Spirit Airlines $9 Fare Club - A Good Deal Depending on Where You Live and Travel

I've posted a number of times about Spirit Airlines and their occasional super-discount prices on date-specific airfares. When I first checked them out, I was able to get penny airfares to Las Vegas and to Florida from Atlantic City. At the time the only restriction was the dates of flying in each direction and getting in quickly to book them before the seats sold out.

More recently, they started a $9 Fare Club, and when they come out with their bargains, the best prices are available to members. They still offer fairly good prices to non-members as well, but nowhere near as low.

As an example, they have a fare sale right now good for flights booked through 11:59 pm tomorrow, October 1st. Many city pairs have flights on specified dates which Club members can get for $9 each direction, and non-members can get for $29 each way (plus airport/security fees). Examples include flights between Atlantic City and Fort Lauderdale, Boston and Myrtle Beach, Detroit and Los Angeles, New York and Fort Lauderdale. To see the whole list of current special fares, click this link.

The question becomes whether it's worth joining the $9 Fare Club. There are two ways to join it: first, to pay for membership. The annual fee to join is $39.95. That's something you might make up in one roundtrip if you're booking the special fares, but it probably makes much more sense if you live in or near one of their major cities and have a reason to travel a few times a year to another of their cities. If you're anywhere near Fort Lauderdale, you have the biggest selection of destinations (including some in the Caribbean and Central/South America). If you're in/near Myrtle Beach or Atlantic City, it would give you some options too. People in other departure cities with family/friends at one or more of their main hub cities could do well too.

To apply for membership, you would use this link.

The second way to join is to get Spirit's World MasterCard, which comes with a complimentary membership as long as you use the card at least once monthly -- it also includes bonus miles you can earn for free travel on Spirit as well. To check out all the credit card rules and see if this is a better option for you, click this link.

Spirit's $9 Fare Club may not be for everybody, but depending on where you live and your travel needs, this might be a way of saving a good bit on some upcoming trips.

Save $50 on 3-Night Hotel Stays in New York, Orlando or San Diego Using MasterCard

Travelocity has a promotional code allowing you to save an additional $50 on 3-night hotel bookings when you use your MasterCard. The offer is valid for stays in New York, San Diego or Orlando, and there are a wide variety of hotels available so you can find a price that fits your travel style. The code is SAVE50, and it's valid if you book the hotel by May 31st.

If you have a trip coming up to one of these cities, it's a nice way of picking up some extra savings.

To do a search for hotels and prices, click the link below. You need to enter the promo code to get the savings.

Use your MasterCard for a 3+ night stay and save $50. Couponcode: SAVE50

Save $100 on 3-Night Trips to Vegas Using MasterCard

If you're thinking about a quick getaway to Las Vegas, why not save a little on the trip so you can play with more at the tables? Or have some more to go see a nice show?

Travelocity has a promotion which gives you back $100 if you use a MasterCard to book a flight and three-night stay in Las Vegas. A variety of hotels and casinos are available so you can find the level that suits your travel habits...

The promotion is valid through the end of the year, with Promo Code VEGAS100. (I think that means you have to book it by then, not travel by then).

So if Las Vegas is on your itinerary (or you want it to be) check out Save $100 Promo for Las Vegas 3+ Night & Flight.

Saving $100 means you start out your trip a winner!

Travelocity Promo Code $75 Off Las Vegas 4-Nights

Travelocity.com and MasterCard have a promotional code in conjunction with four-night packages to Las Vegas. The code offers $75 off the deal if you book with a MasterCard. The code is LASVEGAS75. You have to enter the code at checkout to get the savings. This promotion is good on bookings till October 31st for travel by the end of February 2008.

The packages include airfare and hotel stays at a variety of the Vegas resorts. Here's the link.

If Vegas is in your travel plans, why not let MasterCard make it $75 cheaper?

Save $50 on 3-Night Hotel Stays - Travelocity and Master Card Promotion

Travelocity and Master Card are currently offering $50 off a three-night stay at many hotels. The promo code is HOTELSALE. The offer is valid for reservations made by October 31st.

