Whether you're a diehard American Airlines flyer or hope to never set foot on an American jet, you should be earning American AAdvantage miles. Here's your chance for small business owners (and trust us, you might be one) to earn a bunch of them. Citi has an American Airlines business credit card to help you earn even more AAdvantage miles with a new, limited-time sign-up bonus on the *Citi AA Biz*: bonus_miles_full To top it all off, the card's $99 annual fee is waived for the first year. Read on for a full look at the card and why this bonus should be on your radar.     Learn ..read more

Travelers love taking advantage of long weekends, and if you procrastinated booking a Memorial Day weekend getaway this year, you're in luck! The airlines have been slashing flight prices for May and are even letting the savings trickle into the first week of June in some cases. That's resulting in unusually affordable Memorial Day weekend flights for many destinations in the U.S. and beyond. We've seen some of the best fares of the year for Memorial Day weekend pop up over the last few weeks or so, but we know from experience that the lowest of those fares will evaporate over the next two wee ..read more

Credit cards provide valuable purchase protection for cardholders when goods and services do not meet expectations. The same goes for unauthorized charges appearing on your account statement. This is just one of the many reasons we recommend using a credit card whenever possible.   If an item arrives damaged or the wrong product was shipped, the company is usually liable to provide the customer a refund. But when a company fails to promptly issue a refund, that's where credit card chargebacks come into play. The same goes for any charges that you didn't authorize. Credit card fraud i ..read more

Frequent Delta flyers are all too accustomed to seeing sky-high flight prices and insultingly exorbitant award rates using SkyMiles to book business class abroad. But a recent trend is turning that on its head: Upgrades to Delta One business class seem cheaper than ever. Forget paying $3,000 or more each way to bump up from economy to business class. We've heard from a growing number of Thrifty Traveler Premium members who have recently scored Delta business class upgrades to Europe or Asia for just $500 or $600 within weeks – if not days – of departure. That's as good as it gets, considering ..read more

The Federal Aviation Administration briefly grounded all Alaska Airlines mainline flights Wednesday morning after an issue with its computer system and how it calculates weights and balances. The ground stop was lifted at 8:32 a.m. Pacific time, but delays are likely to continue throughout the day.   According to the FAA advisory, the ground stop was issued at 7:30 a.m. PT Wednesday for all Alaska Airlines flights and those operated by its sub-carrier Horizon Air. Horizon was allowed to resume operations a few minutes later while Alaska sub-carriers like SkyWest were permitted to ope ..read more

My inbox is constantly flooded with marketing emails from hotel chains practically begging me to buy their points for my next dream vacation. Hotel points have helped me save big on past trips, so it seems appealing. But at what cost? There's a lot to consider. Just like U.S. dollars aren't the same as Canadian Dollars – let alone Mexican pesos or the Japanese yen – points from the different hotel chains are all worth varying amounts, too. And the cost to purchase points varies, too, based upon the hotel chain, how many points you're buying, and whether or not there's a sale. Plus, with s ..read more

With the cost to enroll in Global Entry increasing to $120 later this year, some of the biggest banks are raising the credits that cover Global Entry on their top travel cards to cover the higher cost.  On Oct. 1, a five-year membership in Global Entry will increase from $100 to $120. At the same time, Chase will also increase the statement credit for Global Entry (or TSA PreCheck) to $120 – and not just on their flagship *chase sapphire reserve*, but on a slew of co-branded airline and hotel credit cards too, a spokesperson confirmed to Thrifty Traveler on Tuesday. The following cards wi ..read more

With travel demand roaring and flight prices creeping up, the timing has never been better to start getting alerts for cheap domestic and international flights (and points deals!) sent straight to your inbox. We'll give you one more reason to sign up for our Thrifty Traveler Premium service today… This Thursday, April 18, the price of Thrifty Traveler Premium will increase from $89.99 a year to $99.99 annually. That means you can save $10 a year by signing up now – and once you're subscribed, your membership price is locked in for life. Even if our prices increase again, you won't pay another ..read more

Alila Ventana Big Sur is a fan-favorite resort along California's Pacific Coast, one of the best ways to redeem Hyatt points – and among the hardest in the world to actually book. But a storm late last month that wiped out part of the Pacific Coast Highway is also wiping out travelers' plans to visit the resort this spring.  After repeatedly pushing back its planned reopening date due to the inaccessible Highway 1, Ventana Big Sur officially now won't reopen to guests until at least May 27. The resort has not yet informed guests directly, but a property representative confirmed the extend ..read more

Sifting through the barrage of sales and special offers in your email inbox can be a painstaking chore. But when it comes to inexpensive travel, there's one airline email that all savvy travelers should join: Southwest Airlines.  Southwest Airlines emails announcing their latest sales do two things:  The sales feature some incredibly cheap Southwest cash fares and Southwest Rapid Rewards fares More importantly, Southwest's sales put enormous pressure on the entire U.S. airline industry – forcing other airlines to drop their fares to compete, too Even if you never want to fly S ..read more