Columbus, OH

Frequent Miler

This week had a heavy focus on hotel free night certificates. From ways to find and book SLH properties with your Hilton certificates to great uses of IHG certs and how you can and not use Marriott certificates and all the way down to our thoughts about the best of the hot hotel card offers, we covered certificates from numerous angles. Also read about our updated values for several types of hotel points and a lot more in this week’s Frequent Miler Week in Review.

Maximizing free night certificates, award booking for beginners, and more [Week in Review]

A couple of weeks ago Hilton kicked off their integration of Small Luxury Hotels (SLH) properties with the addition of three properties – Teranka Formentera (one of the Balearic Islands), Nobu Hotel Marbella in Spain and Flemings Mayfair in London. That list has now been expanded to a total...

Hilton has added more than a dozen more SLH properties

Las Vegas, NV

Atlantic City, NJ

Ocean Casino Resort in Atlantic City, NJ has long offered a status match for those with competing casino status all the way up to Ocean Prime status. We’ve covered that match pretty extensively in our post about How to get free cruises by gaming casino status matches. One of the other benefits of Ocean Prime status was a complimentary 2-night stay at Resorts World Las Vegas (I reviewed my complimentary stay at Conrad Las Vegas here). As of today (7/1/24), the partnership with Resorts World has ended, but some will be excited to see that Ocean is back to partnering with Wynn Las Vegas — so Ocean Prime members now get a complimentary 2-night stay at Wynn Las Vegas, which can be an incredibly valuable benefit.

Ocean Prime now offering 2 free nights at Wynn Las Vegas + $50 dining credit

Upgraded Points has discovered a ton of standard award availability at the Conrad Bora Bora Nui during the Summer/early-Fall of 2024. Rooms are available between June and October, including multiple 5-night blocks(meaning it will work for 5th-night free stays). When there was wide open standard award availability a few months...

Conrad Bora Bora: Great availability July-September 2024

Mark your calendars: if you have Bilt points, Monday will be a great day to consider transferring them. If you’d like to fly Air France or KLM in business class, we published a couple of helpful tricks this week, whether that’s how to find a calendar of availability or how to book via chat with Virgin Atlantic. Read about all that and a lot more in this Frequent Miler Week in Review.

Bigness from Bilt, tricks for booking Air France & KLM, updated hotel point values and more [Week in Review]

Virgin points are often the cheapest option for booking Air France or KLM flights. For example, for a trip to Paris I’m planning, I found a great Air France business class award that was available. If I booked through Air France Flying Blue, I’d have to pay 303,000 miles plus $225 per passenger. No thanks! Meanwhile, Virgin Atlantic showed the same flight for 48,500 points plus $281 per passenger. Much better! Exciting right?

Solved: Problem booking Air France/KLM with Virgin points

60K points after $3K spend within first 3 months and an additional 60K after $15K total spend within first 9 months. This card is subject to Chase's 5/24 rule (click here for details). Earning rate: 3X Southwest ✦ 2X Rapid Rewards(R) hotel and car partners ✦ 2X rideshare ✦ 1X...

Southwest Business Card 120K Offers: Get a Companion Pass with One Card (for two years?)

Newark, NJ

The all-business class airline La Compagnie is celebrating its 10th birthday on July 21 and as part of that they’re running a new promotion offering roundtrip business class flights from Newark to Paris for only $2,000. The Deal. Fly roundtrip from Newark to Paris-Orly for $2,000 with La Compagnie.

Fly business class to Paris for $2,000 round trip on La Compagnie

Richmond, VA

Southwest isn’t the only one running a sale today. JetBlue is running one too, giving 25% off when using promo code FALL2024. You’ll need to be quick though as bookings have to be made by tonight (July 10). The Deal. Save 25% on JetBlue flights when using promo...

JetBlue sale: Save 25% with promo code FALL2024 (Book by 7/10/24)

Lancaster County, PA

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NewsByJoshua

Fans of Frisco's Chicken were left reeling as the beloved Peruvian-style eatery announced the closure of all its locations in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. The chain, known for its delicious food and strong community values, posted a heartfelt note on its doors, informing customers of the devastating news.

