Get free Gold status with Accor A|Club and Best Western Rewards

So while last weeks free Platinum offer has come and gone there is another from European based Accor Hotels for free Gold Status with their A|Club program. I have to thank one of our Twitter followers @Forest412 for alerting me to this offer. Unlike the Platinum offer, this one has a known deadline date of January 31, 2012 and is meant for new members, so if you are already an A|Club member you may have to join with a different email address (assuming you don't already have some status or points with A|Club).

To join via this offer please visit this page on the A|Club website.

And taking a hint from my platinum post last week you can leverage your Accor status to get the equivalent status with Best Western Rewards. For more details on the Best Western status offer please see Best Western Status Match No Catch

Making the most of your American Express Gold Rewards Card this holiday season

Making the most of your American Express Gold Rewards Card this holiday season This is the 4th installment of my series on the American Express Gold Rewards Card, and with the holiday shopping season in full swing, we look at how to maximize the use of your Gold Rewards Card. Whether it is maximized on the earn or on the burn, using this card for your Christmas shopping can be very advantageous.

Earning
For those of you who have not followed my series on this card, I'll revisit the earning basics of the American Express Gold Rewards Card. The card earns 1 Membership Rewards point for every eligible dollar spent on the card, but where the card shines is on eligible gas, grocery, drugstore and travel purchases as Cardmembers earn 2 points per dollar spent at these locations. It is the strategic use of this point multiplier that will ensure you maximize your earning potential this festive season.

Speaking of festive, what is one of the first things that come to mind for the holidays? Food. And lots of it! Since the card earns double points on grocery purchases all the food for your festivities should be bought on the card. Of course, if you need other items for your holiday celebrations, put all of your spend on the card, as you will still earn 1 point per dollar for all of your purchases outside of gas, grocery, drugstore and travel outlets.

It wouldn't be Christmas without all the shopping for gifts. By putting all your gift purchases on your American Express Gold Rewards Card, you will see your points balance grow by leaps and bounds. But the question to ask here is: How can I earn even more points on those gifts? While it can't be done on all purchases, here are two tips on how to bring in the point multiplier on some of your non gas, grocery, drugstore or travel purchases:

1) Some people (like me) are hard to buy for, so gift cards make a great present. If you want to buy a gift card to give to someone as a gift, buy it at your local grocery store and earn 2 points per dollar versus 1.

2) If you have your gifts (and the stores they come from) planned out, go buy gift cards for your purchases at the grocery store first and then use them to purchase the gifts. For example, say you want to buy a shirt at The Gap as a gift. If you went to The Gap to buy it, you would earn only 1 point per dollar, but if you bought a gift card at Sobeys or Safeway for The Gap, you would earn 2 points per dollar. Then you could simply use the gift card for the actual purchase of the shirt.

By following these tips, you can ensure that you're maximizing your points earning for the Christmas season.

Redeeming
Another way you can maximize the use of your American Express Gold Rewards Card this winter is to look at how you can use the points you have already earned to help you in your gift shopping. How do you do this? Via the Membership Rewards catalogue! With an option to redeem online or by phone, the catalogue is quite extensive - with items ranging from $25 Keg Gift Cards to 46" Toshiba LED TVs and hundreds of items in between. There are even some online-only discounted redemptions that include such items as a Canon Pixma printer for only 13,500 points (regular 29,000) until December 8. But your points don't have to be used only on merchandise or gift cards. How about concert tickets for your significant other or even utilizing TripFlex (see our TripFlex post here) to get your family a vacation to somewhere warm?

No matter how you look at it, there are many ways you can maximize your earn and burn potential this holiday season with the American Express Gold Rewards Card. I know I have and I would love to hear from our readers who also have the card on how they have used it to its fullest for their Christmas shopping and gift giving.

Click here to learn more about the American Express Gold Rewards Card

Get Free Platinum status with Accor A|Club and Best Western Rewards

December 2nd Update:  Almost as fast as I put this offer up it died, hopefully some of you were able to take advantage of it!

