.
United and Delta used to count all miles, but currently only count actual flown mileage for lifetime elite status.
Continental used to have a program that if you were a top-tier elite for 5 consecutive years you got lifetime top-tier status, alas Continental no longer offers any chance at becoming a lifetime elite today.
On AA every mile earned, even those from credit cards, is counted.
At 1,000,000 miles you get lifetime Gold Elite status and at 2,000,000 miles you get lifetime Platinum Elite status.
In addition you also get other nice goodies when you cross each million marker.
It doesn’t matter if you’ve redeemed miles, the only thing that matters is the “program to date miles.”
Today I finally entered the home stretch…I just hope they don’t pull the program before I cross the finish line!
From my AA account:
As with all buy.com orders-open a new Google account and get $10 off…
Never be powerless again!
Belkin Universal Laptop Charger Linky
-Guaranteed to work with your laptop!
-3 Year Warranty
-If your Laptop charging tip is not included, Belkin will send you your first tip free!
Not all devices accept 4GB SDHC cards. Check your manual for more info.
4GB SD Card Linky
$17 Rebate Linky
Express Jet is a fairly new LCC with a hub in Ontario, CA. (Located between Los Angeles and Palm Springs) They were flying as Continental Express, but they launched a separate unit as a standalone carrier.
Apparently though, United’s got a bone to pick with them: They just filed $78 Round trip fares on nearly every single route that they fly!
$78+ RT To/From Ontario on United:
Albuquerque, NM
Austin, TX
Boise, ID
Colorado Springs, CO
Fresno, CA
Kansas City, MO
Monterey, CA
Oklahoma City, OK
Omaha, NE
San Antonio, TX
Spokane, WA
Tucson, AZ
Tulsa, OK
For all of the Canadians who complain that I ignore them…
Travel is valid to and from Canada!
Los Angeles-Toronto-$199+ RT On Northwest
Los Angeles-Montreal-$226+ RT On Northwest
The ridiculous thing about Continental’s cheap airfare sales from PIT is that if I were to take the 100 minute drive to the PIT airport I have to connect back in CLE to get to the west coast and can’t get off in CLE on the return, but if I want to go non-stop from CLE it’s double the price…
Save an additional 5% on Continental tickets by using your Chase Continental MC and using the code: Onepass
Save 5% on Delta tickets by using the Delta business Amex.
Save 3% on Delta tickets tickets by using a Starwood or Jetblue business amex…
Pittsburgh-Tucson-$138+ RT On Delta, Continental and others.
Pittsburgh-Phoenix-$138+ RT On Delta, Continental and others.
Pittsburgh-Los Angeles-$144+ RT On Continental
Pittsburgh-Seattle-$144+ RT On Continental
Sale/Clearance Shoes At Endless.com
Endless.com Linky
Mens’ Shoes At Endless.com
Women’s Shoes At Endless.com
Kids Shoes At Endless.com
Handbags At Endless.com
Endless.com:
-Is an Amazon owned site, you just login with your Amazon login info!
-Ships your shoes out overnight for negative $5/order. (Hint: Order 1 pair of shoes per order!)
-Offers an entire year to return shoes that you don’t like-and return shipping is free as well!
-Offers a 110% price guarantee, so if you find a cheaper price on another site, or even if their own price goes down, you will get a refund of 110% of the difference!
-10,000 miles for opening up the checking account.
-7,500 miles for opening a Continental/Chase debit card. ($25 annual fee)
-7,500 miles for adding 3 additional cardholders.
When you’re done you’ll have enough miles for either:
-A free domestic ticket.
-36% of a ticket to Israel in coach
-25% of a ticket to Israel in businessfirst
You guys will just have to bear with me.
Believe it or not, I am a sports fan as well as a technology geek and a frequent flyer miles hoarder.
I’m a die-hard Tribe fan, and I realize that this is the first time that the Indians will be playing October baseball since I started ctownbochur.com, so you’ll still have to get used to skipping over these posts instead of commenting “stick to the deals.”
At any rate, I just love what the internet has done to buying tickets.
In 1995 when the Indians made their first playoff birth in 41 years, they raffled off the right to buy postseason tickets by postcards only. As a baseball-crazed 10 year old I stayed up day and night sending out literally hundreds of postcards at 20 cents apiece to have the chance to buy face-value tickets. It paid off-I had tickets to all 3 home World Series games, and then some. Unfortunately there was no Ebay yet, so I had to make do with selling my excess to local brokers to cover the costs of my own tickets and the postcards!
Flash forward 12 years, the Indians sell their tickets online only to those with a pre-sale code. Let me tell you, getting 8 tickets to all 3 possible ALDS home games online via pre-sale codes are a lot easier to handle than hand-writing all of those postcards! (Plus I still had the $35 Ticketmaster GC to use)
So, now only one question remains: Is “TBD” the BoSox or the Bronx Bombers?
Who cares? Bring ’em on!
$50 Online Staples Easy Rebate Linky
Prints: Up to 25 ppm black, 20 ppm color
Copies: Up to 18 cpm black, 16 cpm color
Scans: Up to 600 x 2400-dpi resolution
Faxes: Up to 14.4Kbps
AMEX ExpressPay is the same as MasterCard Paypass, it’s an RFID tag embedded into your credit card. You just have to wave it in front of the credit card machine to accept the charge.
Only certain AMEX cards currently have ExpressPay, but don’t worry-your Starwood AMEX does!
