Business Travel Tips

Marriott is offering 5000 bonus Delta SkyMiles miles per stay — beginning with your second stay — from May 1 through September 6, 2010.

As the bonus can be earned up to 12 times, you can earn up to 60,000 bonus miles.

Registration is required.
You can earn the 5000 bonus Delta miles at any of over 3,200 participating Marriott hotels in 68 countries across 10 distinctive brands. Find out details here.

US Airways is offering 1500 miles to new customers who enroll at usairways.com between April 19, 2010 and July 31, 2010.

All you have to do is sign up and you’ll earn 1,500 miles. Just enter promo code NM15 when you sign up.

Existing Dividend Miles members are not eligible.

This offer is not combinable with any other offers.
Details of the promotion are available at usairways.com/en-US/dividendmiles/promotions.

The Transportation Department’s new rule designed to protect passengers stuck on planes, which requires U.S. airlines to let passengers off domestic flights when they’ve waited three hours without taking off, will take effect next April 29.
The nation’s airlines, which could be fined up to $27,500 per passenger if not complying with the rule’s requirements, oppose the rule.

They say it is going to cause more flights being canceled. That because, when planes are backed up at airports, airlines say they will cancel flights rather than risk huge fines.

Five airlines have applied for waivers from the rule for seven months at New York’s JFK and La Guardia airports, Newark and Philadelphia, USA Today reports. [...] The House and Senate are poised to pass legislation this summer that would make it illegal for airlines to hold passengers in planes for more than three hours.

Below are the main requirements of the new tarmac rule.
- Prohibit U.S. airlines operating domestic flights from permitting an aircraft to remain on the tarmac for more than three hours without letting passengers off. Exceptions are allowed only for safety or security, or if air traffic control advises the pilot in command that returning to the terminal would disrupt airport operations.
- U.S. carriers operating international flights departing from or arriving in the USA must specify, in advance, their own time limits for letting off passengers. The exceptions above apply.
- Airlines are required to provide “adequate” food and drinking water for passengers within two hours of the aircraft being delayed on the tarmac. Airlines must maintain operable lavatories and, if necessary, provide medical attention.
Other provisions include:
- Prohibiting airlines from scheduling chronically delayed flights.
- Requiring airlines to designate an employee to monitor the effects of flight delays and cancellations, respond in “a timely and substantive fashion” to consumer complaints and give consumers information about where to file complaints.
- Requiring airlines to display on their websites flight-delay information for each domestic flight.
- Requiring airlines to adopt customer-service plans and audit their own compliance with them.
- Prohibiting airlines from retroactively making changes to their “contracts of carriage” provisions that could have a negative effect on consumers who already have purchased tickets.

Starwood is offering one free weekend night for every three stays between May 1 and July 31.

Redemption period: through December 19, 2010.
You can consume these nights at properties up through Category 6.

To take advantage of this offer you have to register online; registration will open on May 1.

Starwood competitors offering free night include Hyatt — free night every two stays; offer valid all week long (Hyatt is also offering bonus points as an option) and Hilton — free night every four stays.

Armani Hotel Dubai, the world’s first hotel developed by Armani Hotels & Resorts, located in Burj Khalifa will open on April 21, 2010.

The 160 rooms Armani Hotel covers an area of 269,000 sq ft, across the concourse, ground floor and levels 1 to 8 and levels 38 & 39 of Burj Khalifa.

It includes Armani/Privé, an upscale lounge, and the 12,000 square feet in-hotel Armani/SPA, featuring treatment rooms, thermal suites, a fitness centre and an outdoor swimming pool.

Upcoming Armani Hotels & Resorts openings include Armani Hotel Milano, Italy; Armani Resort in Marrakech, Morocco; and Armani Residences villas in Marassi, Egypt.