@Credit_hawk wrote:
Thanks for the reply, Iced. Maybe it was just a weird anomaly with the card. It was a 50/50 crap shoot with me with it not working. I'll order a duplicate just in case.
I will take your suggestion and look more thoroughly into booking separately. For me, each time I looked into booking separately the tickets alone nearly ran the cost of the tickets and the room for a week on Expedia and Orbitz. Admittedly, I'm a snob with lodging so we're talking the Westin Grand for example and those prices are still that cheap on Expedia in comparison to booking separately and I still get the points individually with each hotel and airline, Chase and Expedia to boot. Maybe I'm not savvy enough booking individually to get the best price and that could be very well the case. I use my points a lot and will book flights but sometimes I just can't beat the deal on Expedia. Have you ever looked to contrast the cost? You should just out of curiosity.
While, I'm a snob with hotels, I am just fine in economy on Delta, which is my preferred carrier. I do alright for myself but I'm one of those that even if I was a multimillionaire I'd still fly with the peasants in many cases unless it was a cheap airline because those seats upfront simply just aren't worth 10 times more, IMHO. I just read a great piece in The Economist yesterday (link at the bottom) about he same argument. First class comprises about 13% of he passenger seating and 50% of the profit for carriers. However, some of those awesome cabins like you see "The Points Guy" flying in, may be worth it depending on the cost. But you only find stuff like that on Asian and Middle-Eastern carriers. Not so much American airliners.
I totally agree with your argument that money shouldn't dictate your travel within reason. Certainly not when it's a difference of <$100.
https://www.1843magazine.com/1843-answers/the-daily/is-flying-first-class-a-waste-of-money
I'm in the same boat with hotels - I book Marriott properties (including JW and Ritz, though my personal favorites are the Autograph Collections) almost exclusively when travelling internationally, so the advice still applies. When I book a hotel, I care about location, room comfort, and historical/architectural flair (hence the love of AU properties), so I will often spend hundreds per night for a room when I could have just AirBNB'd it for $40/night. I could probably hunt around and find a site that would drop that room price for $10-20/night, but honestly it's not worth the effort ot me. I'll just bring the hotel up in the Marriott app, reserve it, and be done. Saving 30 minutes of price shopping is worth more to me than the $20 I might have saved.
Premium cabins are a different story altogether and require a different approach, which will be unique to each person. My original comment referred more to airline choice and schedule than cabin choice - that is, by not marrying myself to the cheapest flight available, I may be able to fly a carrier with 32" seat pitch instead of 29", or has a better layover than another, or even a better aircraft - I'd rather fly a A330/340 transatlantic with my spouse in a 2/4/2 economy configuration than on a 777 3/3/3 config where we may have an aislemate.
I personally used to be a bit more flexible on trans-atlantic because they're not long flights (6-8 hours, which isn't much different than flying to California for me), but I just flew a Star Alliance partner of United's for my last European trip and it wasn't very comfortable, so going forward I will only do trans-atlantic on United (E+) or Premium Economy/Business.
I will only travel trans-pacific in a premium cabin with lie-flats because it's simply too long of a flight for me to fold myself into an economy seat for (these are typically at least 12 hours from my home base).
As for the price of premium cabins, the Economist isn't wrong, but they can charge what the market will bear and there's enough out there willing to bear it. As for those super-premium seats (a la Singapore's A380 suite), they aren't really worth the face price - it's the bragging rights/bucket list checkboxes or privacy that most people are paying for, and the former category is largely using points and not cash to pay for the seat. The premium international cabins on most airlines (including US carriers) are just fine. I've flown in business/first on United, ANA, Asiana, Swiss, and Lufthansa and had no complaints except with the barcalounger configurations on ANA, which I think are all replaced now anyway. I also don't need a 32" TV or a private door on my flight - just a comfortable lie-flat and some pillows and blankets.
