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Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here – Marriott Rewards Premier Credit CardThis week we’re giving away a $500 Marriott gift card that can be used at any one of the hotel chain’s properties worldwide. You can use your $500 for stays, dining and more at any participating property, including Edition, JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels.Recently, Chase introduced the new-and-improved Ritz-Carlton Rewards Credit Card which features, among other perks, a sign-up bonus of two complimentary nights at any Tier 1-4 Ritz-Carlton property after spending $4,000 within the first three months of account opening....

Sign up for our daily newsletterEmail addressSign upI would like to subscribe to The Points Guy newsletters and special email promotions. The Points Guy will not share or sell your email. See privacy policy.San Francisco’s United Polaris Lounge has been a (very) long time coming. The carrier’s first — and, until now, only — location opened at Chicago O’Hare (ORD) in December 2016, and at the time, United was expecting to open its lounges in Houston (IAH), Newark (EWR) and San Francisco (SFO) by the middle of 2017....

Uber is bringing back its autonomous vehicles in Pittsburg, just four months after the ride-hailing service’s self-driving car killed a pedestrian in Arizona and caused the company to end its testing operations.Following the suspension of the self-driving program, Uber also laid off about 100 self-driver operators in Pittsburg and San Francisco and replaced the positions with newly trained “mission specialists.“The autonomous vehicles will be driven in manual mode by the mission specialists for the foreseeable future....

Sign up for our daily newsletterEmail addressSign upI would like to subscribe to The Points Guy newsletters and special email promotions. The Points Guy will not share or sell your email. See privacy policy.With summer on its way out, we have to face the inevitable — winter is coming. To get prepared, check out this crazy aviation video where a turboprop airplane known as the Twin Otter successfully lands in a significant amount of fresh powder in Northern Saskatchewan....

To kick off “Infrastructure Week,” the White House announced plans this morning to overhaul the US air traffic control system, hailing what’s coming as “a great new era in American aviation.“In an White House East Room ceremony, the President, Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao and others spoke generally about a proposal to transition control of the nation’s skies away from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). In order to “separate the regulator from the operator,” a new non-governmental nonprofit “co-op” entity will take over air traffic control duties....

“Reader Questions” are answered twice a week — Mondays and Fridays — by TPG Senior Writer Julian Mark Kheel.If you’re not a fan of Southwest’s boarding procedure in which passengers pick their seats on a first come, first served basis, you might presume that buying a ticket on American, Delta and United will at least allow you to preselect the seat you want. But TPG reader Karthik notes that doesn’t necessarily appear to be the case…[pullquote source=“TPG Reader Karthik”]When I logged into AA’s website to choose seats on my flight from New York to San Francisco, the only available seats in economy were middle seats....

Now that it’s possible to check your Uber passenger rating, a few readers expressed concern that their rating seemed “too low.“While the readers concerned about 4.5 to 4.8 ratings have nothing to worry about, riders with much lower ratings are at risk of having drivers decline their ride request. This can leave you with longer wait times, and — if your rating drops too low — there’s the risk of being booted from Uber completely....

This spring we went to Jamaica for four nights to join some friends in celebrating their 25th anniversary (they married young, but it has worked out well for them!). At this point in our lives it is very hard to coordinate travel with other friends mostly because everyone is so dang busy that it just doesn’t end up happening. Additionally, while travel is somewhat easy for us thanks to miles and points, most of our friends haven’t fully adopted that method of travel, so you have the added issue of budgetary constraints....

American Airlines’ fleet has seen a lot of changes over the last year, mostly focused on improving premium economy products while squeezing economy seats tighter on some aircraft. In the last year, AA has retired its embarrassing angle-flat 777 business class product, completed a lie-flat retrofit project on its international 757s and 767s, brought on new 787-9 Dreamliners with premium economy and started retrofitting existing widebodies with premium economy.Let’s check the state of premium economy routes and take a look at some of the noteworthy changes to AA’s schedule this fall....

