Amex Gold 20k is back

Apologies all for the big gap between posts - very busy time at work!

Just thought it was worth mentioning that the Amex Gold signup bonus has gone back up to 20k for a non-referral, and 22k for a referral from a friend (they get 12k).

https://www.americanexpress.com/uk/content/gold-card/

Recently Amex dropped this to 10k/12k for new customers (i.e. people who haven't had an Amex charge card in the last 6 months).

The Gold card is pretty good, gets you 2x membership rewards on travel / foreign spend etc (sometimes 3x as it does stack - i.e. if its a flight denoted in a foreign currency).

One key point to note however is that the minimum spend is £2k in 3 months (which might be a lot for some people - if you were on the minimum income of £20k, you'd be putting nearly 50% of your net salary through your Amex to meet the target!) so might be better waiting if you have a holiday to book or work expenses coming up.

BA Sale - ends 25 September

British Airways is having a "Go After The Games" flight sale for bookings up to 25 September.

Flights booked in Euro Traveller, World Traveller and World Traveller Plus, Club World and First are available for selected outbound travel dates between 10 September 2012 and 12 July 2013.


The easiest way to locate cheap fares is to use the cheapest fare tool which can be found here.
Economy wise, nothing overly exicting. There is LA from just over £500 and Singapore at £699.

Premium economy is a bit better as the tickets can be upgraded using Avios to Club World (if there is award availability) and here we see Hong Kong from £995, Tokyo from £989 and the Caribbean from around £800.

In Business, the fares are not that well discounted so there are none worthy of a mention.

Priority Club - 50% off (selected) HI redemptions - 24hrs only!

On August 16th, for 24hrs only, Priority Club are offering 50% off selected redemptions for various Holiday Properties. See full details here: http://www.priorityclub.com/hotels/us/en/global/offers/hiresorts_one_day_sale

There are some decent looking properties on the splash page (mainly in the US though) for 12.5k points per night. Given how easy it generally is to earn PC points (you can earn 12.5k in 1-2 nights sometimes with promos) that's a pretty good deal.

Definitely worth a look anyway!

Virgin Atlantic Economy Rewards 50% Off...

Another Virgin Atlantic deal again today. This time, 50% off all economy reward tickets to various destinations.

http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/frequentflyer/spendmiles/rewardflights/flightsformiles.jsp

To be honest, its not the best deal since VS taxes and fees on Y (economy)  rewards come to almost the cost of a discounted economy ticket, so personally i think you're better off saving up your miles for a premium ticket.

Sometimes VS do 50% off of Premium Economy rewards (never Upper!) which is a much better deal. But hey, they're your miles! Although I find it hard to believe there isn't more value converting say 20k into 40k HHonors points and using at a Cat 6 (some are ~£200 a night) hotel.

Tesco Clubcard - Virgin Flying Club Miles - 50% bonus

If you have any Tesco clubcard vouchers you don't need, there is currently a 50% bonus on conversions to Virgin Atlantic miles. It now means you will receive 937 miles for every £2.50 in vouchers.

http://www.tesco.com/clubcard/deals/product.aspx?R=2179

This probably isn't the best use of clubcard points (costs you 0.27p per mile at face), although it's much cheaper than buying at £15 per 1k (plus a standard £15 charge - so potentially £30 for 1k!).

So if you have some sat around or need to top your account up with a few points to reach a reward, this could be worth a look. Note, if you signup for "auto opt-in" (converts your clubcard points to miles going forward) you can earn another 1k.

This offer ends on August 31st.

Will I get my 20,000 points? - UPDATE

As discussed previously here due to system issues I was unsure whether I would actually receive my 20k SPG sign-up bonus. Well good news for anyone who is about to hit the £1k mark - it posted absolutely fine.

Virgin Atlantic Economy Sale - ends July 27

Autumn flights must be a bit on the slow side as Virgin Atlantic has released some sale fares.

Full listing here but highlights for me are:


London Heathrow to Chicago £449 (21 Aug 12 - 21 Oct 12)
London Heathrow to Miami    £449 (21 Aug 12 - 21 Oct 12)
London Gatwick to various Caribbean destinations from £529.


London to New York is actually £489 which is not a great deal, but Chicago for £449 certainly is!

It's a longer flight than New York and I have rarely seen it cheaper than New York (which has many more flights per day).

