50% Transfer Bonus for RBC Rewards (Avion only) to British Airways Executive Club is back this July

I am happy to let you all of you RBC Avion cardholders (Infinite and Platinum) that the much coveted 50% transfer bonus for RBC Rewards points to British Airways Executive Club Avios is coming back soon! The promotion will run from July 1st to 31st so now is the time to ramp up your spending if you have been planning to take advantage of this great transfer bonus! As always BA Avios are a great option for flights to Asia (via Cathay Pacific), short to medium haul within North America (Alaska Airlines, American Airlines) and even though huge surcharges are added to their UK/Europe redemptions they can still be an alright value because of this bonus transfer based on your spend with the credit card (see my post about Earn & Burn for an explanation)

Full details will be found here although this link is not live yet.

COMING THIS JULY!!!

FFB8: The FrequentFlyerBonuses.com 8th Anniversary Contest (Week 3)

A little over 8 years ago in February 2005, FrequentFlyerBonuses.com launched to no fan-fare. It was an experiment of sorts and a logical expansion of the FFB Group’s first website RewardsCanada.ca. A major section of the Rewards Canada website was the Bonus Offers section and we noticed a lot of traffic from outside of Canada hitting those pages even though they didn’t list any offers that were available to non-Canadians. So they idea dawned on FFB’s founder to help that traffic by launching a Global site covering bonus offers from frequent travel programs worldwide and thus FrequentFlyerBonuses.com was born!   Fast forward to 2013 and FFB is even bigger and better and providing more coverage than we ever have of promotions relating to the world of frequent travel. Most of that success can be attributed to FFB’s dedicated fans and readers and without the support of them FFB would not be where it is today. We would like to thank past, present and future FFBers by offering you a chance to win some fantastic prizes as we celebrate our 8th anniversary!   There are four amazing prize packages to be won with FFB8! Over the course of the next four weeks there will be four different ways to enter to win one of the four prize packages. Feel free to enter into every week of the contest as they are all considered separate contests!   We are now into Week 3 of the FFB8 contest and here are the details on how to enter this week:   Week 3: The FFB Blog To enter the contest this week leave a comment on the FFB Blog about any of the following by 11:59EST on May 23th, 2013: How and/or where would you use the 8,000 Aeroplan Miles from Aeroplan Where would you plan on using the 8,000 Starpoints (visit SPG.com for reward details) Which lounge you would use your free lounge visit from Priority Pass (see all Priority Pass lounges here) Where would you use an Avis Reward Day coupon at? What hotel would you book via PointsHound.com to make use of your Level 3 benefits?   Week 3 Prize Package One lucky entrant will win the following prize package: 8,000 Aeroplan Miles courtesy of Aeroplan 8,000 Starwood Preferred Guest Starpoints courtesy of the Starwood Preferred Guest and the Canadian Version of the Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express Two Avis Reward Day Coupons courtesy of Avis One Standard Priority Pass Annual Membership + 1 free lounge visit courtesy of Priority Pass One Level 3 Upgrade on PointsHound.com courtesy of PointsHound.com One £5 Prepaid Sim Card courtesy of Aether Mobile

