Southwest Airlines new Rapid Rewards program: what it means for travelers

by McLean Robbins on

Today Southwest Airlines announced changes to its popular rewards program, Rapid Rewards. the all-new program, which promises to eliminate blackout dates and allow redemption for international flights for the first time, will launch March 1 and will will allow members to redeem points for any seat on any flight, with no blackout dates or seat restrictions.

AOL Travel has covered the basic information about the Rapid Rewards program restructuring, but we’re offering a bit more insight into what the program will mean for travelers.

A Brief History of the Rapid Rewards Program

Southwest’s frequent flyer program, Rapid Rewards, previously allowed customers to earn a free roundtrip ticket to any of their domestic destinations after the accumulation of 16 credits per 24-month period. The program also allowed a half-credit for using a Southwest partner to book car and/or hotel stays. Members also earned one credit per $1,200 spent on Chase’s Rapid Rewards-branded credit cards. Select merchants can earn double reward points.

In February of 2006, Southwest issued capacity control limits on its Rapid Rewards redemptions. This potential travel blackout will be removed with the new program. Details of how the Rapid Rewards program will integrate the A+ Rewards program of recently-acquired AirTran Airways have not yet been released.

According to FlyerTalk.com member NSK:

Rapid Rewards 2.0 is a perfect fit with Southwest’s brand as a no-gimmicks airline. The program may not be the most generous, but it is simple and completely free of any hidden catches. Unlike mysterious capacity controls, price-based redemption provides us an excellent ability to predict ability to redeem for free travel.

How Is Rapid Rewards 2.0 Different?

Southwest has assured its customers that existing credits and travel awards will remain available for use after the new system takes effect on March 1. Instead of a one-for-one system, travelers will now accrue points based on the fare and type of fare purchased, and redemptions will work the same way.

Wanna Get Away fares, the cheapest available, will accrue 6 points per dollar; Anytime fares 10 points per dollar, and Business Select fares 12 points per dollar. Travelers can also earn miles from shopping and dining partners.

Members’ accounts will automatically be transferred to the new program on March 1, 2011; no re-enrollment is needed. Points will not expire unless members have no earning activity in a 24-month period.

Truly frequent fliers will benefit from enhanged A-List and Companion pass award availablity. A new status, A-List Preferred, will accure 100% earning bonsuses. A-List Preferred can be achieved by flying 50 one-way trips or accruing 70,000 tier points. The highlight of this elite status is the 100% earning bonus as well as priority standby, sercurity and early boarding status, free Wi-Fi and a dedicated phone line.

Similar to other airline reward programs, members can also purchase points through the new program in 1,000 point groupings. The minimum purchase is 2,000 points.

A major program change is the ability redeem award points any of the more than 800 destinations in the Chase travel program, including internationally. More information about the Chase integration is expected to be released early next week.

Will the New Rapid Rewards Program Mean to Consumers?

Initial consumer feedback indicates that Rapid Rewards 2.0 makes earning and achieving reward travel slightly more complex, but more in line with other major carriers like American Airlines, United and Continental. A positive outcome suggests that because award redemption is now based on length of flight, travelers wishing to redeem awards for short-haul travel won’t feel as if their certificates are used in vain.

The basic component of the program – one free trip for every eight – is still in place.

Frequent flier Mark V. suggests that for long-haul and travelers frequently purchasing Business Select seats, the new program will actually enhance overall customer experience, allowing for faster rewards.

NSK says that “Elimination of extraordinary effective rebate ratios makes [Rapid Rewards] 2.0 much less interesting to FlyerTalkers than programs that still offer such opportunities,” but acknowledges that the program’s greater ease of redemption may be appealing to travelers who “decide that they prefer a program that delivers what it promises without any drama.”

Mark V. champions Southwest Airlines’ transparency in rolling over old credits in to the new program, stating that the shift is “nothing like what other airlines have done in the past. Earning opportunities are still there, and current points are not being devalued like mainline carriers have done in the past.”

NSK admits that “although the new program is significantly less rewarding than Rapid Rewards 1.0 for short-haul discount fare customers, it is financially sustainable and it is customer-friendly enough that we will learn to love it.”

