Aeroplan Offers Up To 5000 Bonus Miles on Hotel Point Transfers

By Darren MakMon, 08/22/2011 - 05:06

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Screen Shot 2011-08-22 at 11.37.08 AMAeroplan is once again running a points transfer promotion from many of the popular hotel loyalty programs, providing up to 5000 bonus miles. When transferring enough hotel points to receive 5000 Aeroplan miles you will receive a 1000 mile bonus. A transfer equalling 10000 Aeroplan miles, you will receive 2000 bonus miles. Transfer 25000 miles or more, and receive a 5000 mile bonus.

Available hotel programs to transfer from and their conversion rates, cover most of the major popular loyalty programs, including:

- Starwood Preferred Guest (1:1)
- Best Western Rewards (5:1)
- Marriott Rewards (10000:2000)
- Hilton Honours (10000:1000)
- Priority Club Rewards (10000:2000)
- Accor A|Club (up to 2:1)
- Club Carlson
- Choice Privileges (5:1)
- Coast Rewards (1:1)
- Hyatt Gold Passport (2.5:1)
- Shangri-La Golden Circle
- Wyndham Rewards (2.5:1)

Just remember, that the bonus is based on how many Aeroplan Miles your transfer will net, not the number of hotel points you have to transfer. And why would you do this? The only time I would make a conversion is if I absolutely needed the miles for an Aeroplan Reward Redemption, or had some points in a hotel program that were going to expire, or didn't have enough for a redemption.

High Speed is Just That at the W London Leicester Square

By Darren MakSun, 08/21/2011 - 02:51

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My second impression of the W London is rather quick! After heading to the Living Room (Lobby Lounge) for a coffee while my room was cleaned, I was given a code for the wifi, so I could get caught up on some emails etc while I waited. After about 5 minutes of surfing around, checking out SIM cards in the UK, the Tube Map and other things I should have done before I left on this trip, I realized, that the Internet Connection I had was not your typical slow hotel connection.

Running a quick speedtest, I discovered that the download speed averaged just shy of 25 Mega bits per second, but even more impressive was the upload speeds of over 8 Mbps. Wow!

Now I had another problem, I got everything I needed to do done before my room was ready! I guess there can be problems with having a really quick Internet connection for your guests!

For my first impression, come back to check out my hotel review of the new W London which will be up shortly!

W London Leicester Square Wifi Speedtest

Free Wifi in Lufthansa Senator & Business Lounges

By Darren MakSat, 08/20/2011 - 15:02

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Lufthansa Lounge Internet Access A pet peeve of many travellers who spend time in International Lounges, is that the wireless access rules differ from carrier to carrier, even though they may all be apart of a Golbal Alliance. Take Star Alliance for example. United used to only provide access to their Red Carpet Club Members, Air Canada gave everyone access in the Maple Leaf Lounges, then took that benefit away from anyone but their own elites. Lufthansa would only give access codes to their HON members.

I am not sure when exactly the change was made with Lufthansa, and whether it applies world-wide, but they now offer free T-Mobile access in their Senator and Business Lounges at Washington's Dulles International Airport (IAD).

As United now gives anyone who enters the Red Carpet Club a code good for 24 hours access, and Air Canada provides free access again with different speed tiers depending on your status, all is starting to be right in the world of Free Lounge Wifi around the world.

Hotels, such as those run by Starwood and Hyatt also now offer free Internet to their top tier members, so the days of Internet being a premium for those who travel the most are slowly disappearing.

As more airports and most budget hotels are now giving away free access, the list of people and places without free access is slowly shrinking!

Now if we could just get the speeds boosted a little!

Loyalty Program Status Levels Really Do Mean Something

By Darren MakFri, 03/25/2011 - 15:04

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hyatt gold passport diamond membership cardI often get made fun of when I mention to someone that I have "status" in a hotel or airline loyalty program. This is, I am sure, partly due to the fact that tiers for those above general membership are called "status levels" with associated names like "Elite", "Super Elite", "Diamond", "Platinum" etc...

After the person I am having my conversation with stops mocking me (which in some instances can be quite a long time), I usually follow up with a short story about a time when my "status" has helped me out of a jam, or has provided a great perk. But today I came across a situation where my "status" made all the difference in how a conversation with Hyatt Hotels Customer Service proceeded.

I was looking at my Hyatt Gold Passport account online recently, and noticed that although I have stayed eight times this year at Hyatt hotels, I had accumulated only seven qualified stays in my quest for renewing my Diamond level status for next year. I finally got around to calling today, to get this taken care of, and dialled the number on the Contact Us page of the Hyatt website. What a mistake.

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