There is time limited offer from Accor Hotels A|Club that gives members of Air France KLM's Flying Blue program instant Platinum status in the A|Club program. Normally, it takes 60 nights or accumulating 25,000 A|Club points in a calendar year to earn Platinum status, so as you can see this is quite the fast track to this elite level. Now, that being said this promo is meant for Flying Blue members, (which is free to join, just visit Airfrance.com or KLM.com) but the actual registration form does not ask for your Flying Blue number, just A|Club membership # and email address. I did so and within 15 minutes had emails from Accor confirming my Platinum status without inputting my Flying Blue number or as the registration page suggests selecting the auto-convert option to Flying Blue. So there you have, that is how you can get free Platinum Status with Accor Hotels.

The next question may be what can I do with this status (which could be combined with "Who the heck is Accor Hotels) as here in Canada there are only a few Accor Hotel locations in Toronto and Montreal and they are not called Accor, as that is the parent company's name. The locations in those two cities are Novotel and Sofitels. Worldwide the Accor family has 10 hotel brands with most locations being in Europe and Asia. So you can definitely take advantage of this status for stays in those two Canadian cities and many more outside of Canada. But for those of you who primarily have stays in Canada and not in Toronto or Montreal may want to consider the next option:

Free Platinum status with Best Western! How do you get this? Best Western offers a promotion called "Status Match. No Catch" which means they will match your status in any other hotel loyalty program. So your first step will be to get your platinum status with Accor A|Club (don't worry, I have all the links at the end of this post) and once it is confirmed, complete the Best Western Status Match form and provide proof of your platinum status (just print off your online Accor Statement showing your Platinum Status) and send them off. I already took advantage of this status match offer not with Accor but used my Hyatt Platinum status to get the platinum status with Best Western. Within a couple of days of sending in the form I had my Best Western status.

There you have it, this is how you can free elite Platinum status in two major hotel chains! Here's a tip, don't wait to do this as Accor can pull this fast track offer for Flying Blue members at anytime.

Links
Accor A|Club Platinum Status Fast Track
Best Western Status Match No Catch

1,500 Bonus Marriott Rewards Points Per Night for stays across Canada

Marriott loves to reward Canadian's for stays at their hotels and the following is their promotion for the first quarter of 2012. Please note that this offer can be combined with any system-wide offers like Marriott's MegaBonus promotion. Depending on the hotel the bonus point rate may cost a little more then the best available or AAA/CAA rate but we have also found some nights/locations where the rate is no different, so if you are paying for the room yourself (ie not billing it out to your employer/client) make sure you check all the available rates first and see if paying a bit extra is worth the bonus points.

Earn 1,500 Bonus Rewards Points PER NIGHT for stays at 14 participating hotels across Canada. Maximum bonus per stay is 7,500 points. Full Details and Online Booking  Valid for stays Jan 1 - Apr 16, 12
Participating Hotels
Calgary Marriott Downtown Hotel
Montreal Airport Marriott Hotel
Edmonton Marriott at River Cree Resort
Residence Inn Gravenhurst Muskoka Wharf
Halifax Marriott Harbourfront Hotel
Residence Inn Montreal Downtown
Ottawa Marriott Hotel
Vancouver Airport Marriott Hotel
Toronto Marriott Downtown Eaton Centre Hotel
Toronto Marriott Bloor Yorkville Hotel
Renaissance Toronto Downtown Hotel
Toronto Airport Marriott Hotel
Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle Downtown Hotel
Renaissance Vancouver Harbourside Hotel

RBC Avion 50% Transfer Bonus to British Airways is back

British Airways and RBC are once again offering Avion cardholders a 50% bonus on transferring RBC Rewards points to BA Avios points. The offer runs until January 31, 12 and the only difference we can see this time around is that you have to transfer a minimum of 10,000 RBC Rewards Points.