Travelers hoping to use short-haul travel to accrue longer rewards tickets will suffer most, Mark V. notes. “The sport of flying cheap to get free awards is pretty much over.”

Naturally, we at Gadling will keep you updated on new developments as they arise. Feel free to weigh in with your opinion in the comments section below.

[Image via Flickr user ColumbusCameraOp]

Top ten simple ways to lower your travel carbon footprint in 2011

by Laurel Miller on

It’s almost a new decade, and the earth ain’t getting any younger, cooler, or less crowded. As travel enthusiasts (even if it’s via an armchair), there are plenty of small changes we can make that cumulatively have a significant positive impact upon the planet. When you consider the amount of fossil fuels required to fly or even take a weekend roadtrip, it makes even more sense to try and offset that footprint by traveling (and living) mindfully. Notice I don’t suggest actually giving up travel: I’m eco-conscious, not delusional.

Fortunately, the eco-travel industry is exploding (be sure to do your research, to make sure companies aren’t just using the term as a buzzword). If you’re a business traveler who doesn’t have a choice on where you go or stay, there are still a number of things you can do to minimize your footprint. And FYI, there’s a growing choice of eco-gear and luggage available for all types of travelers these days.

While it’s simply not realistic to devote every waking moment to living a greener, cleaner life (I confess I love my car, and I certainly can’t afford to buy green or organic products all of the time), doing the best you can does make a difference.

Below, my suggestions for painlessly lowering a travel carbon footprint, no treehugging required.

1. BYO water bottle
It takes over a million of barrels of oil to fulfill our lust for bottled water in the U.S. alone, and those empty bottles have to go somewhere (hint: a landfill). Buying bottled is also just a waste of money, unless there’s a legitimate reason to drink purified water. Get a BPA-free bottle, and carry it to work, on the road, and in the air. You can even go one further and bring your own filter or iodine tablets, so you don’t need to purchase water at all in areas where the supply is untreated.

[Photo credit: Flickr user Brave Heart]

2. Bring a reusable shopping sack/use Ziplocs
These amazingly convenient little guys convert into stuff sacks and are the size of a deck of cards. Many have clips so you can hook them on your belt loop or day pack. Try ChicoBags or Foldable Bags for fun, practical, affordable options.

Ziplocs have dozens of uses, but one of their big bonuses (especially if you buy the heavy-duty freezer ones; if you can find industrial-strength bio-bags, even better) is that you can repeatedly use them to store snacks and leftovers; just wash, turn inside out, and dry. Now you have a place to put those juicy blackberries you found while hiking, or stash that crottin from the farmers market.

3. Use refillable bottles for toiletries
Who doesn’t love saving money? Whole Foods and other stores of that ilk have bulk body wash, shampoo, conditioner, and soap (often biodegradable/paraben-free) so not only can you top off for under a dollar, but get an earth-friendly product, to boot.

4. Conserve electricity
This is as simple as turning off the light, heat, A/C, or ceiling fan when you leave (you’ll survive the slight increase or decrease in temperature upon your return, I promise). If you’re staying somewhere long-term, unplug devices or appliances when not in use, since they continue to draw energy.

5. Walk, rent or borrow a bike, or take the bus
Think of it as getting some exercise so you can eat more of the local food. It’s also an eye-opening, and often enlightening experience to travel with locals, or explore a place by foot.

6. Pack collapsible flatware and utensils
I realize not everyone travels with a bowl and spoon when they’re not camping, but travel writers don’t earn the big bucks. I usually end up buying a bag of granola and picking up yogurt or individual cartons of soy milk (which don’t require refrigeration if unopened), so I can cut down on food costs when I’m traveling. I even reuse and carry compostable utensils I acquire from dining out, and stash them in my car and backpack. There are all different makes and materials for collapsible dinnerware; REI has a great selection. As long as I don’t turn into my mother and start slipping half-gnawed dinner rolls into my purse, I think my little habit is harmless.

7. Shorten your showers/turn off taps while brushing teeth and shaving
Water shortage is a life-and-death issue in much of the developing world. At home, practicing water conservation is also important, even if you don’t live in a drought-stricken region. But when you’re traveling? It’s not just courteous, but critical.

