Prepaids are All the Rage--Add Another to the List (if You Live in New England)

Word on the street is that miles and points aficionados may be interested in prepaid debit cards. See How Much is Bluebird Really Worth? and my Bluebird Calculator.

The players involved have included the NetSpend card, Mio card, Wells Fargo prepaid card, US Bank and Nationwide Visa Buxx cards, and the American Express Prepaid card.

I am excited to announce that I will be speaking at the Los Angeles Frequent Traveler University, being held November 30 - December 2 at the Sheraton Gateway Hotel LAX.

My talk will be about free oneways on awards, probably under a title like Three Vacations, Two Awards: Adding a Free Oneway to Award Tickets.

Club Carlson has had some amazing promotions this year, and their newest is no slouch either. Scott talked about it a few weeks ago; the gist is:

Stay one night at any Radisson in the U.S, Canada or Caribbean and get another night in any Radisson in the U.S, Canada or Caribbean for free!

This meant that buying a room for about $89/night at a random Radisson would net you a certificate to stay at any other Radisson including the Radisson New York Martinique.

The Enhanced Business Gold Rewards Card from American Express OPEN

Get 30,000 Membership Rewards® points after you spend $5,000 in purchases with your new Card in the first 3 months following approval of your new Card account
Plus, get a statement credit for your initial Amazon Prime membership fee after you sign up for a new membership with your Card and meet the spending requirement in the same time period
As an Amazon Prime member, you get unlimited FREE Two-Day Shipping on millions of items on Amazon.com
Built with business-sized purchasing power and fast rewards
3X points on

Look for a post tomorrow on getting to French Polynesia with Delta miles, Hawaiian miles, and AMEX Membership Rewards.

This post will be about getting to French Polynesia--Tahiti, Bora Bora, and more--with frequent flier miles. This is an award I get asked to book frequently through my Award Booking Service, and I wanted to share some free tips.

French Polynesia is a French-speaking "overseas country" controlled by France. It is south of Hawaii and east of Australia. The main tourist spots are Tahiti, Bora Bora, and Mo'orea. People go to French Polynesia for the absolutely stunning beach-and-island landscape.

According to this thread on FlyerTalk, Aegean Airlines--a Star Alliance member--is offering a 2,000 mile signup bonus to new members of their loyalty program, Miles & Bonus. Although this 1,000 mile increase over their previous offer may seem like a paltry sum from a Greek airline you are unlikely to fly frequently, this 2,000 mile bonus actually puts you halfway to Star Alliance Silver status and 1/10th of the way to Star Alliance Gold Status!

Aegean Airlines has one of the lowest mileage requirements for elite Star Alliance status.

This is a guest post from Chase Tajima. Chase is a tax attorney in Honolulu--Aloha! He writes about Hawaii tax law at TheTaxTable.wordpress.com. Anyone is welcome to submit a guest Anatomy of an Award post, so we can all learn from interesting award bookings.

I started following MileValue because I wanted to find a cost effective way to get from Honolulu to Delhi, India to attend my college roommate's wedding. Roundtrip flights from from Honolulu to Delhi ranged from about $1,600 to $2,000+ in economy.

For the past 24 hours, this thread on FlyerTalk has been buzzing with excitement about Alitalia's most recent discount code that gave a flat $315.30 discount off any flight booked up until 10/26/12 on Alitalia's Japanese website.

For several days, the US, Italian, German, British, Canadian, and Spanish Alitalia websites have been running a promotion that gives a 25% discount on flights booked using the e-Coupon code SPECIAL:

This was a nice upgrade from the 15% off promotion that Alitalia offered in September--covered in Mile Value's first Forum Buzz post.

More enticingly, the version of the promotion offered on Alitalia's

This is based on a classic post from bengalimilesguru.com that Scott has edited, updated, and expanded, so it is current as of publication.

Reader Maya sent me an article from One Mile at A Time where Lucky broke the news that Delta is currently not charging high fuel surcharge fees for travel with Virgin Australia!

There are some great deals and tips kicking around the web that were already written up perfectly. I have added a few notes, and hopefully the aggregation will be useful.

1) Mile Nerd flags the opportunity to earn 15 American Airlines miles per dollar on donations during October--Breast Cancer Awareness Month--to Susan G. Komen for the Cure.

Donate through the link on this page. Full terms and conditions:

If you were already intending to donate, this is a great deal.