About this week’s sponsors: Aeroplan Aeroplan, Canada’s premier coalition loyalty program, is owned by Aimia Inc., a global leader in loyalty management. Aeroplan's millions of members earn Aeroplan Miles with its growing network of over 75 world-class partners, representing more than 150 brands in the financial, retail, and travel sectors. In 2012, approximately 2.3 million rewards were issued to members including more than 1.5 million flights on Air Canada and Star Alliance carriers which offer travel to more than 1,000 destinations worldwide. In addition to flights, members also have access to over 1,000 exciting specialty, merchandise, hotel, car rental and experiential rewards. For more information about Aeroplan, please visit www.aeroplan.com or www.aimia.com Starwood Preferred Guest / The Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express The Starwood Preferred Guest® Credit Card from American Express rewards you with starpoints® virtually every time you make eligible purchases with the Card. available in the US, the UK and Canada, the Card offers a generous welcome bonus, lets you access exclusive Cardmember-only events and so much more. terms and conditions apply. Apply for the Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express (Canadian Version) Avis Avis Car Rental and its subsidiaries operate one of the world's best-known car rental brands with approximately 5,200 locations in more than 165 countries. Avis has a long history of innovation in the car rental industry and is one of the world's top brands for customer loyalty. www.avis.com Priority Pass Priority Pass™ is the world’s largest independent airport VIP lounge access program and give you access to over 600 airport VIP lounges worldwide irrespective of your class of travel or the airline flown. Priority Pass is offering a Free Standard membership valued at US$99 which gives access to over 600 lounges worldwide for a visit fee of US$27 and also enables you to take guests into the lounges for a visit fee. Find out more about the three membership plans available at www.prioritypass.com/ffb PointsHound.com Pointshound is the most flexible way to collect the most miles and points when booking hotels online. Currently, PointsHound allows users to earn miles on over 150,000 hotels around the world in any of 10 frequent flier currencies. That’s 1,500,000 unique accrual offers available on any given day and we're always adding new currencies and hotels to the site. Sign-up and see how many miles you can earn on your next hotel! https://pointshound.com/ Aether Mobile Aether Mobile is a licensed MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator), providing a superior global roaming mobile service for the travelling person in mind.  By using the Aether Mobile global roaming SIM when abroad, leisure and business travellers alike can use their mobile/cell to make and receive calls and text messages, with peace of mind that it won’t cost them the earth. www.aether-mobile.com I have to extend many thanks to all of the above sponsors for helping out with this contest and to show our appreciation I would ask that you visit the sponsor’s websites to learn more about them! (plus if they see lots of traffic coming from here they may be more inclined to provide more prizes more often to give away on the FFB sites!)

Week 3 Contest Rules 1. Contest End: Contest runs until 11:59pm EST on May 23, 2013 2. Eligibility: Contest is open to anyone over the age of 18 anywhere in the world except where prohibited by law. Residents of Quebec, Cuba, Iran, Syria, North Korea, Myanmar (formerly Burma) and Sudan are also ineligible to participate. The Contest is void in these countries and where prohibited or restricted by law. Limited to one entry per person per method (maximum TBD entries). Multiple entries per way and/or automatic entries will be deleted 3. Contest Entry: To enter the contest you must leave a comment on the specific FFB Blog post per the instructions listed above. Limited to one entry per person (we will only count the first comment should a person post multiple comments) 4. By entering the competition, participants automatically accept these Terms and Conditions 5. Prize Drawing: On or about June 6th, 2013 a random drawing from each section of the contest will be conducted from among all eligible entries received 6. Awarding of Prizes: The selected winner(s) will be contacted by email and will have Seven (7) days to respond with their name and mailing address. After Seven (7) days no further attempts will be made to contact the winner and another entrant may be chosen to receive the prize. Prize packs will be mailed/emailed to the winner no later then June 15, 2013. Prizes are provided “as is” and without any warranty of any kind. Prizes are non-transferable. No cash redemption or prize substitution allowed by winner. Sponsor reserves the right to substitute prize of equal or greater value if advertised prize becomes unavailable. Odds of winning is dependent on the number of entrants per way as of May 9, 2013 7. The prize winner is responsible for all taxes, costs and other expenses that are not explicitly included in or connected to the prize(s), and agrees that upon accepting the prize(s) he/she does so entirely at his/her own risk and responsibility. 8. Employees and agents of Frequentflyerbonuses.com and parent The FFB Group, and members of such employees’ immediate families and individuals living in the same household with such employees, are not eligible to win. 9. Except where prohibited by law, entry in the Contest constitutes each Entrant’s consent for Sponsor to use Entrant’s first name and last initial, city and state/country of residence, Contest Entry for advertising, publicity, and promotional purposes in any media, online or off-line, without further permission, consent, payment or other consideration, unless prohibited by law 10. The FFB Group reserves the right to request written proof of a possible winner’s residence and age before awarding a prize. 11. All provincial, federal, state and local laws and regulations apply. Sponsor reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to cancel, terminate, modify or suspend this sweepstakes or any portion hereof, or to disqualify any individual implicated in any of the following actions, if for any reason: (a) infection by computer virus, bugs, tampering, unauthorized intervention, actions by entrants, fraud, technical failures, or any other causes which, in Sponsor’s sole opinion, corrupt or affect the administration, security, fairness, integrity or proper conduct of the sweepstakes, (b) the sweepstakes or any website associated therewith (or any portion thereof) becomes corrupted or does not allow the proper processing of entries per these rules, or (c) the sweepstakes is otherwise not capable of running as planned by the Sponsors. By entering, participants agree to release and hold harmless Sponsor, Administrator and each of their parents, subsidiaries, affiliates, divisions, advertising and promotional agencies, wholesalers and retailers, and each of the foregoing entities’ employees, officers, directors, shareholders and agents (collectively the “Released Parties”), from and against any and all claims, actions and/or liability for any injuries or death, loss or damage of any kind arising from or in connection with participation in and/or entry into the sweepstakes or acceptance or use of any prize. The Released Parties are not responsible or liable for any incorrect or inaccurate entry information, and assume no responsibility for (i) any error, omission, interruption, defect or delay in operation or transmission at any website, (ii) failure of any entry to be received by Sponsor due to technical problems, human error or traffic congestion on the Internet or at any website, (iii) communications line, hardware and/or software failures, (iv) damage to any computer (software or hardware) resulting from participation in the sweepstakes, (v) theft or destruction of, tampering with, unauthorized access to, or alteration of entries and/or entry information, or (vi) entries which are late, lost, stolen, damaged, illegible, and/or unintelligible. By entering, entrants agree to comply with these rules. Any entrant who attempts to tamper with this sweepstakes in any way shall be disqualified. In the event of dispute as to who submitted an online entry, the entry will be deemed submitted by the Authorized Account Holder of the email address submitted at the time of entry. “Authorized Account Holder” is defined as the natural person assigned to an email address by an Internet access provider, on-line service provider or other organization responsible for assigning email addresses for the domain associated with the email address in question. Additional restrictions may apply. Additional Rules for the Priority Pass prizes: - Employees of Priority Pass and The Collinson Group of companies, and their immediate families, are not eligible to enter, nor is anyone under 18 years of age. - Current Priority Pass members are not eligible but can nominate another party to receive the prize. - The winner must complete an application form and provide credit card details before the prize of Priority Pass membership can be issued.