Favorite Chicken Chain Suddenly Closes All Stores, Heartfelt Message Found on Doors

Sonesta is a hotel program that’s tended to fly under the radar for most points and miles folks (including me). It’s been around since the 1930’s, but remained fairly small for several decades. That’s changed in the last ten years or so and it’s now become one of the fastest-growing hospitality companies in the US. In 2020, Sonesta had a total of 80 properties. Today, it’s grown to over 1100, in part due to its acquisition of Red Lion Hotels.

What are Sonesta points worth?

Hertz has repeatedly earned itself negative publicity over the past couple of years. Unfortunately, they are at it again. After previously reducing the expiration timeline for points from needing activity once every 18 months to once every 12 months, Miles Talk reports on a new restriction that came from Hertz via email today: now points expire 5 years after they are earned, regardless of activity. That’s a huge bummer that is no doubt tough to track and designed to create even more breakage in a system that’s already of marginal value at best.

Hertz expiration policy now hurts even more

New York City, NY

Writers represent independent, third-party users who have joined our contributor program and self-verified their accounts. Writers are expected, like all users, to adhere to our Community Standards.

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Cheryl E Preston

Yesterday was the third time this year that an ad stating Chelsea Clinton lives in a beautiful Virginia home popped up on my laptop. My computer did not warn me this was a dangerous site, so this time, I clicked on the link.

Chelsea Clinton is rumored to be living in Virginia but probably still in NYC

Years ago, Greg wrote an excellent post about the “Earn and burn” fallacy. In it, he suggests a better strategy is to “hoard and cherry pick”. If you’ve been a Hilton hoarder for years, your cherry trees hit harvest season yesterday with Hilton’s wider launch of the partnership with SLH. Still, not everyone is a believer — a few readers commented about their disappointment with SLH. I’d argue that even if you didn’t make a great booking yesterday, the Hilton SLH partnership is sunny news for Hilton point hoarders who have been hunting for an opportunity to cherry pick.

SLH is a big win for Hilton hoarders

Looking for the cheapest ways to get to South America? This post outlines the best options available to get there in using frequent flyer rewards programs available to the major US transferable currencies, including American Express Membership Rewards, Bilt Rewards, Capital One Miles, Chase Ultimate Rewards, Citi ThankYou points, Marriott Bonvoy points and Wells Fargo Rewards.

Best ways to get to South America using points and miles (2024)

Virginia State

Mercurochrome and Merthiolate were in medicine cabinets in many Virginia homes decades ago. They were in bottles with droppers that gallons the red liquid. Looking at that old bottle in the above image brings back many memories.

Mercurochrome and Merthiolate once were in many Virginia homes

We received an interesting tip from reader Lauren yesterday giving us a heads up about a targeted Hilton offer that gives you bonus points on your next stay after doing a dummy booking. If you tend to do searches when not logged in to your Hilton account, you might be missing out.

Get bonus points offer on next Hilton stay when doing a dummy booking (Targeted)

In sadly unsurprising news, Virgin Atlantic has finally done the seeming inevitable and devalued one of its few remaining sweet spots. Thrifty Traveler has spotted that if you’d like to book Delta flights to Europe in business class, those will now require more miles in most cases. That’s not...

Virgin Atlantic devalues Delta, destroying deal

Illinois State

Chicago, IL

Foodie in Chicago

MOD Pizza has over 500 locations across the country with 22 restaurants in Illinois. The Washington-based chain offers fast-casual fare known for its customized, artisan-style pizzas. Customers can choose from over 40 toppings and 8 sauces to create their own masterpiece.

Bankruptcy Looms for Major Pizza Chain With Chicago Suburban Locations

Earn 5,000 bonus points for every three nights you stay at Hyatt properties in the Caribbean and Latin America. You must be a World of Hyatt member in good standing and register for the promotion between July 1 at 8:00 a.m. CT and September 30, 2024, at 11:59 p.m. CT to participate. To join World of Hyatt, visit hyatt.com/join, and to register for the promotion, visit hyatt.com/5kpoints.

Hyatt promo: Earn 5k bonus points for every 3 nights in Caribbean & Latin America

NewsBreak

3 more Maldives overwater villas now bookable with Hilton points & free night certificates

Hilton integrated hundreds more Small Luxury Hotels of the World (SLH) properties today. We covered that here, but there’s a particularly notable development if you’re interested...

3 more Maldives overwater villas now bookable with Hilton points & free night certificates

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