Despite the change to British Airways program (from Executive Club to Avios) this can still be  a great offer to take advantage of if you are not looking at booking travel using the set RBC Rewards chart as the new BA Avios program has seen a reduction in the number of miles required to fly from Montreal/Toronto to London and huge reductions in some short haul flights in North America. See our post on the new Avios program here.  They also offer miles for upgrades so if you do not have enough miles for a business class or first class flight you can use miles to upgrade a paid fare in economy, economy Plus, or business class. Another good use of BA miles is with their partners from the OneWorld Alliance which means you don't have to redeem for BA flights via London but go direct on airlines like Cathay Pacific to Asia or American Airlines to the U.S. One thing to watch out for however with BA is seat availability, we have heard mixed stories of people being able to get or not get reward seats on flights plus redemptions on BA to the U.K. can carry heavy taxes and fuel surcharges.

For more details on this offer please visit British Airways

Book an Award Stay with Club Carlson and receive 9,000 bonus Gold Points

The latest and greatest in the slew of promos coming out of the Club Carlson camp is this offer on award night stays called Redeem Points, Earn Points

Redeem Points, Earn Points.
Register and stay at any of our more than 1,000 Carlson℠hotels, on a Award Stay between December 1, 2011 and January 31, 2012, and earn 9,000 Gold Points, enough for a future Award Night at select hotels worldwide. Points + Cash reservations are not eligible for this offer.
Full details and registration

Avios is now the official program for British Airways and Iberia

It had been announced awhile ago that the FFPs of British Airways (Executive Club) and Iberia (Plus) would be merged into one big loyalty program which also would bring in the Air Miles UK program. When the announcement came out the news hit many North American's members of BA's Executive Club hard as some of the great redemption opportunities in that program (North America to Asia and South America) were lost as the new redemption schedule is based on distance and not to a set reward chart. All day today I have been reading various frequent flyer blogs looking at the new Avios system and while those great offers mentioned above may be gone there are some new gems to be had within the program, in particular for flights within North America on BA's partners.

Since the Avios program now works on distance rather then the set reward chart a lot of the shorter haul redemptions have actually gone done in price. For example a one-way flight between Toronto and New York can be had for only 4,500 Avios points (9,000 round trip) and used to be 12,500 miles (25,000 round trip), compare this to 15,000 Aeroplan Miles, 25,000 AAdvantage Miles etc.. Toronto to London has also become cheaper as it used to 50,000 miles for a round-trip redemption in economy and that is now 40,000. These lower redemption rates make the semi annual RBC Avion 50% transfer bonus to BA even more attractive (that is if they keep the bonus around)

Another issue that seems to arise in addition to the redemptions that became more expensive is the fact the if you want to build an itinerary with a connection (think stopover in previous Executive Club terms) you have to price out each connection separately. So where you used to be able to get a round trip flight Calgary to Paris for 50,000 miles with a connection in London (and the option to stopover in London for a few days) now has to be priced at Calgary-London for 50,000 miles and London-Paris for 9,000 miles so in the new program it will cost you 9,000 more points.

What do you think of the changes to the program? For those of you who are BA flyers will it make you shy away from BA and take your business to another airline or will you take it as it is and continue with your loyalty to BA?

To see some more news on the good and the bad of the new Avios program here are some other blog posts made today (bear in mind all of these are U.S. based but do hold some merit for Canada):
Dan's Deals has a good run down of redemptions that have gone down, stayed the same and increased
View from the Wing - it always good to hear Gary's take on programs
One Mile at a time had numerous posts today: Post 1 | Post 2 | Post 3

Aeroplan fuel surcharge saga continues

In our last post on the new fuel surcharge for Star Alliance award tickets from Aeroplan, we first mentioned it was going to be on few Star Alliance carriers, then Aeroplan retracted that and said it was only for Lufthansa then yesterday they release this:

With the increasing cost of fuel, many airlines have started charging fuel surcharges on redemption tickets. All fuel surcharge amounts are applied by Aeroplan on behalf of the ticketing carrier and are passed through directly to the ticketing carrier. Fuel surcharge amounts are determined by each airline and may change from time to time. Aeroplan has applied fuel surcharges for flight rewards on Air Canada since 2004. The fuel surcharge amounts to be applied by Aeroplan for flights on Star Alliance airlines will be the same as those applied by the individual airlines within their own frequent flyer programs.