Save an additional 5% on Continental tickets by using your Chase Continental MC and using the code: Onepass
Baltimore-Los Angeles-$124+ RT On USAirways
Pittsburgh-Phoenix-$138+ RT On multiple carriers.
Pittsburgh-Tucson-$138+ RT On multiple carriers.
Philadelphia-Phoenix-$138+ RT On multiple carriers.
Philadelphia-Tucson-$138+ RT On multiple carriers.
Cincinnati-S. Juan-$153+ RT On Continental
Pittsburgh-Los Angeles-$158+ RT On Northwest
Cleveland-S. Francisco-$164+ RT On United
Cleveland-Los Angeles-$164+ RT On United
Philadelphia-S. Francisco-$164+ RT On Continental
Pittsburgh-S. Francisco-$164+ RT On Continental
Pittsburgh-Seattle-$164+ RT On Continental
If you’re in the mall anyway, seems like it’s worth stopping by…
“Earn 500 AAdvantage miles just for attending a Lifestyle system demonstration at your Bose store through October 4th.”
This is today’s woot, so hurry up if you want to buy it before it sells out!
Woot.com linky
Be sure to check out the “emergency” open letter about the woot’s zune price drop as well…no surprise here, but these guys are funny!
Hurry: The $118 flights that fall within the promo’s date ranges are disappearing rapidly!
This flight is now the cheapest one that qualifies for the AA bonus miles promo!
Chicago/ORD-Las Vegas-$118+ RT On AA and other carriers.
Update 2: Everything is sold out again!
Update: More BusinessFirst tickets are now available!!! Hurry! First-Come, First-served!
Please contact Joel at <number redacted>
Available for Sukkos or Pesach travel-prices will range from just $2500 to $3500 based on travel dates!
Thank You For The Absolutely Incredible Response! Everything Has Been Sold!
Take A Tour Of Continental’s BusinessFirst B777 6.5 foot sleeper seat.
Read More About Continental’s BusinessFirst experience.
I have a very limited amount of tickets available from Newark to Tel Aviv nonstop on Continental Airlines for sale. (Connections via Newark are available as well)
Continental’s Boeing 777’s only have 2 classes to Israel, BusinessFirst and Coach.
BusinessFirst comes with complimentary access to airport clubs in Newark and Tel Aviv, where you’ll be able to enjoy the complimentary wi-fi and drinks, take a shower, or even get your suit pressed.
The tickets can be used for this Sukkos or Pesach!
These are not mileage tickets-they are confirmed BusinessFirst tickets that will earn full mileage, and 150% elite miles.
Sample Date: Prices will vary, depending on the exact date/flight desired.
April 14-April 30, 2008: (Pesach)
Price on Continental.com for BusinessFirst, including taxes from Newark-Tel Aviv (Booking class: BusinessFirst-D): $4,974.00
Dansdeals.com One Time Special for BusinessFirst, including taxes from Newark-Tel Aviv (Booking class: BusinessFirst-D): $2,499.99
This is definitely in response to Southwest’s Fly 2 Fly Free Offer…
A quick search revealed that non-stop tickets between Chicago and Phoenix on AA are $150+$20 tax RT for a total of just $170. Use AA.com’s nifty price and schedule feature to find the best flight options.
4 round-trips, a $680 expenditure, would net you over 63,000 miles including flight miles (11,600), bonus miles (50,000), credit card miles (680), and booking bonuses (1,000). If you have AA Gold or Platinum status you would get 25-100% more bonus flight miles. It’s not hard to get a value of over 5 cents with AAdvantage miles, arguably the easiest miles to redeem in the airline industry…
Offer Details: (AA’s language here is pretty clear and straightforward, so I’m not going to bother paraphrasing it)
Dates:
Book your trip between September 13, 2007 and November 15, 2007.
Travel between September 13, 2007 and November 15, 2007.
Offer:
American Airlines is kicking off the fall season with a great new offer! Just book and fly two qualifying round trips on select flights between now and November 15, 2007, and earn 25,000 AAdvantage bonus miles – enough miles for a free Economy Class award ticket to anywhere we fly within the continental U.S. and Canada.
Or, even better, fly four round trips and earn an additional 25,000 bonus miles, for a total of 50,000 miles. With all those miles, you’ll be able to travel to Europe, Japan, Mexico, the Caribbean, or Hawaii! You decide where your miles will take you!
Here is how it works:
Book and fly at least two qualifying round trips on nonstop flights on American Airlines to or from the cities noted below:
Between Dallas/Fort Worth, TX (DFW) and:
Oakland, CA (OAK)
Portland, OR (PDX)
San Francisco, CA (SFO)
San Jose, CA (SJC)
Between Chicago, IL (ORD) and:
Las Vegas, NV (LAS)
Los Angeles, CA (LAX)
Phoenix, AZ (PHX)
Portland, OR (PDX)
Reno, NV (RNO)
Salt Lake City, UT (SLC)
San Diego, CA (SAN)
San Francisco, CA (SFO)
San Jose, CA (SJC)
Seattle, WA (SEA)
Tucson, AZ (TUS)
Between St. Louis, MO (STL) and:
Las Vegas, NV (LAS)
Los Angeles, CA (LAX)
Between Austin, TX (AUS) and:
San Jose, CA (SJC)
Seattle, WA (SEA)
Between Nashville, TN (BNA) and:
Los Angeles, CA (LAX)
To participate in this offer, simply register before you travel. Register online at www.aa.com/offers using promotion code AA25X
