It’s the first news round-up of 2015! This week’s edition includes mistaken identities, airplane videos, and a whole other mess of stories you need to read over the weekend.
The Weekly News Roundup is a collection of headlines from around the internet that caught the attention of the Tagging Miles team. Content on these blogs do not necessarily reflect the positions of Tagging Miles, and should not be considered endorsements. Have a great story we should read? Contact us now and let us know!
Let’s get to the point(s)
- Chasing the Points shares his three favorite ways to use American Express Gift Cards – although Trevor has gotten away from them since Barclays offered amazing portal bonuses (+/- 4% at one point, stacked with two of the Arrival, and it seemed pretty nice). That said, we are starting to see portal bonuses on the AMEX Gift Cards returning, albeit slowly.
- From As the Joe Flies: Creating a British Airways Household account. Any time you can have a household account, you should (just Trevor’s recommendation) – because the more accounts that can pool miles, means the quicker you get awards. Definitely worth reading!
- What if I told you…your points didn’t have to expire? Michael W. Travels had his expired points reinstated – and all he had to do was ask!
- Ever had a problem booking an award flight with US Airways? Join the club.
All about that destination (no troubles)
- Hungry for Points – a blog that’s new to us – has a nice overview of the Seychelles and the Maldives. It paints an interesting picture of two destinations that are generally known to be on the “bucket list.” While Trevor’s only been to the Seychelles, he can attest to the food being mediocre (barely so if you don’t like seafood).
- Dia the Deal Mommy is Vendoming in Vietnam.Can’t wait to read the trip reports from Camp Mom Asia 2015! (Joe says: ENTER THE VENDOME!!!)
- Cynthia Drescher (@JetSetCD on Twitter) shared a Jaunted article about the five extremely unique ways airlines train their flight attendants. Good things to know in the event you are looking for a wine selection on Delta, find yourself in the middle of an Amazon Jungle with a TAM flight attendant, or have any interest in competitive outrigger canoeing.
- Tahsir (aka Bengali Miles Guru) highlights three reasons travelers need a VPN subscription, and gosh it would’ve been great in China!
- Million Mile Secrets tried Silvercar, the Audi A4 only rental car company that has locations at select airports including Austin, TX, and San Francisco, CA (SFO). I thought this review was pretty detailed, perhaps the most detailed review to date on Silvercar.
- The Post Game, a Yahoo! blog, reminds us of the following wisdom: under no circumstances should you ever challenge a character at a Disney Theme Park. You will be humiliated.
Don’t you know who I am?
- Matt encountered a situation where multiple people were using the same SSN. That’s kind of a problem – he identifies some tools to see if someone may be using your SSN without your permission.
And the best of the year goes to…
- The staff at Skift wrote their travel resolutions of 2015. Definitely interesting insight as to where the industry is going in 2015 (and beyond).
- From One Mile at a Time: The best trailer of 2015. Period.
- View from the Wing reports on what could be the best reason to pursue United Global Services status again: Global Services members will now get access to the Lufthansa First Class lounges in Munich and Frankfurt, when flying from either airport in United Global First. Not great, but, well, what about that program is?
- If you didn’t see these top #avgeek videos of 2014 on FlyerTalk…you’re really missing out. Go ahead and check them out – we’ll wait here for you.