Fuel surcharges to flight rewards on the following Star Alliance airlines will be effective as of the dates noted below:

November 30^th, 2011: Asiana Airlines, THAI, ANA, Austrian Airlines, LOT Polish Airlines, bmi

December 14^th, 2011: Aegean Airlines, Adria Airways, TAM, South African Airways, TAP Portugal

These are in addition to fuel surcharges to flight rewards on Lufthansa that became effective on November 9^th 2011 at 7pm.

Members making voluntary changes after the applicable effective date to existing bookings with these airlines will also be subject to the fuel surcharges.

Fuel surcharges to flight rewards on other Star Alliance member airlines not referenced in this notice will come into effect only if those airlines elect to apply them within their own frequent flyer programs.

So as you can see fuel surcharges are back on the carriers that were first mentioned and even more. Some Star Alliance carriers will still not have any fuel surcharges but the door has been left open for Aeroplan to add them in the future

Aeroplan now charging fuel surcharges for award tickets on select Star Alliance carriers

One of the biggest complaints I always hear about Aeroplan is the fuel surcharge imposed on redemptions for flights on Air Canada metal. A way around this has always been to redeem Aeroplan miles for flights on their Star Alliance partners as members were not charged the fuel surcharge. Well that changed earlier this week when a member on the FlyerTalk forum posted that he was told by an Aeroplan call center agent that they will begin imposing fuel surcharges on Star Alliance awards as of November 9th and it does appear that this has become reality.

Apparently the fuel surcharges can now be found on Lufthansa, ANA, Asiana and Thai Airways (see update below). No word yet on the other Star Alliance partners. Now when you book an Aeroplan award for these airlines you can expect to pay a few extra dollars for short domestic flights or in excess of $500 more for trans-Atlantic or -Pacific flights. Granted if these Star Alliance carriers are charging the fuel surcharge to Aeroplan, Aeroplan must recoup those charges but the question that begs to be answered, why now? Most of these airlines have had fuel surcharges for years and have not changed or increased them. Did they not charge these to Aeroplan and unilaterally decide that they would start charging them? Another question that will probably go unanswered.

Overall another not so good year for Aeroplan news
First came the increases to select redemptions off of the Aeroplan and Star Alliance reward charts and now this. Many people, both frequent and infrequent flyers love to hate Aeroplan and Air Canada and this latest move, especially without proper communication to its members will just exemplify why people feel this way. I have said it before and so have many others, if you communicate changes properly, sure you will feel the heat but at least you will keep and/or gain the respect of your members for being truthful, honest and proactive. Now Aeroplan will have to go on the defensive, justifying the move and explaining why they did not communicate this. (I can think of one reason, there would have been an onslaught of bookings prior to the effective date and they would lose out on the fuel surcharge that with proper assumption is being paid to the carrier that the member is travelling on). In the end you would think that Aeroplan, which is part of Aimia a corporation that happens to be at the forefront of loyalty marketing not only in Canada but globally would know that customer engagement and retention is key to a loyalty program and making unannounced negative changes goes against all aspects of those two key factors.

Now, believe me, I hate putting Aeroplan in a negative perspective as overall I am a fan of the program but it is my duty as an unbiased consumer resource to let Canadians know about these changes since Aeroplan did not.

* Nov 13 Update:
Later on November 10th,  after we posted this Aeroplan posted on their website that they are charging the surcharge only on Lufthansa flights (retracting the fuel surcharges on ANA, Asiana, Thai) but stating that other Star Alliance carriers will be added as applicable. See here for more details

Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One Review

This review is taken in its entirety from the original review on the Rewards Canada website

The newest travel rewards credit to come onto the market is the Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One (and it's little sister card the Priority Club® Platinum MasterCard®). The card which was announced earlier this spring and truth be told been in Priority Club's sights for at least three years was finally released today. Rewards Canada was lucky enough to receive all the details of the card at the start of summer so that we could include it in our annual Top Travel Rewards Credit Card rankings where the card tied for top spot in the small category of Hotel Points cards. With this cards introduction, Canadian's can now choose from 5 major Worldwide hotel frequent guest programs to tie a credit card into.

