Toddlers and Time Zones - Asia

Last week, we talked about how to deal with jet lag on flights to Europe. Today we'll talk about traveling the other way to Asia.

Unlike fights to Europe, these trans-Pacific flights are more varied with options that will get you there at various times throughout the day.

However, we always seem to be on flights that arrive late in the evening (9PM or later Asia time). That late of an arrival almost forces you to get an airport hotel nearby for a night before you can either (a) connect to your flight the next morning or (b) explore the city if that is indeed your final destination.

However, as you can see below looking at flights to Hong Kong and Tokyo, you have multiple more flight time options, including flights that arrive in the morning or mid-day.

The best time for you again depends on if you need to connect to another flight. But assuming you've reached your final destination, here are the factors my family would look at:

A. 9AM Departure - 1PM Arrival. If you arrive mid-day, then you can still drop your stuff off at your hotel and have an afternoon to explore the city, get a proper dinner and ease into your Asian vacation.

However, that really depends on your ability to shift your mental clock and get a "night's worth" of sleep on the 14-16 hour flight during what would normally be your daytime. I don't know about you, but I can only nap for a max of 2 hours when the sun is out. Sitting in my seat for such a long time in a confined area means I really need a lot of Disney Junior on the iPad and a lot of coloring books.

But when traveling with young kids, most parents quickly realize this is almost too much to ask of their children. This is why my family almost always opts for overnight flights when flying long distances.

B. 4PM Departure - 9PM Arrival. This evening flight would have a scheduled sleeping time more approximate to your New York time. Assuming you take off, eat dinner and watch a movie, you could try to asleep at 8PM NY time (9AM Hong Kong time) and get a full 8 hours and wake up at 5PM Asia time, enough time to watch another movie and have your second meal before you land in Hong Kong. Unlike the European redeye flights, this 16 hour flight is definitely long enough to get a full night of sleep.

However, when you land, you'd be ready to start your day when a toddler should be going to bed (9PM Hong Kong time). Now if you were a single guy/girl looking for Hong Kong nightlife, this situation could be ideal.

But if you're a 3 year old toddler, probably less so. Depending on your choice of hotel, it might make sense not to break the bank on the first night since you're just going to sleep. When possible, my parents will sometimes secure a nearby hotel (focusing on price and distance) for the first night. After all, any destination hotel they actually want to spend time in will probably be much more expensive, and it'd be a shame to pay those prices for a just a few hours of sleep without any time to enjoy the property.

We didn't do this for our 2014 Hong Kong trip, but we did in 2013 when we needed a night in Bangkok after our flight landed at 10:30PM. Instead of traveling into the Bangkok city center, we opted for the Best Western located just 5 minutes from Suvarnabhumi Airport - which was actually extremely impressive!

Again, the first night is just the beginning of your Asia trip. The real trick is to manage the jet lag as quickly as possible so that you can re-adjust to the local time zone. Again, my parents are probably more strict than others, but we do whatever it takes to acclimate.

So assuming we took the late afternoon flight, my parents would actually wake me up early (~5AM New York time or 6PM Hong Kong time) so that I'd have more awake time on the plane. Then by the time we landed and arrived to our hotel, I'd have a chance at being tired.

Then instead of going to bed as soon as we checked into our hotel room (~11PM Hong Kong time), I'd get a bath to wake me up a bit and stay up a few hours more. We'd go to bed closer to 2-3AM (which is only 1-2PM New York time).

Most of the time, with it being dark out, that would be enough to do the trick for me to sleep through the night, but I am noticing it getting tougher and tougher as I went from 10 months old to almost 3 years old. There were definitely times when I woke up at like 6AM, but that's not so bad since we could start our days (and breakfasts) earlier.

Toddlers and Time Zones - Europe

One of the questions I get often as a traveling toddler is "How do you deal with the jetlag?" Well, it's not easy, but I do have some great parents to help me adjust to different time zones when we travel long distance.

The challenge with living on the East Coast of the US is that you're almost always going to have inconvenient flight times.

However, when you travel (especially as or with young children), you learn to "deal with it." Here are a few ways we try to adjust as best you can.

Flights to Europe 
These trans-Atlantic flights are often business-traveler oriented, so they're always scheduled to arrive very early Europe time (like 7-9AM) so that people can make their business meetings in the morning or make a connecting flight to another part of Europe. That's great for them, but that means we're departing at 4-6PM and landing at midnight-2AM on New York time. Not ideal for families, or non-senior citizens who don't fall asleep before the show Modern Family comes on.

Plus, the flight from the East Coast is likely only 6-8 hours long, which isn't enough time to really sleep a full night after factoring in taxiing to the gate, dinner service, breakfast service and landing. So you're really only looking at maybe 4-5 hours of actual sleep time. I know this pretty well, because we just did a red-eye flight to Munich this past July.

But I wanted to show you a flight with multiple options, so we'll use the more popular New York-Frankfurt route that has more than 1 flight per day.

Ignore the fact that there seem to be 7 different flight options, because there are actually only 3 (partner airlines like United and Lufthansa often code-share for the same exact flight). You have the following:

• 5PM departure arriving 5:30AM local time (aka 12:30AM New York time);
• 7:30PM departure arriving 9AM local time (aka 4AM New York time); and
• 11PM departure arriving 11:30AM local time (aka 6:30AM New York time)

Your choice will likely be determined by your itinerary the next day. If it were us and we were staying in Germany that trip, then I'd opt for the 11PM flight because it would better align with my normal sleep schedule. But if you're connecting in Frankfurt to catch an morning flight to Rome, then you may have to go with the earlier flight.