Here's the link.

So if you have any travel plans coming up, here's a way you might save on hotel bills.

Savings Buried on a Website - US Airways to Europe 10% Off and 10,000 Bonus Miles

I was looking for airfares to Europe and got a reminder on why you always want to keep your eyes open...

We wanted to travel to Europe during a certain time period and were comparing deals on various airlines, checking Orbitz, Hotwire and all. Most of the low fares involved making a connection, which we'd be willing to do if the savings and schedule matched up... but along the way, Orbitz showed that one of the directions was with a connection but the other was non-stop. Struck me as interesting that an airline had a non-stop on the route - and I thought if they had it in one direction they might have it in the other. So I decided to go to the airline's website and check.

In this case it was US Airways. I did some researching and found that they didn't have non-stops between my city pair every day, but if I switched my return by one day I could fly both ways non-stop. So that was a step in the right direction.

The next interesting element I saw was the effect that multiple flights have on fees. With all the airport and security fees that are now being tacked on to flights, the taxes and fees (for international travel in particular) really add up. The base fare for US Airways was a bit higher compared to some of the other airlines, but because it was only one flight each way instead of two, the taxes/fees were way less. And that made the final net price of the ticket less on US Airways, by a good enough margin to make that the clear choice (with the benny of not having to change planes, wait in a second airport etc.)

I was getting ready to book the fare and my eyes were just sort of gazing at the screen -- and they ran across a link on the site for 20% off fares to Europe and 20,000 bonus miles. I wondered if that was on top of the lower fare I had just found, so I clicked on that link.

Turned out they had a promotion going on together with MasterCard -- if you booked travel to a few of their European destinations and paid with your MasterCard you would get 20% of Envoy class plus 20k bonus miles for your frequent flyer. We weren't planning to fly that class, but the promotion went on that if you booked coach and paid with the MasterCard you would still get 10% off and 10k miles.

The promotion is good for tickets bought through September 30th for travel between September 2nd and November 14th to any of seven major European destinations.

You had to register your frequent flyer account number to get the promotion credited, so I went ahead and did that for both our accounts. Once that was done, I went through the steps to get the same reservations, and the 10% savings just popped in there! Enough to pay for some extra special dinners out while we're there (or maybe a side trip on the bargain airlines on flylc.com)

So thanks to some digging and using the link I almost overlooked, I got the better airfare, the non-stop service, an extra 10% off and a future 10,000 extra miles!!! Wow, did seeing that link ever pay off!

Credit Card Tip to Save 2%-3% on International Travel

I wanted to let you know about a credit card that ends up saving you money when you use it in foreign countries.

I travel occasionally to other countries, so exchange rates to foreign currencies matter to me. It always irked me when credit card companies would add a fee to transactions made in anything other than a US dollar. What irked me was that the umbrella company (Visa, MasterCard) was already adding a fee for the transaction (I believe it's 1%) and they were doing the conversion and then passing the transaction in dollars to the bank/credit card company. To have the credit card company add another fee when the currency exchange had already been processed by Visa or MasterCard was adding insult to injury. It seemed to be a fee for doing nothing.

And it wasn't a cheap fee. Many banks were adding 2%-3% to each transaction (again, this on top of the initial conversion fee by Visa/MC).

And over the last few years it seemed as if more and more credit card issuers were going to this additional fee. But I have found that Capital One credit cards still do not charge any fee/exchange premium on top of what's put there by MasterCard. The base fee by MasterCard is added into the transaction but nothing more. So using this card instead of others means that I automatically spend about 3% less than I would have if I used a different card.

The Capital One cards I've seen carry no fees, so having one available for international travel would cost nothing, and could add up to big savings -- imagine paying 2%-3% less on every hotel transaction, meal and souvenir purchase you made while on that exotic trip to Paris, Rome, Venice...

And they have some credit card types that have reward features, so it's not like you have to sacrifice reward-point-earning to save this way.

So if you have occasion to take a trip to that exotic destination (or some not-exotic but foreign destination) it's probably worth applying for one of the Capital One cards a couple of months before your travels.