May 16 Update: Aeroplan bonus for Marriott stays in Canada, 4x HHonors points @ Tropicana Las Vegas

This will be the last day of updates until Tuesday as I am taking an extended long weekend for the Victoria Day holiday. Watch FFB however as Week 3 of the contest will launch tomorrow and if there is any crazy amazing news or offers to post I will do so before Tuesday! Hope you all have a great long weekend!

News, Tips & Tricks
Don't forget to enter in my FFB8 Contest! This is the last day to enter for Week 2! For more details and how to enter please visit www.frequentflyerbonuses.com/FFB8


Bonus Offers
Air Canada Aeroplan
- 1,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles when you register your Aeroplan number on Aeroplan's Facebook page and complete an earning activity from selected Aeroplan travel partners. More... Until Aug 31, 13
- 500 Bonus Aeroplan Miles per night for stays at participating Marriott hotels across Canada. Receive 500 bonus miles per night, for up to 4 nights per stay. More... Jun 1 - Aug 31, 13

Hilton HHonors
- Quadruple HHonors Points on all stays at Tropicana Las Vegas - a DoubleTree by Hilton. More... Until Aug 31, 13

Japan Airlines Mileage Bank
- Double Mileage Bank Miles for stays at the at the Hotel Niwa Tokyo. More... Jun 1 - Aug 31, 13

Southwest Rapid Rewards (on FrequentFlyerBonuses.com only)
- OFFER EXTENDED Double Rapid Rewards Points & Double Tier Qualifying Points on all Southwest Airlines flight Systemwide. More... Until Jun 15, 13

Starwood Preferred Guest
- Triple Starpoints when you in a one Bedroom Pool Villa at the W Retreat & Spa Bali - Seminyak. More... Book by Jun 30 for stays until Dec 19, 13

Thai Airways Royal Orchid Plus
- Double Royal Orchid Miles for stays of 2 or more nights at participating Millennium & Copthorne Hotels Worldwide. More... Until Jun 301, 13

Ukraine International Panorama Club(on FrequentFlyerBonuses.com only)
- Double Panorama Club Miles for flights between Istanbul and Odessa.More... Until Jun 30, 13