For the sake of this blog post, let's just assume you have to take the 5PM flight, so you'd land in Frankfurt just after midnight New York time. We'd do the following:

• Stay up SUPER late the night before in NYC (like 1-2AM) so that we're more likely to be tired for our flight.
• Set our watches smart phones to Frankfurt time as soon as we arrive at JFK. Then try to do everything as if we were on German time already. So assuming it was 3PM when we arrived to the airport, we'd pretend it was actually 8PM, so we'd try to have dinner and I'd get into my adorable Hello Kitty Pajamas.
• Since we already had dinner (or attempted to), we may opt to skip the in-flight meal completely and really try to sleep as early as possible. By the time we take off and reach cruising altitude, it will likely be 6PM New York (11PM Frankfurt). 

If successful, I'd get a good 5 hours of toddler sleep before the cabin lights will come back on at 11PM NY time (4AM Frankfurt) to begin breakfast service.

However, more often, I will not actually fall asleep so early and will only get ~3 hours of sleep and get woken up before I was ready. In either case, I really won't be well rested when we land and get off the plane.

So depending on your plans for the day of your arrival, we try to get to our hotel as soon as possible and beg for an early morning check in. Given most European cities have plenty of active American business travelers, the hotels are pretty used to these requests. I won't lie, it definitely helps if you (a) call in advance to notify them and/or (b) have elite status with their hotel loyalty program.

Then we'd use the blackout shades, go back to sleep for a few hours and wake up to get a late 1PM lunch. We found that it's much better to enjoy your first day in Europe when you're well rested. However, my father NEVER lets us sleep too long, because we still need to be a little bit tired so that we'll go to sleep at a normal (European) time and break from our US time zone.

But now comes the KEY to our success.

During the first day, if I start to doze off, my father will do whatever he has to do to keep me awake. Most parents probably wouldn't be willing (or able) to do this to their adorable tired toddler, but my father's definitely not like most parents. He will tickle me, make me walk, sprinkle me with water, bother me by touching my face as I sleep, and even bribe me with ice cream.  He's pretty strict about me not sleeping off-cycle, because he knows how difficult it will be for all of us if I didn't adjust to the new time zone. After all, having a 3 year old constantly waking up at 2-4AM for our entire trip isn't a recipe for success.

United Same Day Change

Sometimes you book a flight so far out in advance, you didn't know what ideal flight time you should have booked. Othertimes, one flight is so much cheaper than others departing the same day, so you prioritize your wallet over your watch.

The end result is the same. You wish you were on an earlier or later flight than the one you originally booked.

Fortunately, the airlines do offer SOME flexibility.

Standby
If your desired flight is earlier than the one you have, then you can always ask to go Standby. Most of the time, you can get this for free. You simply go up to the airport counter or call and request it. Of course, going standby doesn't mean you're owed anything. If there's an opening at the last minute, and your name is next on the list, you get to fly. It's a favor, more than a right.

And because a standby is not confirmed, you can only request a new flight to your original connecting airport or to your final destination. Why? If you were originally flying EWR-ORD-SEA and wanted to change to EWR-DEN-SEA, United doesn’t want you to standby on the first flight, show up in Denver, and find out that there is no available space to get you home to Seattle. They want to know you have a confirmed flight waiting for you.

But lately, I've noticed that most flights are leaving full and are more oversold than anything else. So standby success is hardly guaranteed. Plus, if there are delayed passengers who have missed their original connection or higher tier elite flyers, they will jump ahead of you on the Standby List. In theory, a Premier 1K status holder could walk up to a nearly full flight and jump to the front of the Standby List even if there are a dozen people with lower or no status already on it.

Nevertheless, you can still arrive early to the airport and take your chances with the confidence that you still have your original flight confirmed for later on.

Same Day Change
However, unbeknownst to many leisure travelers is a concept called a Same Day Change (SDC). Unlike going standby, a SDC is a confirmed change. You're issued a new ticket for the desired flight and give up your old ticket.

So what's the difference between a SDC and a regular flight change? Well, for regular changes to your flight (either time or destination), United charges $200 plus any difference in fare. But within 24 hours of your originally scheduled flight time, they will allow you to do a SDC for a reduced $75 fee (and no fee if you have United Gold status or above) and you may not have to pay any difference in fare.

To get the new flight for the reduced SDC fee (without the difference in fare), the desired flight needs to have availability in the same fare class as your original flight. So if you booked a S fare (deep discount economy), then you can only SDC into another S fare to avoid the fare difference.

Each carrier has its own rules, but I know United Airlines the best. Here are the rules:

• The itinerary must be operated by United or United Express
• The ticket number must begin with 016
• The SDC option will be available within 24 hours before your originally scheduled flight. 
• The requested flight must be departing within 24 hours from the time the SDC request is made and can include any fare class, but:

- When the original ticketed fare class is available, only the SDC fee will apply.
- When the original ticketed fare class is not available, the SDC fee plus any difference in fare.

• Changes are only available for the same origin and destination airports, however, connections may be added/removed/changed.

• You may stand by if seats are not available in the purchased fare class. 

- In these cases, the SDC will apply, but will not be charged unless you are assigned a seat on your desired flight.
- Changes in routing are not allowed when standing by. 

So as an example, back in early May, my father booked an 8PM flight to Chicago for later today. It would arrive at 9:30PM Chicago time, not giving him much time to do anything there that night. So early this morning (within the 24 hour window), he called up United to see if he could SDC to an earlier flight. Pulling up the list of LGA-ORD flights today, there were plenty of available options, but not every flight had the S fare class available.

Fortunately, the 4PM flight did, so the phone agent was able to rebook him onto that earlier flight with no fee. Now he will land at 5:30PM and be able to have dinner with our friends, Beth and Paul.

Again, my father could have still gotten a SDC on any flight he wanted with an open seat, but then he would have to pay the fare difference, which isn't something he wanted to do.

