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Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.When it comes to paying for airfare, your best bet is usually to go with one of the handful of cards that earn you bonus transferable points on these purchases, or with a co-branded credit card from your airline of choice if you’re looking to earn more miles or even get an elite-qualifying dollar waiver.With the recent introduction of the Chase Sapphire Reserve, which earns 3x points on all dining and travel purchases (including airfare), it’s become clearer than ever that other cards — especially premium travel rewards cards — need to step up their game when it comes to rewarding you for spending on airfare and other travel expenses....

The German government is reported to be considering buying three brand-new Airbus A350 to replace its aging fleet of A340s as VIP transports. This would give Germany the most modern fleet of VIP government jets. The US, Russia and other states have larger fleets and airplanes, but they tend to be older generations, like the 1990s vintage Boeing 747s used as Air Force One or the Soviet-era Ilyushins that ferry around the Russian president....

Sign up for our daily newsletterEmail addressSign upI would like to subscribe to The Points Guy newsletters and special email promotions. The Points Guy will not share or sell your email. See privacy policy.With the 737 MAX still grounded worldwide, Boeing saw a sharp drop in deliveries last month compared to May 2018.According to data on the company’s website, Boeing delivered just 30 planes overall last month, compared to 68 in the same period last year....

Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.Aer Lingus, Ireland’s largest airline, is one of the most popular ways to get to Dublin and beyond. Until the carrier joins with British Airways and Iberia in using Avios next year, it still requires a bit of savvy to book award flights. TPG Contributor Richard Kerr shows you how to book award travel on Aer Lingus utilizing a variety of partners....

Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.TPG reader AK sent me a tweet to ask about pooling Starpoints:“If my friends and I sign up for the Starwood Amex card, can we combine points to book a longer stay?”The award travel game is one where it often pays to join forces. By pooling hotel points with friends or family, you can increase your booking power, share elite benefits and take advantage of programs that offer a discount for longer award stays....

This week, cruise giant Royal Caribbean made a major pricing mistake.After briefly waffling, according to TPG reader Anthony W., who watched the line vacillate on social media, the line on Wednesday announced it would indeed honor a “fat finger” underpricing of its top-tier Deluxe Beverage Package that could end up costing it millions of dollars in lost revenue.The line said more than 20,000 customers were able to book the package online for upcoming sailings at a rate of just $18 per day — nearly 70% below the normal cost of $55 per day — before it caught the error....

As evidenced by recent date-based ticket pricing changes to try to even out attendance throughout the year, Disney World is certainly not hurting for visitors. With sure-fire hits such as the opening of Star Wars Land on the near-term horizon, these Mickey Mouse fans need places to lay their ears at night. With that in mind, Disney has just announced a new resort to be located along Bay Lake between Disney’s Wilderness Lodge and Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort....

Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here – The Platinum Card® from American Express, The Business Platinum Card® from American ExpressNew Year’s Day was just on Tuesday, and that means everyone is probably starting in on their New Year’s resolutions…which usually includes an effort to exercise more.To help with that, one of the little-known perks of the American Express Platinum Card and The Business Platinum Card from American Express OPEN is a partnership with Equinox Fitness that gives cardholders several value-added benefits for signing up for an Equinox membership and using your card to pay for it....

Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.It’s a struggle as old as the points and miles game itself: should you use your points for a given redemption, or hold for something grander in the future? We’ve argued before that it’s not wise to stockpile points without a goal in mind.Instead, you’re better off cashing your points and miles in for a desired trip, flight or hotel stay as soon as you have enough....

Indonesian search-and-rescue divers retrieved the flight data recorder on Thursday from the crashed Lion Air Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft, which plummeted into the Java Sea on Monday.The recorder, also known as a black box, from downed flight JT610 will help investigators learn why the two-month-old passenger plane suddenly crashed. Flight tracking sites show the flight was experiencing erratic speed and altitude changes in the moments before plunging into the water, killing all 189 people on board....

Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.Hyatt announced today that starting on October 1, 2012, the Hyatt Visa will be offering some brand new features and as an existing cardmember, you will be get these new benefits as soon as they launch – you do not need to register or reapply.Increased Point EarningThe card used to offer 1 point per dollar spend on everything besides Hyatt spend, but now you get 2 Hyatt Gold Passport points for every $1 spent at restaurants, on airline tickets when purchased directly from the airline, and at car rental agencies....

Leaving a personal item behind on a plane could be a traveler’s worst nightmare. When it happens, typically the only option is to file a claim with the airline’s lost and found department. However, when losing an electronic device, you may be able to take matters into your own hands and track down it using a location app.That is exactly what one airline passenger did after he accidentally left his laptop on a Delta aircraft at the Atlanta airport last Thursday....

Last year, Venice experienced the worst floods the city had seen in at least a decade. And this week, the annual high tides known as acqua alta once again turned deadly.With floodwaters rising more than six feet — higher than at any other time since 1966 — the city has endured significant damage. Venice mayor Luigi Brugnaro declared a state of emergency and said the city was “on its knees,” The New York Times reported....

The president of the tech company that manufactures laser sensors for self-driving cars is defending its product after an Uber autonomous vehicle with its sensors hit and killed a pedestrian in Arizona on March 18.Marta Thoma Hall, president of Velodyne Linar Inc., said she was “baffled” why the lasers on the self-driving car didn’t detect the pedestrian and cause the car to hit its brakes, Bloomberg reports. The Uber vehicle hit 49-year-old Elaine Herzberg as she crossed the street with her bike outside of the crosswalk around 10:00pm in Tempe, Arizona....

You may have to deal with fewer people during the check-in process the next time you fly Spirit Airlines from New York’s LaGuardia Airport.On Tuesday, the ultra-low cost carrier started offering passengers departing from LGA the choice of tagging their own checked baggage and personally dropping it on the conveyor.The airline touted the self-service bag drop as making the check-in process more efficient and shortening the amount of time passengers have to spend in line to see a customer-service agent....

Update: The 60,000-point pricing detailed below is no longer available as of March 5, 2019. For details on Marriott redemption options, please visit How to Redeem Points With the Marriott Bonvoy Program.This is officially the final countdown before the Starwood Preferred Guest and Marriott Rewards programs become one on this coming Saturday – August 18. The merger and integration process has been years in the making, and hopefully, you are already well prepared for the big transition coming this weekend....

Cities around the world are seeing their street corners increasingly cluttered with rentable bicycles, e-bikes, scooters, e-scooters and mopeds. Now there’s a man in Sweden who wants to shake it all up by introducing a new vehicle to the ride-sharing market: pogo sticks.Yes, pogo sticks, the preferred ride of cartoon coyotes. Except that it’s not a joke.“Of course, it’s just fun to take the WTF angle, but the reason we chose pogo sticks in basically as a way to stand out in the generic market of micromobility,” Adam Mikkelsen, CEO and founder of Cangoroo, based in Malmö, Sweden, told TPG....

TPG is happy to announce that the Southwest Rewards Points Giveaway winners have finally been revealed. Twelve winners were chosen each day for 12 straight days in December to win 60,000 Southwest Rapid Rewards points — that’s 8,640,000 Rapid Rewards points cumulative.Based on TPG’s valuations, each individual winner’s points are worth $900. What’s even more exciting is that these points will count toward Companion Pass eligibility, and we think this is one of the most valuable airline perks out there....

I am a mother of two, and by this point I’m no stranger to traveling with little ones. We’ve done big trips, little trips, fancy trips, cheap trips, solo trips, big family trips, and we’re still standing to tell the tale. And, for the most part, they are good tales.But, traveling with children isn’t exactly the same as traveling with a baby. Life in general with a baby is just fundamentally different than life without one....

The Lannisters, Starks and Tyrells live in remarkable castles that only seem possible in the magical, medieval realm of the Seven Kingdoms. But to bring these ancestral seats of the great Houses Westeros to life, the production crew of “Game of Thrones” located spectacular palaces and fortresses around the real world for the show.Though the show filmed all over Europe, including Northern Ireland, Iceland and Croatia, many of the most striking castles featured in the hit HBO series can be found in Spain....