8. Pick it up!
Your trash, as well as trash you find during hikes or other outings. At the beach (or lake or river), collect discarded bottles, plastic bags, and other flotsam that can kill or injure aquatic life or pollute delicate marine ecosystems (which ultimately affects human health). I always make a point of doing a beach clean-up during my sunset stroll when I’m on a coastal trip. I keep a couple of trash bags stashed in my car and backpack. If you can afford it, get
compostable bags, which can now be found at just about any decent-size grocery store, but be aware most are pretty flimsy.

This beach clean-up behavior has garnered me baffled looks and even finger-pointing and snickers in Southeast Asia and Latin America, and of course these items aren’t going to get recycled. But if getting them off the ground and out of sight can temporarily tidy up and preserve the natural beauty of a place, I feel like I’ve done something positive for the planet and the local people.

9. Learn what not to purchase
Ivory, sea turtle products, rhinoceros horn, tiger penis, endangered animal pelts or pets, certain species of plants: just say no. The same goes for shady tour operators. Do a bit of research and talk to fellow travelers to get feedback on what trips or companies to avoid.

I’ve been seduced by slick promotional materials and operators in the past. This would explain how I’ve variously ended up at a squalid Burmese refugee camp (not a “Thai Hilltribe village”) full of downtrodden people who most definitely did not want a bunch of gawking backpackers in their faces; ridden some horses that were little more than walking skeletons; floated on a raft made from endangered wood; seen my tripmates buy drugs off of our guide, and literally had to make a run for it after a clueless guide had us set up camp in a flash flood zone. I realize I’m deviating a bit from the eco-theme here, but my point is, be careful.

For more information on what animal and plant products to avoid overseas, click here.

10. Give back
If I’m headed to a developing nation, especially if I’m doing a trek or other outdoor trip with guides, I pack old clothes and shoes, and donate them when it’s over. Sometimes operators will ask clients for donations if they have anything they’d like to part with. This isn’t greedy, tacky, or sketchy; when you consider what the average Quechua porter on the Inca Trail makes in a year, you can see why your gift of a pair of child’s mittens is important. Bonus: Packing light and donating articles reduces the weight of your luggage, which burns less fossil fuels on the drive or flight home.

I do still feel uncomfortable making unsolicited donations, but one of my favorite travel memories is from a culinary tour I took in Morocco a few years ago. On our final morning, a couple of us collected a bag of clothes, shoes, and toiletries to donate to the poverty-stricken community we’d passed each day on the way back to our accommodation. After seeking out an old woman who was clearly the village matriarch, we used sign language to explain our motive. With a huge, toothless grin, she began passing out items to the crowd that had suddenly gathered around her. They thanked us profusely, and we went on our way.

That afternoon, on our way to the airport, I spied an ancient, wizened Berber man scuffing down the dusty road. He was clad in skull cap and jellaba, and a pair of size 11 running shoes that had belonged to a 5’11 woman in our group. He kept pausing to hold up one foot, then the other, staring at them with wonderment. I have very mixed feelings about spreading Western culture when I travel to developing nations, but if those Air Nikes found a second life and enabled an old man to walk more comfortably, then so be it. And you know, he looked pretty damn fly.

[Photo credits: bags, Flickr user foldablebags.com; bike, Flickr user Pörrö; sign, Flickr user Beau B]

3 no-brainer cruise safety tips

by Chris Owen on

There are a lot of great features on your upcoming cruise vacation. Good times with friends and/or family, seeing new and exotic ports of call or visiting ones you’ve already seen again and lots of stuff to do on board the ship are just a few.

You’ll be encouraged to get into the whole experience and that’s good advice. You can unwind, relax and come away a new, renewed person. Throughout your voyage you’ll have the opportunity to do or not do some things that can impact your experience. Here are three cruise safety tips that focus on some things you don’t want to do.