Aegean Gold Status

Flight #88 - United Airlines 91 
Tel Aviv (TLV) – Newark (EWR)
Monday, June 23, 2014
Depart: 11:10PM / Arrive: 4:20AM (+1 day) 
Duration: 12hr 10min 
Aircraft: Boeing 777 
Seat: 17J, 17K and 17L (Economy) 
Earned: 5,692 miles 
Lifetime Miles: 175,328 miles

[UPDATE (September 23, 2014): Aegean announced they are changing their Miles & Bonus frequent flyer program so that you need to re-qualify each year. Therefore, it makes less sense to go for Aegean Gold Status.]

By the time everyone reads this post, I'll likely be in transit coming back to New York. It's definitely not an easy commute. From my grandparents' house in Haifa, we drive about 2 hours south to Ben Gurion Airport outside Tel Aviv. Since this is Israel, we are advised to arrive a full 3 hours before our flight departure time due to the extra security check points. And unless we're flying in business/first class, my father's United elite status doesn't get him much preferential treatment at TLV.

Then it's another 12 hours on board the plane til we land at 4:20AM. By the time we get through Customs (thank you, Global Entry!), collect our bags and get a car to take us to Manhattan, we're looking at 6AM. That's about 19 hours of transit door-to-door!

But on the positive side of things, upon completion of this flight, I will earn my very own Aegean Airlines Gold Status membership, clearing 20,000 Aegean miles in their Miles & Bonus frequent flyer program. I'm sure you may have heard me mention this in other posts, but I figured I'd take time now to answer the series of questions you may have.

1. But aren't you flying United?
Yes, this flight is operated by United. And our home airport is Newark where United Airlines has a hub with dozens of non-stop domestic and international flights to just about anywhere we'd want to fly. So most of our flights are operated by United. But...United is a key member of the Star Alliance that partners up 26 international airlines.

2.  What's Aegean have to do with that flight?
Through the Star Alliance arrangement, I can fly just about any airline in the alliance and credit the mileage to any other airline's frequent flyer program. One of the Star Alliance members is Aegean Airlines based in Greece. So I will fly United on this trip and credit the mileage to their Star Alliance partner, Aegean. My Aegean frequent flyer # will be on the boarding pass and as far as they know, I'm just another loyal Aegean customer.

3. Why Aegean? 

The Aegean Airlines frequent flyer program is called Miles & Bonuses. Since Aegean is a Greek airline primarily serving a domestic market, they don't fly that many long haul routes compared to United or Lufthansa.

Therefore, M&B has one of the lowest mileage thresholds for earning elite status in the industry. In a single rolling 12 month period, only 4,000 miles are required for Aegean Blue (comparable to United Silver which requires 25,000 United mile per calendar year) and 20,000 miles for Aegean Gold (comparable to United Gold and it's 50,000 mile in a calendar year requirement). Plus, just for signing up with M&B, you get a free 1,000 mile head start, so it's really only 3,000 miles for Blue and 19,000 miles for Gold.

Additionally, while most frequent flyer programs have elite status that ends every year, Aegean's lasts indefinitely. After you have earned Blue or Gold status once with Aegean, you keep it as long as as your M&B account is active, which means having at least 1 flight credited to Aegean every 3 years. For United (and most other airlines), you'd have to fly another 50,000 miles each calendar year to retain Gold status for the next year. It's just a crazy hamster wheel.

4. 20,000 miles seems to be 3-4 month's worth of travel for you. Why did it take so long?
Good question. Not every flight earns the same % of miles in each program. It's based on a few things: (a) what airline I'm actually flying and (b) what the fare class was on my ticket.

Each operating airline (the one actually labeled on the plane you're flying) has a different agreement with each of the other Star Alliance members in terms of crediting mileage. Aegean has a website with each of their partner airlines to show you what you'd earn on each of the 25+ other partners.

Separately, the mileage credit depends on the fare class of your ticket. I'm not talking just the cabin classes of first, business or coach. There's literally a dozen fare classes within each cabin class (F, A, J, C, D, Z, Y, etc), so you can earn anywhere from 0%-300% of the mileage depending the airline program you want to credit the miles to.

Most leisure travelers who book weeks in advance have oftentimes purchased discounted economy tickets (W, S, T, L, K, or G). These discounted economy fare classes on United "metal" only earn 50% mileage credit with Aegean. In fact, even some discounted business class fares (P) earn nothing in Aegean's program.

5. So then you really flew 40,000 miles to get Aegean Gold? 

Not really 40,000 miles, but yes, definitely more than 20,000. First, as I mentioned earlier, you receive 1,000 Tier miles just for signing up.

Second, some of my flights were actually on US Airways (when they were still part of the Star Alliance). The agreement between Aegean and US Airways was to give 100% credit on all economy fare classes.

Additionally, there is also a 500 mile minimum you will earn on all flights, regardless of fare class. So for United flights under 1,000 miles (like New York-Chicago), I'd still earn 500 miles on Aegean and not 357 (50% of the actual 714 miles flown).

6. But then still...Why Aegean instead of just crediting to United?
Another multi-part answer. First, starting in 2014, United implemented a dollar spend requirement to earn status with their MileagePlus program. The way my family chooses to fly - long distances on cheap fares - we were not going to meet the $5,000 Premier Qualifying Dollar requirement for United Gold (or even $2,500 United Silver) even if we were able to hit the mileage targets.

To give you an example, my father has flown 36,928 miles credited to United already this year before including our ZRH-TLV (1,747 miles) and TLV-EWR (5,692 miles) flights. So he's well on his way towards United Gold's 50,000 threshold by December 31.

However, in terms of PQD, he has only spent $2,096 and will likely not get to $5,000 absent some really bad situation where he needs to buy an expensive last minute ticket. Fortunately, he can waive this PQD requirement by spending $25,000 on his United co-branded credit card in 2014. Through his manufactured spending tricks, he's already been able to do just that.

Fun fact, though - 2.5 year old toddlers can't get credit cards, so I'm SOL.