It also looks like other airlines are matching these fares. For instance, most of the Star Alliance airlines that fly these routes have similar prices for the same dates. So take your pick!

Radisson Blu 3 for 2 using Amex

Radisson Blu has a very good promo running until 30 September for American Express cardholders. Everyone who collects points/miles has an Amex so hopefully not too many people will miss out.


You can book via http://www.radisson.com/nightthree or you can use the promo code NIGHT3FR


The promotion excludes Radisson Blu Edwardian hotels (which covers most London Radisson hotels) and all brand hotels in Asia Pacific. 

Obviously, you need 3 consecutive nights and the third night is free, plus you have to book using your Amex.

You also get 2,000 bonus points per eligible stay.

There is much better availability on this promo than the one mentioned here. Even the top hotels in Paris have this rate available on lots of dates, so this is definitely worth checking out.

Lufthansa A380 Sale - Ends 24th July

Lufthansa are running a promo on selected A380 flights for London to Beijing, Tokyo, Johannesburg and Singapore with prices from £449.

http://www.lufthansa.com/online/portal/lh/uk/specials/booking?l=en&nodeid=2097008&cid=1000243

To me, Singapore for £499 stands out as a great deal. (Singapore is fantastic!) I've had a quick look and it seems like it has decent availability in October and early November (not so good in December disappointingly).

I've done a dummy booking and the seats are in Fare class K, which amazingly earns 50% with miles and more! But sadly 0% with UA/CO and Asiana (OZ). Worth checking your preferred partner though!
Also, you have to book by the 24th July so get in there quick!

50% off Club Carlson award nights

Yet another Club Carlson related post, but they keep coming out with more and more offers!

I just got an email from them detailing a few different offers starting 1 August 2012.

They are available to Club Carlson members only at participating Radisson Blu, Park Plaza, and Park Inn by Radisson hotels in Europe, the Middle East and Africa bookings made between now and 29 September 2012 for stays beginning 1 August 2012 and completed no later than 30 September 2012.

It looks like America and Asia miss out.

Anyway the promotional codes to enter on the Club Carlson website are:

• 50REDEEM - This reduces the number of Points normally required to be redeem for a standard Award Night by 50%. Points + cash bookings are not elegible.
• FREEBKFT - This gets you free breakfast for two each night of the stay
• CCDOUBLEPOINTS - Double points if you stay 2 or more consecutive nights on eligible rates
• WESILVER - 10% off best available rates on weekend stays, only for Club Carlson Silver & above

The 50% off award bookings looks like the stand-out deal as this means the top tier Club Carlson hotels are down to 25,000 points per night if available. This could be a good use of the points earned through various recent Club Carlson promotions.

I've only had time for a very quick search, but it looks like these codes are all subject to availability, so don't expect to be able to find the top Paris hotels for 25,000 points. You might be able to find something decent though in less popular places.

Will I get my 20,000 points?

As many of you will probably have done, I recently applied for the SPG Amex For the 20,000 SPG points after £1k spend promotion (since this converts to 25k Airline miles with most schemes) however there is a well documented problem with people receiving 10k points instead of the promised 20k. See here.

Now I understand some people have seen their second 10k come through. I crossed the £1k spend threshold today so the big question is will I receive 10k or 20k!?!

You'd think a huge company like American Express would able to set up their IT systems to award 20k points for people who applied in a certain date range. But then I sometimes wonder if companies do this sort of thing on purpose to rely on people's ignorance / apathy to avoid paying out!

Cash + Points London Radisson for £50.

With the Radisson promo ending on Sunday I'm trying to cram one more stay in to take advantage of the 50,000 points on offer.

The last stay was on my other half's account so this one will be on mine. I don't want to spend too much money so I was looking at Cash + Points prices as these rates are still eligible for the bonus.

I found this one for a Friday night at a London Radisson:

As you can see, I'm sacrificing 10,000 points but it's only costing me £50, although this is just a single room with no added extras.

I should end up with just over 40,000 points for this stay due to the online booking bonus and some points earned on the cash part of the booking. Not quite enough for a top tier Radisson but probably enough for a tier 2 and anyway I'll be adding it to the points I earned on a prior Park Inn stay, and hopefully a future Park Plaza stay.

And don't forget Club Carlson is fairly generous with status matches.