  1. Don’t blindly trust the youth counselors– We want to believe the best of everyone and we really want to believe that the people we trust with our kids are good people. Take a few minutes from time to time throughout the voyage to make eye contact with and talk to the youth counselors that will have direct contact with your kid. If you see something odd in those eyes, don’t be afraid to walk right out of there with your kid. Trust your instincts as a parent; they are as good at sea as they are on land.
  2. Don’t visit crew areas of the ship– This sounds like a no-brainer, crossing over into the world marked “crew-only”, but here’s one good reason for it: While you are visiting with your new crew friend, you are surely not in your cabin and that would be a great time for some other crew member to get in and take your stuff. If you or someone you know is entering the crew-only world that’s a big red flag that something is wrong. Maybe that person is drinking too much and having an alcohol-induced crush on that handsome bartender with the charming accent.
  3. Don’t blindly go ashore- Bad stuff can happen when traveling anyplace by any method of travel. There are bad parts of most all towns whether on a Caribbean island or in the middle of some continent. Going ashore, from a native point of view, there are two kinds of people; those going on an organized shore excursion and those going it on their own. The later are the easy marks and the ones crooks most commonly target. Yes, there are rare stories of groups on excursions being held up too but a couple or small group walking around town for shopping are easy prey.

Whale Wars resumes: Sea Shepherd and Japanese Fleets Head Back to the Southern Ocean

by Jon Bowermaster on

Whaling season in the Southern Ocean is off and gunning, with both Japanese and Sea Shepherd ships alike steaming for the fertile hunting grounds off Antarctica

Last season was largely regarded a “win” for the conservation group (even though it sacrificed its $2 million chase boat, the “Ady Gil,” in a collision with a whaling ship) since the whalers missed their goals by a wide margin.

The Japanese fleet of seven ships had hoped to take home 850 minke whale — in the name of science and research in order to avoid the international moratorium against whaling that’s been on the books since 1986 — but successfully hunted only 506. They’d also hoped for 10 fin whales, but killed just one.

This year, perhaps due to the increased visibility the Shepherd’s campaign has attracted thanks to Animal Planet’s “Whale Wars” series (the upcoming season will be the fourth it has documented), the Japanese fleet left port several weeks later than usual for its annual five-month hunt.

The size of its fleet was reduced as well. Last year it included a factory ship, three harpoon ships, a supply ship and two patrol vessels; this year’s fleet has been cut by at least three ships. At the same time the Shepherd’s have beefed up their harassment team by replacing the sunken “Ady Gil” with a 115-foot monohull named “Gojira,” Japanese for Godzilla, which combines the words for “gorilla” and “whale.”

The state of Washington-based group’s mainstays the “Bob Barker” and “Steve Irwin,” as well as a faster helicopter, all of which departed Hobart, Tasmania last week, will join the speedboat, which previously held a record for blasting around the world in just 74 days.(The off-season was hardly quiet for the Shepherd’s, particularly the “Ady Gil’s” skipper Pete Bethune who spent four months in a Japanese jail and was given a two-year suspended jail term by a Japanese court for boarding one of the whaling ships. Despite having spent an estimated $1 million defending Bethune, after the trial the group’s charismatic commodore Paul Watson engaged in a public spat with the just-freed Kiwi over who exactly and what had caused the sinking of the “Ady Gil.” Apparently peace has been made though, and Bethune has launched his own group intent on protecting pilot whales in the Faroe Islands.)

Pro-whaling countries are not backing down from a fight. In a two-day meeting last week in Shimonoseki, Japan, representatives from 24 countries and regions convened to “map out their joint campaign” for resuming whaling.

Greenpeace campaigners predicted from Tokyo that this was saber rattling and that the reduced Japanese fleet and late departure means the 2010-2011 hunt will produce less than half of last year’s hoped-for-quota.

“As of August 2010, there were over 5,700 tons of whale meat in frozen storage, over a year’s supply,” said Greenpeace’s Wakao Hanaoka. “This wasteful taxpayer-backed program produces product no one in Japan wants.” He cited surveys that suggested even a majority of Japanese are against whaling in the distant high seas.

flickr image via gsz

Bowermaster’s Adventures: America’s Night out for Gulf Seafood

by Jon Bowermaster on

Last week, nearly 300 restaurants across the country joined in promoting an event they called “Dine Out America: America’s Night Out for Gulf Seafood.”