Second reason. If I earn Aegean Gold status now, I'll potentially have it for the rest of my life (as long as the M&B program rules don't change). I can always earn United Gold status later on and get on that hamster wheel later.

And the most important reason, when you have Gold status with a foreign Star Alliance airline, you get complimentary access to United's domestic airport lounges. Oddly enough, even having United Gold won't get you United lounge access within the US unless your itinerary includes an international segment overseas.

So if I'm flying United BusinessFirst class from New York-Honolulu and have United Gold status, no lounge access for me.

But if I were flying New York-Boston and flashed my Aegean M&B Gold card, then I'm relaxing in leather seats enjoying Youtube using the free lounge wifi while my dad is drinking free cheap beer and mother is stealing packing up the complimentary crackers and carrot sticks.

[UPDATE (September 23, 2014): Aegean announced they are changing their Miles & Bonus frequent flyer program so that you need to re-qualify each year. Therefore, it makes less sense to go for Aegean Gold Status.]

Retention Offers

It's February 2014 and my family has now been playing this travel reward credit card game for the past two years. And even at 2 years old, I have been benefiting from their financial discipline and resourcefulness.

Big warning! If you have any outstanding debt at all (student loans, credit card, personal loans or mob gambling debt), then you're better off not opening more credit cards, because you're probably spending more than you're making and ruining your future. The interest charges alone will destroy any point/mile value you may receive. The last thing you need is another credit card.

While the miles/points game can allow an ordinary person to stretch their limited dollars to travel well beyond their usual means, it is definitely not a "free" game to play. For example:

1. Round trip business class flights to Europe this summer using United miles still cost us $163/person in taxes (vs. retail $4,000+/person).

2. 6 night stay at the Conrad Koh Samui in Thailand was all on Hilton points, but we still had to pay overpriced hotel prices for our daily meals on the property which came out to about $25/person per meal (vs. retail $850/night x 6 nights for the room).

3. Having over 20 active credit cards currently open that all offered a lucrative sign up bonus (50,000-100,000 miles/points) as well as bonus spending categories (2x-5x per dollar charged) gets us a lot of loyalty program currency, but many of these cards also charge $95+ annual fees after the 1st year. Assuming half of our cards have annual fees, that's ~$950 in fees for the privilege of using them for another 12 months.

Of course, there's not much my father can do about the cash cost for #1 and #2, but he can mitigate much of #3 by just getting a hold of the Credit Card Retention representatives.

There's a lot of discussion in the blogosphere about credit card Sign Ups. That's primarily because the bloggers get paid by the credit card companies to get people to sign up for their cards. Not me of course - I'm only 2 years old. I only talk about the cards that my parents sign up for and/or use for illustrative purposes. I don't really care if you get a card or not.

But while there's a lot of public attention around the card sign up, there's little said about the other end of the spectrum - the card cancellation. This end is where my father's OCD nature gets us the proverbial "second bite at the apple."

February 2014 Cancellations
Last February, my parents had their Credit Card Churn (signing up for a lot of credit cards at the same time).

• Some of these new cards were No Fee cards, which meant we could keep them open forever. 
• However, many were only waiving the annual fee for the first year, then $95/year each and they weren't worth keeping for another year if we had to pay the fee. 
• In addition, there were a few reward cards we had for a few years because they were great to keep around, even after paying the fee.

In total, we had 7 cards coming due for their annual fee.

A. Starwood Preferred Guest Amex ($65 annual fee)

If you've been reading LCD for a while, you'll know that this card is my father's all time favorite. He uses this for all his non-bonus spending (anyplace where he would only earn 1x points). It's really the only way to accumulate a significant number of SPG points, because actually staying a night at a Starwood hotel doesn't get you that many points.

He's had this card since 2009 and has been paying the $65 annual fee since 2010 (after his 1st year). For him, it's been worth it because he accumulates SPG points, gets 2 stays/5 night credit towards his SPG elite status each year and is an American Express card. As you may know, Amex often runs several amazing promotions each year (such as Small Business Saturday) that will save you significant money, especially since the promotions are available to each unique Amex card (even if the cards are authorized users under the 1 master account). Since we have 3 authorized users under my father's account, we get the promotional benefit 3x, even though we pay just one $65 annual fee.

But on February 2, the 2014 annual fee posted to his account. While he had NO real intentional of cancelling the card, he called the number on the back of his SPG Amex and got an account representative.

Father: "I just got charged the $65 annual fee. I'm not sure I'll use the card enough this year to be worth the fee. I think I'd like to cancel."

Rep: "I see, well, you've had the card since 2009 and you've been using it quite actively. Let me transfer you to our account specialist who can see what they can do for you."

Specialist: "Sir, this is one of the best cards for earning points and miles. It's the only card that allows you to transfer points to both American Airlines and Delta at a 1:1 ratio. And also, if you transfer in increments of 20,000 points, you get an additional 5,000 miles, which is a 1.25x ratio."

Father: "I understand, but I'm not sure that's worth paying the annual fee for. I've actually been using other cards that offer me better bonuses (like 2x) on my spending."

Specialist: "Sir, I'd hate to lose your business. I can offer you a $25 statement credit to partially offset the fee."

Father: "Um, I'm not sure that's of interest to me. Is there anything else you can offer?"

Specialist: "Well, Starwood allows you to buy SPG points. $35 for 1,000 SPG points. Instead of the $25 statement credit, I can offer you 2,000 SPG points, which would be $70 if you purchased them yourself."

Father: "Wait, to be clear, are you offering me the ability to pay $70 for 2,000 SPG points?"

Specialist: "No, sir. Of course you could always just do that yourself if you wanted, the 2,000 points would be a gift for keeping the card another year."

Father: "And paying the $65 annual fee."

Specialist: "Yes, sir."

Father: (deliberate long pause) "OK, I'll take that offer."