For the third time this week, Icelandair announced a new US destination — this time, it’s San Francisco (SFO). The Reykjavik-based carrier will launch nonstop service between Iceland’s capital of Reykjavik (KEF) and SFO beginning June 1, 2018.The SFO-KEF route will offer 4x weekly service, operated by one of Icelandair’s Boeing 767-300ER aircraft. Here’s the operational schedule for the route:FI862 San Francisco (SFO) 3:15pm Departure ⇒ Reykjavik (KEF) 6:35am (+1) Arrival — Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, SaturdaysFI863 Reykjavik (KEF) 5:00pm Departure ⇒ San Francisco (SFO) 6:55pm Arrival — Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays, SundaysIcelandair’s 767-300ER features three cabins: Saga (business class with recliner seats), economy comfort and economy....

Update 5/22/17: In a rare move, British Airways and AARP have extended the date ranges well ahead of expiration. The terms and conditions have now been updated to allow the discount on flights through December 31, 2018 — instead of the previous limitation of March 31, 2018. You must still book by December 31, 2017 to get the discount.One of the greatest travel promos available over the past few years has been the AARP British Airways discount....

For my first trip to Tokyo I wanted to try out both Haneda and Narita airports, since Delta now flies to both. Haneda is served nonstop from Detroit and Los Angeles, though the Detroit service isn’t slated to re-start until June 16, 2011 (but now may be delayed further, just like American is delaying their JFK-HND and Hawaiian is holding off on their second daily Honolulu-Haneda) and my trip was on June 3rd....

Airline shopping portals are a great way to double-dip on travel rewards for purchases you’d be making anyway, and they can be especially lucrative when they offer elevated earning rates through limited-time promotions. Starting today, one such promo is offering customers a generous bonus on purchases made through Gilt City.Just as it did last summer, deals site Gilt City is partnering with Alaska, Delta and United’s portals to offer up to 30 miles per dollar....

One of the things I like doing least in life is calling up airlines. Even as a top-tier member in several elite status programs, I dread having to pick up the phone and speak with phone agents. However, as much as I don’t like it, it’s a fact of life for a frequent traveler because airline websites only allow you to do a fraction of the things you need to do, like changing flights, processing upgrades and booking complex awards....

Hurricane Michael continues to devastate the Eastern coastline, with a current death toll of 13 as of time of publication. As the strongest storm to hit the continental United States in more than half a century, the natural disaster has left more than 1.5 million people without electricity in a broad swath stretching from Florida to Virginia. Hundreds of thousands more have been displaced, either because their homes were destroyed by the storm or from evacuating in advance of anticipated floods, as well as damaging wind and rain....

Norwegian is continuing its rapid expansion efforts. This time, it’s not in the US, Europe or even Argentina. But instead, the low-cost carrier with an ever-expanding route network is planning to launch service to Brazil.The carrier launched its first-ever service between London (LGW) and South America in February, with a nonstop route to Buenos Aires (EZE). (Check out the full review here.) Now, Norwegian is continuing to expand its presence in South America, as it plans to launch a route to Brazil from both London and Argentina....

Congrats to the following winners of Monday’s Mega Do Giveaway!Two one-way American Airlines Systemwide Upgrades go to Twitter follower Kati Lechner @katigirl who will use the SWUs to upgrade Chicago to Shanghai. Congrats - I’ll be in touch!The $50 AA Gift Certificate goes to commenter Snuggliestbear who is a mileage geek because “I try to show off to my wife when they announce the list of connections when we get to our destination - most of the time I can give almost all of the airport codes they list off - she thinks I’m really nerdy!...

When it comes to flying, one of the biggest influencing factors on the overall experience is if your flight was on time. If you’re planning a tight connection, for example, you’ll want to avoid Newark International Airport (EWR), as it’s notorious for traffic delays on the tarmac. And if you think EWR is bad, OAG’s latest report for on-time performance is out, and many of America’s airports fall well behind their international counterparts....

Sign up for our daily newsletterEmail addressSign upI would like to subscribe to The Points Guy newsletters and special email promotions. The Points Guy will not share or sell your email. See privacy policy.I just got an email from Southwest about a new bonus points offer and although the language seems like it might be targeted, it pointed me to a registration page so you might as well try and register if you have any Southwest flights coming up....

It’s an open secret in the aviation world that the Airbus A380 program is on life support. Since early 2014, Airbus has only secured orders for just five more examples of its behemoth four-engine aircraft. Over the same time, it’s gotten cancellations notices for nine that were previously ordered. That’s a net of negative four aircraft orders in four years.Programs such as the manufacturer’s “I Fly A380” initiative have failed to drive enough A380-specific demand for the aircraft to keep the airline orders coming....