The mission was straightforward: Get folks around the country back to eating fish, oysters, shrimps and crabs taken from the Gulf of Mexico. The impetus was that while most of the Gulf’s fishing grounds have been reopened since the spill and while government continues to vouch for its seafood’s safety, the market for Gulf seafood remains depressed.

The “special night out,” according to the New Orleans group that organized the nationwide effort, was intended to “honor the thousands of Americans and their families in the Gulf seafood industry who are now back at work fishing the Gulf waters for their catches.”

Which sounds fine and good, in a patriotic, support-our-troops kind of way, but one big question remains: Are we sure seafood from the Gulf is truly ready for prime time?

News stories from the region are not reassuring. Oyster beds are on the ropes, many still buried under detritus stirred up by the spill. Pictures from a Navy ROV last week showed a 30 square mile kill zone on the ocean floor near the site of the spill where nothing lives. Fin fishermen report they’re coming in with catches but that the markets for their fish have disappeared, forcing them to sell for 35 cents on the dollar. And last week NOAA closed 4,200 square miles of fishing grounds to red shrimp after tar balls were found in the same nets.

I called my friend Marylee Orr who, for more than 23 years, has run the Louisiana Environmental Action Network (L.E.A.N) in Baton Rouge. One of the group’s expertises is studying the impacts of environmental pollution on human health.

Though she has many friends and supporters who are fishermen and certainly understands their plight – many are still unemployed, uncertain when they’ll get back to fishing — based on just-completed blood sampling done by Louisiana chemists she’s not convinced the nation should be being pitched Gulf seafood.

Her concerns are straightforward:

In the midst of the BP gusher the FDA (with NOAA’s input and concurrence) questionably raised the allowable levels of PAH (polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons) found in Gulf seafood. They are an EPA-classified carcinogen, particularly harmful to pregnant women and infants and the BP crude was full of PAHs. “The FDA based their decisions on a 175-pound person eating four shrimp a week, which is a joke on the Gulf,” she says, where four shrimp wouldn’t even qualify as an appetizer. “And what about all the children and our Vietnamese fishermen (who are smaller)?”

Much of the government’s evidence continues to be based on “sensory testing” – essentially giving seafood a sniff test. Only if a shrimp or fish does not pass the smell test does it go on to any further government testing. “We’ve given the seafood we’ve tested the smell test and there was no odor,” says Orr. “However when we got the numbers back after testing it there were alarmingly high for both petroleum hydrocarbons and PAHs.”

Orr and LEAN are not alone in their concerns. Ed Cake, an environmental consultant from Ocean Springs, Mississippi, recently told the International Conference on Shellfish Restoration, “They’re doing the sniff and taste test. We as human beings no longer have the nose of bloodhounds. I will not eat any seafood coming from the Central Gulf at this point.”

Chuck Hopkins, director of the Georgia Sea Grant Program at the University of Georgia told the same conference that he’d just been to New Orleans and had eaten shrimp and oysters six days in a row. But was it safe? Given the misleading information doled out by the government during the spill, he admitted he didn’t have a lot of faith in its current testing. “Why should I believe their claim that the seafood is safe?”

Perhaps the toughest and most consistent critic of any quick return to Gulf seafood has been Dr. William Sawyer of the Sanibel, Florida-based Toxicology Consultants and Assessment Specialists, who says since the spill he has found petroleum in 100 percent of the shrimp, oysters and fish he’s tested that was already on its way to the marketplace.

The government’s stand is that those toxins are far below dangerous levels.

But Sawyer is adamant. “I don’t recommend eating any Gulf seafood, not with the risk of liver and kidney damage.

He has called the FDA’s safety threshold “borderline absurd.” “It’s geared so that shrimpers can go back to work and that’s great … but if we’re talking about human health and the environment, you need to proceed slowly.”

Evidence of the dispersants used during the attempted cleanup continues to mount too. Off the coast of Florida, for example, since the BP well was capped the state’s Department of Environmental Protection has found the widely-used dispersant Corexit in two out of four tests; prior to the spill, they found no Corexit in 20 samples.

Flickr image via wolfpix