So for a credit card that he planned to pay $65 for and keep another year anyway, he received a bonus 2,000 SPG points, which are worth $50-70 to us based on our usual 2.5-3.5 cents/pt redemption history.

B. Chase United Select ($95 annual fee)

This card was another of my father's long time favorites (since 2009). In addition to earning 3x United miles on United.com purchases, it also earned him 1x Premier Qualifying Miles (PQM) up to $5,000 on United.com purchases. Many times, this extra perk of 5,000 PQM was the difference between getting to that next tier of status (Platinum in 2013 and Gold in 2014). Plus, it earns 2x on gas, groceries and restaurants and already comes with an automatic 5,000 United mile annual bonus each year you keep the card. And the fact that this card is no longer offered anymore makes it all that much more special to my father.

So under no circumstances would he ever cancel this card. However, we wanted to see if he'd be offered a retention bonus as well, so he played a little game of credit card chicken.

Father: "I just got charged the $95 annual fee. I'd like to cancel."

Rep: "I see, well, you have an outstanding balance of $XXX. Let me transfer you to a specialist."

Specialist: "Sir, I understand you'd like to close the account. I just want to remind you that this card is a great one for earning United miles. We don't offer this card anymore. As you know, you can 3x on United purchases as well as 2x on gas, groceries, home improvement stores. It also comes with 5,000 annual bonus miles which we've already sent to your account. In fact, this past statement you've earned over 24,000 United miles."

Father: "I understand, but I've been starting to use other cards for my travel spending, including many of your own Chase cards like the Sapphire Preferred"

Specialist: "Wow, yes, I see that you have several cards with us. Well, we'd hate to close your account so perhaps I can look in my system to see what promotions you're eligible for... I can offer you 2 additional United Club passes good for 6 months."

Father: "Um, I actually already have United club access for being a United frequent flyer. Is there anything else you can offer?"

Specialist: "Well, I can offer you an additional 5,000 United miles. If you wanted to purchase that yourself, it would be well over $100 cost."

Father: (deliberate long pause) "Wow, OK. That's very generous. I'll take that offer."

So for another card that he was already willing to pay the $95 fee for, he received another free 5,000 United miles, worth about $100 to us, especially since my father's United account was wiped out after our redemption last week.

C. Citi American Airlines American Express ($95 annual fee)

Unlike the first two, this card was completely expendable after we earned 50,000 American Airline miles for the initial sign up a year ago. This card was my mother's account, and my father already had one in his account. So no need for duplicate benefits (free checked bags, priority boarding) for the same airline that we hardly fly anyway.

Of course, we'd gladly keep the card if the $95 fee were waived or we received an offer worth more than the fee. Since we don't really fly American Airlines, it's hard to keep my mother's AAdvantage account active without doing something excessive (buying something we don't need or donating miles). Otherwise, after 18 months of inactivity, the account closes and the miles are wiped out. But spending a bit on the card every so often adds miles to her AAdvantage account and resets the expiration date by another 18 months.

Father: "I opened this card about a year ago and I know I'll be charged the $95 annual fee. I'd like to close the account before the fee hits."

Rep: "I see, well, you have 30 days after the fee actually posts to cancel without paying it, but let me transfer you to a specialist."

Specialist: "Sir, I understand you'd like to close the account. [insert review of the card benefits here] "

Father: "I understand, but I'm not sure I want to pay another $95 annual fee."

Specialist: "Well, let me see what promotions we're offering. I can offer you a 2 part promotion. First, we give you a $95 statement credit which will offset the fee, but you have to still pay the fee normally. The statement credit will automatically be processed. Second, there's a special bonus offer for an extra 1,000 AA miles for each month that you spend at least $1,000 for the next 16 billing statements."

Father: "So what happens if I spend $1,000 in March, but then the $95 statement credit posts, bringing my total below $1,000."

The Specialist repeated the original terms verbatim, but didn't actually answer the question. After 2 iterations, she finally understood.

Specialist: "Oh I see, well, you'd still get the 1,000 mile bonus" (but she sounded very uncertain)

Father: "Well, OK. I'll take that offer."

Since there was a $95 statement credit to offset the fee, keeping the card for another year was a no brainer. It gave my mother an easy way to keep her AAdvantage account active as well as retained a lot of Available Credit with Citi, so that we could use it as leverage to trade in when we applied for future Citi cards. The fact that we'd essentially earn 2x AA miles for $1,000 of spending each month was a nice plus, but not overwhelmingly amazing. We'll see if we take full advantage of that or not.

D. Citi American Airlines Business Mastercard ($95 annual fee)

While my mother had the Citi personal card version, my father had also applied for the Citi business card version at the same time last February. While the sign up bonus at the time was only 35,000 AA miles, it was the best Citi business card offer at the time, so he decided to apply for it anyway.

Similar to before, the benefits of this Citi AA card was also 100% duplicative with the personal card versions, so there was little reason to keep the card if we had to pay another fee. However, since it was a business card, the available credit didn't count for my father's personal credit score. So keeping it or closing it, wouldn't impact it at all.

Father: "I opened this card about a year ago and I know I'll be charged the $95 annual fee. I'd like to close the account before the fee hits."

Rep: "I see, well, we do have other no fee cards that we can convert this into, including our Thank You card where you'd earn Thank You points. That one has no fee. I can transfer you to our specialist to handle that for you."

Father: "Hmm, are there any other options?"

Rep: "You can close the account outright."

Father: (after some thinking about converting the card) "Actually, I think I'd to close the account." My father actually wanted to be transferred to the specialist who would have the authority to make additional (better) retention offers. Then if he had to, he would close the account. While he thought about downgrading to the no-fee Thank You business card, he opted against that since it would then make him ineligible for getting a sign up bonus on that card later on.

Rep: "OK, let me transfer you to the specialist."