Virgin Atlantic Flying Club
- Triple Flying Club Miles for stays at the Jumeirah at Etihad Towers, Jumeirah Beach Hotel or the Jumeirah Zabeel Saray Dubai. More... Until Dec 31, 13
- Earn up to Triple Flying Club Miles on Sixt car rentals Worldwide. More... Until Jun 30, 13

1,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles on select mileage earning activities

In yesterday's daily update I mentioned the new Aeroplan Around the World Contest but I only went straight to the Aeroplan blog and not their Facebook page. It turns out that you can not only enter the contest via their FB page but if you register your Aeroplan number via the FB page you can 1,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles when you earn with the featured Aeroplan travel partners:

 

and the partners included are:

You can find most of these offers listed on my Aeroplan page (the Marriott offer is being added later today) and here is the Facebook offer as it will appear on that page also later today:

Earn 1,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles when you register your Aeroplan number on Aeroplan's Facebook page and complete an earning activity from selected Aeroplan travel partners. Full details. Until Aug 31, 13

For me I will easily earn the 1,000 bonus miles either through a couple of Hertz rentals I have plus I do have some Air Canada Executive Class flights during the period which aren't eligible for the 50% Bonus as they were booked before the promotional period but should count as activity. What doesn't seem clear about the Facebook promotion is whether it is a one time bonus (I'm leaning this way) or if it is a bonus for each transaction.

PointsHound.com gets even better: now offering frequent guest earning benefits at select hotels

PointsHound.com, one the sponsors of my FFB8: The FrequentFlyerBonuses.com 8th Anniversary contest sent out an email last night detailing some exciting enhancements coming to the hotel booking site on Monday. As featured here on Rewards Canada back in October, PointsHound.com is a service that awards a hefty amount of miles or points for booking hotels via their online booking engine.

At the time I mentioned that most stays booked via PointsHound.com did not offer frequent guest points or elite qualification as is the case with most third party site booking sites although many hotels would still recognize your status at time of check in. Well that is about to change. If you have used the site over the past month or so you may noticed select hotels had a 'Double Dip' icon  (now rebranded to  'Double Up' which meant you would earn you miles for the booking via PointsHound.com and your frequent guest points along with elite qualification. This test proved successful and on Monday PointsHound.com will be expanding that offering to around 1,000 hotels in the U.S. from Hyatt, Hilton, Starwood, Marriott and IHG. Now unless there is a significant price difference (which at times it can be) you should be funneling your hotel bookings for any of those 1,000 hotels through PointsHound.com so that you can earn even more on your stays. I don't have a list of those hotels but I would suggest you bring up the hotel you want to stay at on the actual hotel brand site and then also spend an extra minute or two to see if PointsHound.com offers Double Up and comparable prices for that same location.

Finally, you can expect another new airline partner to be added to PointsHound.com later next week bringing their total number of partners to 11.

The more you book through PointsHound.com also means the more you earn as they have three mileage earning levels (1 through 3) and as a special offer via PointsHound.com to FFB & Rewards Canada readers using our referral link you will receive an automatic 60 day Level 2 upgrade where users earn miles at an accelerated rate (avg of 4-8x per $ depending on hotel) compared to Level 1 users. You will also earn a 250 mile bonus on your first booking made after signing up via the referral link. Just so you know, I will also earn a 250 miles bonus on that first booking of yours for referring you. I thank everyone in advance who joins via my referral link!

May 15 Update: LifeMiles award ticket increases, Aeroplan Hertz Bonus & a targeted IHG rewards offer

Here is your middle of the week update:

News, Tips & Tricks
Avianca TACA LifeMiles has made several tweaks to their award chart with any prior notice. Certain award tickets will be going up anywhere from 5,000 LifeMiles to 50,000 LifeMiles! One type of award ticket was actually decreased by 15,000. More info and details can be found at LoyaltyLobby

Aeroplan launched a new contest called "Around the World" where members can win one of three prizes of 200,000 Aeroplan Miles. To enter you simply need to vote for the "best of" in select popular cities around the World. Full details can be found on the Aeroplan blog

Don't forget to enter in my FFB8 Contest! Week 2 is in full swing on Twitter. For more details and how to enter please visit www.frequentflyerbonuses.com/FFB8