Virgin Atlantic PE Reward Seat Sale

Just received a mail from VS promoting discounted redemption rates for Premium Economy seats. I travelled to Dubai recently in VS PE and it's pretty good - the extra legroom and improved service make quite a big difference from Economy.

If you have Virgin miles sat around and don't think you'll ever get to 100k for an Upper class redemption, this is potentially a decent use - 35k + £415 to Chicago stands out as you can easily (and cheaply) get to anywhere else in the USA from there. As always in the UK though, the tax and surcharges are painful.

Bookings must be made by 16th July so don't hang about if this interests you! (Also I expect availability might disappear quickly)

TO/FROM UK MILES Taxes (from)

JFK/NEWARK 35,000 £415

CHICAGO 35,000 £415

WASHINGTON 38,500 £415

LONDON-ORLANDO 45,000 £392

MANCHESTER-ORLANDO 45,000 £394

GLASGOW-ORLANDO 45,000 £391

LONDON-LAS VEGAS 47,500 £418

BARBADOS 47,500 £427

DUBAI 40,000 £412

ACCRA 38,500 £462

DELHI 47,500 £477

SHANGHAI 50,000 £482

TOKYO 50,000 £493

MUMBAI 47,500 £441

Full details at http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/frequentflyer/spendmiles/rewardflights/flightsformiles.jsp

Park Plaza Free Nights

We've posted before about the Radisson Big Night Giveaway, but that promo ends next week. However, another chain within Club Carlson is Park Plaza and they are currently running the Park Plaza Ultimate Night Giveaway. This runs until August 28th and:

"The first 20,000 people to register for the Park Plaza® Ultimate Night Giveaway will be eligible to receive 50,000 bonus Gold Points® – that's enough for a night at any Park Plaza hotel worldwide."

Terms and conditions are on the site and it's important to note that you have to use a rate that would earn points normally to qualify for the bonus. After the first 20,000 people have registered, the bonus goes down to 15,000 points.

At the moment, Club Carlson members can transfer points from their account to another Program member account by contacting Member Services.

There are plenty of Park Plaza hotels in the UK and there are a few dotted around Europe and Asia, if you have an upcoming trip.

Remember though, the 50,000 bonus points you get do not have to be used at a Park Plaza; they can also be used at Radissons, Park Inns and Country Inns & Suites throughout the world, and some of these hotels would usually be very expensive (Radissons in Paris for example).

Club Carlson may not be as generous in the future, so this is definitely worth registering for if there is a chance you could stay at a Park Plaza in the next couple of months.

Amex Platinum 50k signup

Just in is that the sign up bonus on the UK American Express Platinum Charge Card is now 50,000 Membership Reward points (up from 40,000) for a spend of £2,000 in the first 3 months.

Caveats as always:

• Annual fee is £450
• Household income of at least £40,000
• 50,000 MR points are not available to existing American Express customers

Thanks to Raffles over at Head For Points for spotting this one.

More Club Carlson

On the subject of Club Carlson, its worth mentioning that currently if you’re a high tier member of another loyalty scheme Club Carlson will usually match status. For example, I’m a Hilton Honors Diamond and was matched to Club Carlson Gold Status. Drop a mail to goldpointsplus@carlson.com with a screen grab of your existing status (although make sure the image isn’t too big as they appear to have a problem viewing them) and see what happens.
 
If you haven’t yet joined Club Carlson but don’t need a stay its worth waiting for a decent signup offer. Until the end of May they were giving you 4,500 points just for opening an account! At the moment they are running 2,000 for your first stay http://www.clubcarlson.com/privatePage.do?privateCode=NEXTSTAY2K which isn’t as good – but we’ll update you here if a better one comes along.
 
[Note: to do a screen grab in Windows press ALT+PRTSCN and paste into your mail]

An easy one to start - Hilton Q3 2012

Since we're now in Q3 2012, I thought I'd start with the HHonors Q3 promo. It's double points during the week and triple during the weekend.

https://www.hiltonhhonors.com/Quarterlypages/2012/Q3/landing.aspx

IMHO, it's a good, if not great promo. I can see where they are coming from by trying to encourage leisure travellers to stay during the weekend, but tbh I'd much rather have a double/triple miles promo - particularly as I'm still on "Mission OZ 80k" (more on that later...)

Either way, make sure you signup just in case, as in my experience HH will never honour these promos retrospectively. As always though YMMV.