Overview
The Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One is a hotel rewards card that earns points into InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) Priority Club program. The IHG group of hotels includes the Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, InterContinental Hotels & Resorts, Candlewood Suites and numerous other brands. Being a 'World' version of the MasterCard brand the card comes with an excellent insurance and benefits package that is the same across Capital One's suite of World MasterCards. It comes with some nice signup and ongoing bonuses, accelerated earning for stays at all the IHG brands, instant Priority Elite status and bonuses for ongoing spending.

Costs
The Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One comes with an industry standard $120 primary card annual fee. The card offers a decent sized 30,000 point welcome bonus which could garner as many as 6 free nights if you take advantage of Priority Club's point break offers. Like all Capital One cards, adding an authorized user is free which gives this card a slight edge in the cost department over its biggest competitor the Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express. The interest rate on the card is 19.8% placing it right in the middle of the pack of competitors.

Earning
The Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One earns 2 Priority Club points for every dollar spent on the card for all purchases except those made at IHG properties. For purchase made at IHG properties, the card earns 5 Priority Club points per dollar spent. The card also offers a 5,000 Priority Club points bonus for every $10,000 spent on the card.

Redeeming
See Application

Features and Benefits
As stated above the Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One comes with an excellent insurance and benefits package that competes with all the other high end cards. The card features Trip cancellation which is only offered as a standard feature on a few other travel rewards cards and Travel Medical insurance which only comes standard on about 50% of the cards in the market. .

The other primary benefit that the card comes with is Platinum Elite Status. What does Platinum Elite Status from Priority Club get you? It gets you a 50% bonus on your base point earnings for IHG stays, priority check-in, complimentary room upgrades and guaranteed room availability.


What is good about this card
There are a few really good things about the Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One outside of the great suite of features and benefits, there has to be otherwise the card would not have split first place in our Hotel Credit card ranking for 2011. First off, is the vast number of hotels worldwide that you can earn and redeem your points at, with over 4,500 locations the InterContinental Hotels Group provides great global coverage from small towns to large cities to luxury resorts. Next, the point breaks redemption option provides an extremely high value return on your spending especially if you redeem for higher end hotels. Last but not least is Priority Club's rule that all points count towards status, not just your hotel stay points. Last but not least, the Priority Club World MasterCard from Capital One now guarantees Platinum Elite Status guaranteed for the life of the account.

What is not so good about this card
As mentioned above, one of the things that is not so good about the Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One is Priority Club's conversion ratio to airline programs. If this is a feature you really look for you could be better off with another hotel loyalty program that does have a credit card in Canada. The elite status levels from Priority Club also leave a little to be desired when compared to other frequent guest programs.

Conclusion
This latest entry into the crowded travel rewards credit card market should do quite well because of what the card and the Priority Club program do offer. If you are looking for a hotel credit card that offers many hotel choices in Canada and Worldwide then then Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One is for you because of the large number of hotels under the IHG banner. Existing Priority Club members who make IHG their number one choice when booking hotels will probably latch onto this card right away. The general public in Canada may not do so as fast until they learn about the true value of hotel frequent guest programs and their flexibility advantage over frequent flyer programs. When you look at the ease of earning points on this card and on IHG hotel stays it can and couple that with some great hotel reward redemption options you can see why this card shot to top and tied last years top pick in our Hotel Credit Card category.

Care to comment? Do you agree or disagree with us? Tell us your experiences with the Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One on our blog

Related Links:
Priority Club® World MasterCard® from Capital One on the Capital One website
Priority Club® Platinum MasterCard® from Capital One on the Capital One website
Rewards Canada's Hotel Credit Card Comparison including the Priority Club® World MasterCard®

Other cards to consider if you are looking at this card:
Chase Marriott Rewards Platinum Visa
MBNA Best Western Rewards Platinum Plus MasterCard
MBNA Choice Privileges MasterCard
Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express

“The interest rates, fees, rewards details, benefits and other details of the Capital One product(s) described in the article may have changed since the time of publication. Please consult the product information pages on the Capital One website for accurate product details. In the event of any conflict between the product details in this article and the Capital One website, the details on the Capital One website shall prevail.”