Bonus Offers
Air Canada Aeroplan
- Earn Triple Aeroplan Miles on rentals of 2 days or more in Canada, Mexico, Puerto Rico and the U.S. More... Until Aug 31, 13

American AAdvantage
- Earn up to Triple AAdvantage Miles for nonstop flights between Chicago and Portland. More... Jun 12 - Sep 15, 13
- Earn up to Triple AAdvantage Miles for nonstop flights between Miami and San Diego. More... Jun 12 - Sep 15, 13
- Double AAdvantage Miles for nonstop flights between Los Angeles and Eugene or Redmond, Oregon. More... Jun 12 - Sep 15, 13

IHG Rewards Club
- Earn up to 10,000 Bonus Priority Club Points on every qualifying stay, beginning with the first qualifying stay at participating InterContinental®, Crowne Plaza®, Hotel Indigo®, Holiday Inn®, Holiday Inn Express®, Holiday Inn Club Vacations®, Staybridge Suites® and Candlewood Suites® hotels worldwide. More... Until Aug 31, 13 Targeted Offer - May Not work for everyone

Philippine Airlines Mabuhay
- Century Park Hotels Double Mabuhay Miles for stays at the Century Park Hotel. More... Until Dec 31, 13

May 14 Update: WestJet returns to Brandon, MB, Air Canada raises Transborder Flex fee, 50% Bonus Dividend Miles for hotel stays and car rentals

A bit more to offer in today's update!

News, Tips & Tricks
WestJet announced they will be returning to Brandon Manitoba after nearly a ten year absence. The new service will be with WestJet's regional Encore service on a Q400 once per day to/from Calgary and will start on Sep 3. (Source Airline Route Updates)

Air Canada has silently upped its Transborder changes fees on Flex Tickets only to match the recent increases from many of the U.S. carriers. Find out more on this Flyertalk thread.

I also posted the correct link for registering for the new Aeroplan Hilton offer. See yesterday's post for details

Don't forget to enter in my FFB8 Contest! Week 2 is in full swing on Twitter. For more details and how to enter please visit www.frequentflyerbonuses.com/FFB8

Bonus Offers
airberlin topbonus
- Double topbonus Miles when you fly on airberlin or Etihad between Berlin, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf, Munich or Geneva and Abu Dhabi. More... Register and book by Jun 13 for travel until Jul 31, 13
- Triple topbonus Miles when you fly on Etihad between Abu Dhabi and Bangkok, Singapore, Male, Johannesburg, Bahrain, Kuala Lumpur, Seychelles, Jakarta, Kuwait, Muscat, Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore, Colombo, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Dammam, Jeddah, Riyadh, Nairobi, Chengdu, Shanghai Pudong, Beijing, Tokyo or Nagoya. More... Register and book by Jun 13 for travel until Jul 31, 13
- Earn up to 3,000 Bonus topbonus Miles starting with your second stay at Best Western branded hotels in Germany and Luxembourg. More... Until Aug 31, 13
- Triple topbonus Miles on all Hertz rentals of 3 or more days Worldwide. More... Until Jun 30, 13

Air Canada Aeroplan
- 1,750 Bonus Aeroplan Miles for each qualified stay at Best Western branded hotels in Canada, the United States, or the Caribbean Islands. More... Until Aug 31, 13
- Earn up to 3,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles when you stay with participating hotels and resorts within the Hilton HHonors portfolio. More... Until Aug 31, 13

US Airways Dividend Miles
- 50% Bonus Dividend Miles on all hotel stays and car rentals credited to your Dividend Miles account. Hotel point conversions are excluded. More... Until Jul 31, 13

Virgin Australia Velocity Rewards (on FrequentFlyerBonuses.com only)
- 2,000 Velocity Points per qualifying stay at a participating hotel within the Hilton HHonors™ portfolio Worldwide. More... Until Jul 31, 13

Earn 8x the Aeroplan Miles for Best Western stays this summer!

Last week it was IHG, earlier today it was Hilton and now the summer for earning tons of Aeroplan miles on hotel stays continues with Best Western!

Earn 1,750 Bonus for each qualified stay at Best Western branded hotels Worldwide between May 13 and August 31, 2013. Up to 8,750 Bonus Miles awarded during the promotional period (5 stays max) Full details, online registration and booking.  (Registration is required)