After a 2 minute hold, the original representative got back on the line.

Rep: "There wasn't a specialist available, but I have authorization to close the account, so I've done that for you. Do you have any other things I can help you with? "

Father: "No, I'm all set. Thank you."

While not the ideal outcome, my father wasn't too concerned about the account closure since he was 100% prepared to cancel the card anyway. But lesson learned that sometimes when you play chicken, you can lose.

E. Barclays US Airways Mastercard ($89 annual fee)

My father signed up for this card because (a) it was a Barclays card and we had too many Chase/Citi/Amex cards, (b) US Airways was set to merge with American Airlines and the miles would be consolidated and (c) there was times when flying US Airways was our best option since they were currently in the Star Alliance with United and we could credit the miles to United or Aegean Airlines.

In addition to the 2x on US Airways purchases, the card also offered priority check in and priority boarding (but no free checked bags). The other perks were a set of $99 Companion Pass and Lounge Passes. We ended up using the $99 Companion passes for a flight to Austin last month but ended up never needing the lounge passes (which will expire at the end of this month) because we got access to the US Airways lounges using our expired American Express Platinum cards.

For paying the $89 annual fee this month, we'll get another set of Companion Passes and Lounge Passes, but now that US Airways will leave the Star Alliance on March 30th, we'd no longer be able to credit our flights to United or Aegean. Thus, no more reason to fly US Airways. Upon reading reports, it seemed that many Barclay representatives were willing to waive the $89 fee with little/no discussion. So my father was hopeful.

Father: "I opened this card about a year ago and I know I'll be charged the $95 annual fee soon. I'd like to close the account before the fee hits, because I'm not sure what will happen to this card after the American-US Airways merger."

Rep: "I see that the charge will be posted on February 28th. I can transfer you to the specialist who will be better suited to explain everything about the merger."

Specialist: "Hi, sir, let me first tell you about the merger. The merger was completed late last year but the airlines will continue to operate independently for another year. Accordingly, their frequent flyer programs will also continue to be independent through 2014 and will be combined sometime in 2015. As such, Barclay will continue to service this US Airways card for the next year. But if you'd like to avoid the fee, I can permanently eliminate the fee on the card. You will continue to earn US Airway miles."

Father: "Really? So no fee ever?"

Rep: "That's correct."

Father: "Wait a minute. Will I still have the same version of the card or will I be getting a new card with different benefits?"

Rep: "You will no longer get the companion passes or priority boarding..."

Father: "But will I still earn 2x miles on US Airways purchases?"

Rep: "You will have the opportunity to continue accelerating your mileage balance through spending."

Father: "But will I still earn 2x miles on US Airways purchases?"

Rep: "You will earn 1 mile for each dollar spent on US Airways. You will earn 1 mile for each 2 dollars spent on other spending."

Father: "OK, let me think about it. I'll call you back."

The lesson here is that my father knew enough of the playbook to ask the right follow up questions. He was actually being offered to downgrade to a lower tier card (albeit a no fee card), but it was presented in a sneaky way to make it sound like the annual fee was simply being waived on his premium card. He decided to just call back later and hopefully get a new specialist who may be able to waive the fee on the higher end US Airways Mastercard he currently has. Additionally, by waiting until Feb 26 (the annual fee will post Feb 28), he will receive 10,000 anniversary US miles. While he doesn't plan on needing the US Airways benefits, he'd rather have it than not if it's free for another year.

But thinking further through this situation, we would ultimately give up and convert to the no-fee card if we had to, because it would keep an active account with Barclay (who is starting to offer some interesting new travel reward cards including the Arrival Card). Barclay is known to evaluate historical customer relationship length and card activity to approve new applicants. A 1 year history of opening/closing the one Barclay card wouldn't help his case for another future approval.

E. Chase Sapphire Preferred Visa ($95 annual fee)

F. Chase Hyatt Visa ($75 annual fee)

These cards fall into the same category, so we'll discuss them at the same time. My mother applied for the Sapphire Preferred Visa in February 2012 and already paid the $95 annual fee in 2013 because we needed at least one premium Chase Ultimate Reward card open to transfer to United or Hyatt. But this year, we had her Chase Ink Bold Mastercard as well as my father's Chase Sapphire Preferred card. Therefore, she was hoping to avoid paying another $95.

However, with the Sapphire Preferred, at the end of each cardmember year, we'd receive a 7% dividend on the UR points earned over the prior 12 months. So that's an additional 3,500+ UR points we are due in a few weeks. Since the annual fee didn't actually post yet, we would still have a few months to cancel the card without paying the fee.

Similarly, my father's Chase Hyatt Card offers an annual certificate for a free night at any Category 1-4 Hyatt hotel. I'd bet that my father would be able to find a hotel that would be worth more than the $75 annual fee, but it wouldn't be worth making a special trip just to redeem the certificate. Also, since we live in Manhattan where all the Hyatt hotels are Category 5 or 6, we couldn't use the certificate for friends/family to visit us either. But we'd rather have the certificate than not, so we'll wait a few weeks before cancelling to avoid the fee.

The ongoing benefit of the card is that it gives my father Hyatt Platinum status for as long as he has the card, but (a) Hyatt Diamond status is the top tier level you'd want, (b) we already earned Platinum status for 2014 from our 2013 stays and (c) we're focusing our hotel activity towards Starwood to keep top-tier status there. But who knows, maybe Chase will offer us a compelling retention offer to keep the card another year.

So for making a few phone calls this morning, my father got us:

1. 2,000 SPG points
2. 5,000 United miles
3. $95 statement credit + bonus opportunity for an extra 1,000 AA/month
4. Avoided a $95 annual fee

Not a bad haul for 0 hard inquires on his credit report. Then for the other three cards with annual fees coming due soon, we'll let you know in a month!

