End Justifies the Means ??

Let’ s get straight to the point – Is there an ethical boundary in the travel hacking game? What would you do and not do to earn points and miles? Are there clear black and whites or are they just a bunch of greys all around? Where do you draw the line?

What Calvin Thinks. (I do not have the copyright to this image)

These questions have been swirling around in my head the last few days. I read a few blogs about people calling up the credit card companies after completing their spend challenges and telling them they had registered for a higher sign-up bonus, when in reality that sign-up bonus had expired before they applied for the card and they had signed up for a lower sign-up bonus. Is this right? You know you are lying. The credit card company knows you are lying. They still let you have it (or sometimes they don’t) because they want your business. But just because they let you have it, does it make it right?

In the same vein, is using someone else’s RSVP code for credit card application, justified? The person receiving the credit card offer was the one the bank was targeting. Is it ok for someone else to use their RSVP codes and get the benefit of the offer?

One must be wondering why these questions are doing the rounds. Well, here’s the reason. A few weeks ago I noticed that one of my CC companies had stopped crediting points for my purchase. I called them and asked them to credit the points for my purchase. After a quick research the customer care personnel informed me that it seems there was a glitch and the system did not calculate and credit my points for one full month. They apologized and assured me it would be done soon. No harm no foul, so far.

Forward one week later, I check my account balance and lo behold they have calculated my points and credited it to my account. Only, instead of one month, they calculated for the last 2 years. Yes, the CC company credited me points for all my purchases in the last 2 years. And here’s where my dilemma is – Should I call them and make them aware of their mistake or simply enjoy the free points? I took time and effort to call them to credit what was rightfully mine. Do I not owe them the same courtesy when they make a mistake in my favor?

I can’t figure out what to do. What would you have done in my position? Are there other clear black and white’s in the obsessive game or there are no rules at all?

Using AVIOS to my advantage

Now that the credit cards are applied for, the money has been spent and the points have posted, I was sitting and wondering, what do I do with these points. I did not want to spend them right away but I wanted to just go out and do some award searches in real life and see how it feels. Can I get the better of the airlines ?

One such opportunity came along last week when my friend called and said he needs help with his Honeymoon ticket planning. He wanted to use his miles and not money. It was like dream come true for me. 

So here were the challenge parameters:

1.       Travel from Delhi (India) to Manila (Phillipines)

2.       Tickets were costing Rs. 74,000, return (that’s $ 1233, for the forex challenged).

3.       We had some BA Avios (70k approx.) and some Miles and More points (50k approx.), which we could use. Throw in some more Jet Privilege miles. Period. No other miles.

4.       The dates were not very far out (Feb 2014). But we had the flexibility of a few days here and there. No fixed dates agenda.

So my friend did the first round of award searching. As it turns out, there are no direct flights from DEL to MNL. And so it began.

The obvious thing to do was look at the BA website. The only option that came up was Cathay Pacific, with their huge surcharges. The flight was via Hong Kong and the total was coming to 80000 Avios plus taxes of Rs. 44000 ($733). That seemed like a bad deal from whichever angle I choose to look at it. Plus we din have 80k Avios. We looked at using Miles and more, came to some ridiculous number of miles. Jet Miles were only useful till Hong Kong, with more ridiculous tax.

We tried searching BA again. Same old Cathay Pacific. No Malaysia airlines, no JAL. Just when I thought we are out of options, it struck me. BA was pricing the flights individually. So I could do the same. And we struck gold (well silver..!!). We looked for a DEL HKG and HKG MNL. The result wasn’t much different. 

But now that I knew I could do it, we tried again. This time DEL KUL and KUL MNL. And Jackpot. Now I had Malaysia Airlines result, just like I wanted. Net result: 90k Avios and Rs 13,000 ($216). Now we were getting somewhere. We were just short of 20k Avios. Thanks to BA miles+cash chart, this wasn’t much of a problem. I was borderline orgasmic.

End result – 70K Avios + Rs. 28,000 ($466) and we had ourselves a honeymoon ticket, with a sweet 3 day layover in Kuala Lumpur. The trick was to break the sectors, into individual sectors. We tried JAL too, but the tax was too much again. The avios gave us a Rs. 0.67 value (1.1 cent). Given what the prime objective was (save money), I think we did a decent job.

How would you have done it ? Do you think we could have or still can do it better ?

Why Hertz is my go-to car rental company

I have been renting cars for personal and business purpose for the last 3 years. By most people’s standard that might not be a long time, but long enough for me to be able to try all the well-established car rental agencies. After 3 years of regular usage, I can confidently say that Hertz is the best car rental company out there. This is not to say I have not had the occasional “bad experience” with them, but in the larger scheme of things, they are the best. Here’s why I like them over others:

1.       Ease of booking: the first and foremost thing. After all, to get car you need to book it. And that’s where Hertz scores over the others. Their website is user friendly and intuitive. Doesn’t take long to make your booking and it’s easy to modify it from any stage of the process. They have an app also, that provides similar ease of booking. So even if I am on the road and want to make a car reservation for pick up, I can do it. The only issue, sometimes it doesn’t let me book car for the very hour I want it. Thankfully, the on the spot rates at the Hertz locations aren’t all that bad.