Changing Flights w/o Penalty

The other day, I discussed how we were able to use a sudden NYC snowstorm to get back our $1,200 on a non-refundable international flight to Tel Aviv that we had wanted to cancel anyway. It was a bit of a small miracle for us, even though the polar vortex snowstorm probably wreaked havoc on many other travelers that day.

Some people say, "When it rains, it pours," and apparently when it snows, it blizzards!

On that same Saturday that the $1,200 was fully refunded from our cancelled TLV flights, we also received a surprise email from United Airlines. The update told us that they changed the schedule for another reservation we had with them in April.

Background
As you may recall, we had already made plans for the first few months of 2014, and our long Easter Weekend was going to be spent in New Orleans, Louisiana. My mother and I have never been to the Big Easy, and my father had only driven through it on his cross country road trip when he was back in college, so NOLA was going to be a fun new family experience for all of us.

Most importantly, that Sunday along the fabled French Quarter, there were 3 different Easter Parades (2 of which appropriate for toddlers like me, with the other parade being more suitable for what my father calls "Top Bottom Twinkie Bears").

Unfortunately, our return flight home departed New Orleans Airport (MSY) on Sunday at 2:37PM, meaning we'd need to leave our hotel at 12PM. So we'd only be able to see part of the first Easter parade that starts at 10:30AM, and we'd miss the Chris Owen's 1PM Easter Parade and the 3PM Gay Easter Parade. Furthermore, we were connecting in beautiful Cleveland, Ohio (CLE) for about an 1 hr 35 min before getting on our 7:34PM flight back to New York (LGA). Not a horrible itinerary, but we did it to save a few hundred dollars on the flights ($554 direct vs. $371 for 1 connection just on the return).

A Schedule Change We Like

As you can see here, our email from United notified us that our schedule had changed since we booked it:

1. First, our outbound flight was on a different plane that was leaving just 4 minutes earlier than the Friday 7AM we booked. No biggie.

2. On the return portion, we were still departing at Sunday 2:37PM, but apparently on another plane that wasn't quite as fast, because instead of arriving in beautiful Cleveland at 5:59PM, we were landing at 6:09PM. Not a huge deal, unless...

3. The big change was our connecting flight to New York, which now departed beautiful Cleveland at 6:51PM instead of 7:34PM.

So instead of a leisurely hour and a half between flights (with access to the United lounge), we were down to just 42 minutes. Considering that the 6:09PM arrival time tells you when the flight lands (not when it gets to the gate and lets people get off the plane) and that the 6:51PM flight starts boarding 30 minutes before scheduled departure, they were cutting it too close! And that's assuming that our first flight isn't delayed at all.

Sure, if it were just my well-traveled father flying solo, he could easily get off the first plane quickly with his simple carry-on and just walk down to the new gate for his next flight easily within 15-20 minutes. However, as we experienced when connecting in Charlotte last week on our way back from Austin, having both an independent minded 2 year old and checked luggage created more challenges than most traveling families want. So my father planned to call United to see what alternatives were available to us.


Research First
Most reservation agents are happy to help, but will often only look at the simplest option that their computer tells them. My father never takes chances like this, so he took some of the variability out of the equation by researching the alternative flight options before calling. That way, if his call was assigned to a stupid less experienced agent, that would be to his advantage, and not to his detriment.

There were a lot of options available:

1. The simplest choice would be to just put us on the next CLE-EWR flight departing at 7:13PM and arriving into Newark at 8:59PM (though we'd have preferred LGA which is closer/cheaper to get home from).

2. But if we connected in Chicago O'Hare, we'd get a better United airport lounge to rest in and a few more frequent flyer miles for the more circuitous route. In fact, there were 2 Chicago connection options, though the first one was a 60 minute connection, and the second one was on a smaller regional jet instead of a full Airbus 319 aircraft (#champagneproblems). We'd likely opt for the second flight which is scheduled to arrive at LGA at 10:21PM.

3. There was also an option to backtrack and connect in Houston, though it was going to take us to LGA (which we prefer over EWR when coming home). We'd get 500 more frequent flyer miles than connecting in CLE and fly on fully loaded Boeing 737 and Airbus 319 planes, but we'd be on a 1 hr flight followed by a long 3hr 39min flight, getting into LGA at 10:24PM.

4. And finally, the Holy Grail of them all...the non-stop direct flight to Newark. It would only be a simple 3hr 4min flight. No worries about connections to catch, long second flights or checked baggage not making it on the next flight. Plus, it departed at 4PM which would give us extra time at the Sunday parades and still get us home at 8:04PM.

Calling United
My father's plan was to ask if we might have the ability to switch onto the direct flight to Newark, but if rejected, he would think about Option #1 or Option #3. When the agent picked up, she first told my father that 42 minutes was "plenty of time between flights."

My father immediately explained that he would be traveling with a 2 year old and a child car seat. Before he got into the second part of his case (the risk of the checked bags not making the connection), she said she was looking into other CLE-LGA flights.

Realizing she would immediately head towards Option #1, my father then said, "We're actually not tied to connecting through Cleveland. I know there are some other options including Chicago, Houston and also, I see there's a direct flight to Newark at 4PM..." making sure to have his voice trail off as a subtle invitation for her to react and respond to the bait.

She then asked to put him on hold. About a minute later, she came back on the line and said as a "one-time concession," she would put him on the 4PM direct flight to Newark!

Conclusion
While not intentional, we were able to capitalize on a schedule change and use the system to our advantage. We successfully got on the ideal non-stop itinerary we originally wanted, but didn't have to pay $554/person ($1,662 total). That was an aggregate "savings" of about $550. That's a lot of beignets and hurricanes for my parents.

And just for kicks, my father looked up the same non-stop itinerary we now had, and it was pricing at an incredible $682/person, or $2,046 total.