2.       Rates: To me, this is the most important part of the rental. I am very cost conscious. I always look for the cheapest deals. My loyalty is to my wallet first and then to any car rental agencies. This is where Hertz almost never disappoints. Their rates are always very competitive against any car rental company. Best of all, they always have some great discounts listed on their website. Find the one which suits you and you are on your way to saving money. And if you want to find more, there are some more at website like flyertalk. Find the coupon codes that works for you and suddenly the good rate Hertz was giving you becomes the lowest rate available. Voila, you are in business. And best of all, they don’t have slimy charges not mentioned on their contract. No extension charges or the likes. The only charge I probably don’t like in US- The daily rate for using EZPass is atrocious.

3.       Quality of cars: Now that I have booked it easily at the cheapest rate possible, I want the best possible car for myself in that category, or may be better. And hertz never disappoints here either. Their car classes usually have the best cars in each category and most are new. I can hardly remember ever getting a car that had more than 20000 miles on the meter. But I can surely remember cars having below a 1000 miles. And atleast 2 instances where the cars were brand new – less than 100 miles. And if I don’t like the car they offer me I simply ask what else they got- they are more than happy to help me switch. That allows me to try all sorts of car – from the Chevy Cruze to the Rav 4, the VM Passat to the Ford Fusion, the Kia Optima to the Audi, I have driven them all.

One of my more recent rentals with Hertz

4.       Customer Service – This is the icing on the already delicious cake. Most of the hertz customer reps at the local editions are well behaved and willing to help out. Any issue, any request, you can rest assured they will hear you out and try to help you as much as possible. As is true for any customer service, sometimes they are unable to help or you bump into that occasional person who doesn’t want to help. But that’s more of an exception than the rule. In case they can’t help you and/or your issue can be handled after the rental, just email them. They will take some time to respond, but they will solve it for you. My personal experience ranges from getting $400 damage charges removed from my CC to renting a car and returning after 30 minutes to return it due to sudden change in plan and not being charged for it. If they can, they will help you.

5.       Miles and Points: You got the cake, you got the icing. All that is left is the cherry. Here’ it comes. Hertz has a great membership program (Hertz Gold Plus). Earn points as you rent and once you get to 500 points, you can get a free car for yourself for a weekday day. The always have some promotion or the other going on, increasing the rate at which you earn your points, so that you get to the free car-FASTER. And if you are the occasional renter, then you can always get credit for your rentals to your choice of Airline or Hotel Miles. Their hotel list is tiny, but their airlines miles partner is looonngg. From American to Skymiles to Flying Blue to Miles and More to United. They got it all covered. They help you rake up those stray miles that convert 58000 miles to 60000 miles in your FFP account and get you the ticket you want. I used to initially take all my points on my airlines program, but once I discovered the benefits of taking them on Hertz Gold Plus, I switched and I don’t regret it one bit. I have enough points to cover my car rental for almost a month. That’s more than $1000 in value.

No matter how good a company is, there is always that random incidence that leaves your with a bad memory of the company you are dealing with. I have had my share and then some. The extra rude agent at a local HLE in London, the damage charge that I thought was plain wrong, the upgrade that never came and so on. But you gotta look at the bad ones alongside the good incidences and see which is more. In my case, my good experiences with Hertz far outnumber the bad ones.

So, which is your preferred rental company and why? Have you had a good experience with Hertz that made you a loyalist? Or did you have a very bad experience with them and vowed never to rent with them again? How do you decide on your car rental ????

2B or 22B

A few weeks ago, I started hoarding miles and points from different airlines and hotel programs through credit card spend. My AoR went pretty well and the miles and points did start pouring in. While I am enjoying the process and the miles are coming in thick and fast, I am stumped by what to do with those miles. With the spend bonuses, the actual spend miles, my personal flying miles and other bonus you get from various sources, I have enough miles to buy myself some free flights.

Question is, do I want to have one flight in 2B (Business Class) or 2 flights in 22B (Economy Class).

Let’s do the math- a free ticket from EWR to DEL in United will set me back by 40,000 miles if I fly economy. That’s 16.5 hours in a Boeing 777 with a 31” seat pitch clubbed with 18” inch widths, 4.0 recline and the economy class service (source: Seatguru.com). Add an additional 20,000 miles, and now I have a flat bed with 20” widths, 76” pitch and the full blown business class service. A return flight this way would set my back by a total of 40,000 miles, which is good enough for another free economy ticket. While this may not seem much, but when this is multiplied in favor of 10 return business flights anywhere in the world, it boils down to this – do I want to visit a few places in style or do I want to a few more places in the regular way.

Photo source: CNN travel - Cathay Pacific Gallery

The question is not for those who have been in the game for years and years and those who churn and burn a million miles an year and travel all alone. They probably don’t care. But for people like me, who are relatively late to the game, have to spend miles not just on self but also on our family members sometime, trying to play the game where the bonuses are dwindling and the rapid devaluation of the miles is only making matters worse, it’s a huge dilemma.

I gave this considerable thought and reached the following conclusion for my own purpose – I can do a bit of both. I have BA miles to burn, but they charge huge surcharge on their redemption tickets, specially the one’s flying out of LHR. So why not use my BA miles, when I fly BA on a paid fare, and use it to upgrade myself to business class. On the other hand, United miles, the best of the miles out there have little surcharge on them, so should use them to buy coach tickets for a vacation. So what if I am in coach for a vacation. Won’t be my first time in coach and won’t be my last for sure. The idea is to use them as fast as I earn them. With the speed at which miles are being devalued, they are best spent now than later. And it takes a lot more time to earn miles for 2 people flying to-fro in business class than coach class. And isn’t that the whole point of earning miles – using them up and not saving them for that flight of fantasy that might never happen.

But what works for you? How do you prefer spending your miles?