Cancelling Flights for A Full Refund

Background
You may recall that back in November, my father was able to nab 3 tickets on non-stop United flights from Newark to Tel Aviv for the low, low price of just $398/person by purchasing them through a small Norwegian Airline's website that was incorrectly pricing tickets without adding the Fuel Surcharge (which amounted to $600/person). While normal United flights were ~$1,000/person, we were able to get the 3 of us for just $1,200 TOTAL! So for the past few months, we were all getting ready to fly out on January 21, 2014 and celebrate my mother and grandfather's birthdays this week in Haifa, Israel.

Then you may have read the other week that my mother was finally scheduled for her long awaited U.S. Citizenship interview on January 29th - right in the middle of our planned Israel trip! Unfortunately, we couldn't reschedule the interview for a confirmed future date (we'd just be thrown back in the queue), so we regretfully made the decision to cancel our Israel trip, meaning we'd just have to forfeit the $1,200 in prepaid airline tickets. Now for some of you $1,200 isn't a lot of money, but remember, I'm half Asian and half Jewish. I'm twice as likely to hate wasting money.

You can read more about the mistake fare and the decision to cancel here:

• Newark to Tel Aviv for $395/Person (11/24/2013)
• Cursed with Israel Flights (1/15/2014)

Wait For It...
Now, while we may have decided to cancel our itinerary back on January 13th, we didn't actually cancel the reservation at that time. Why?

We realized that it would have been much better for United Airlines if we just cancelled as soon as we decided to forego the trip. That way, they could re-sell our Economy Plus seats on the January 21st EWR-TLV flight to other passengers (likely at a more realistic price of $1,000+/person). However, we wanted to wait til the very end, because (A) we had no financial incentive to cancel early and (b) there's always a chance something would happen...

Then, as you Northeast readers will remember, last week New York City prepared for it's second Polar Vortex of 2014, scheduled to arrive on... you guessed it, January 21st (our scheduled departure date).

Getting Your Ducks In A Row
The evening of January 20th, my father immediately jumped online to see what the United.com Travel Notices website was saying for passengers traveling through the affected airports. At that time, they were offering a waiver of their Change Fees if you wanted to reschedule your flight. Had we wanted to just fly out a few days later, we could have done so and avoided the $300/person Change Fees for international flights. Nice, but not what we really wanted.

My father then called United and spoke to a live agent who confirmed the same weather related change policies (no change fees for rescheduling, but may have to pay a fare difference). Unfortunately, she said (a) there were no cancellation refunds being offered, and (b) that because the ticket was issued by the Norwegian company, she couldn't even make any changes if she wanted to.

He would have to contact the Norwegians to see what they could do. However, my father was smart enough to ask the United agent what specific protocol/policy he should reference to the Norwegians so that they could abide by the same rules. He was told "EWR Weather Waiver - Severe 1."

Of course, our specific issue wasn't the just Jan 21 departure date, it was the fact that we wanted to cancel the entire trip.

Side note: You may be thinking that we should have used this opportunity to just reschedule the entire trip to dates that would allow my mother to have her Immigration Interview, but that wasn't a viable option. Rescheduling for new dates would require United to reprice the $400 mistake fare and we would have to pay the fare difference. Trust me, my nerd father literally has nothing better to do than think through all these sorts of details and scenarios.

So here was the hand we were dealt as of January 20th.

1. We booked our United operated flight on a random Norwegian company that United wasn't really familiar with (and vice versa).

2. Our flight from Newark the next evening was possibly going to be affected, though international flights tend to depart even though domestic flights are cancelled. But as of Jan 20, it was unclear what would ultimately happen.

3. After calling United, we knew to use the term "EWR Weather Waiver - Severe 1" as our ace up the sleeve.

4. However, United was not actually offering refunds for cancellations, just waivers on their self-imposed change fees. Their typical protocol was to retain the value of your original ticket for a future flight, but you'd have to pay the change fee (which in this case would be waived).

Fire When Ready!

So my father contacted the Norwegians by online live chat (given it was 8PM in NY and afterhours in Olso). However, given that this was Norway, it was highly likely that the person on the other end of the chat would be a Norwegian (surprisingly, they generally speak fluent English), not some offshore call center in Bangladesh.

He got Merete, which based on the photo seemed to be a middle aged woman with a stern disposition. He explained the situation and while she initially said that a cancellation of the reservation would only refund the airport taxes and fees (~$80 USD/person), after invoking the "EWR Weather Waiver Severe 1" terminology and standard United Airline protocol for giving full fare credit (notice we didn't say refund), Merete relented and said she would ask for a refund of the fare as well.

To be very sure, my anal father tried to get her to confirm in writing that the "full fare" meant the $390/person (fare + taxes, but not the $5/ticket service charge). She slyly responded "you see the amount on your receipts" though that may have been to avoid specifying an exact US dollar amount (given we were dealing with moving FX rates). As the chat ended, he clicked to receive the transcript of the conversation sent to him via email, so that he had some backup in case he needed it.

Outcome
So now we had to wait. On Thurs (1/23) morning, our credit card showed a refund for the $80/person in taxes. $240 back was nice, but my father went back to the online chat to see why the rest of the fare wasn't being refunded. He got Merete again. Small world.

She informed him that the fare refund was still in process by their Refund Department and that I should continue to wait. Given #4 above (United wasn't actually offering refunds) and the fact that on January 21, United Flight #90 actually successfully departed for Tel Aviv despite the winter snow storm, we were a bit nervous our refund wouldn't be approved/processed.

But then on Saturday morning (1/25), we saw that our credit card was refunded the additional $306/person.

The big lesson learned here is that there are oftentimes situations where you should wait as long as you can before cancelling/changing a reservation. There may be a schedule change or weather that may allow you to wiggle out of your original booking with little/no penalty. Until the airlines start to incentivize us for declaring our intentions early, we have little reason to do so.