Almost everything went wrong in air travel over the past week and change - including for Gunnar and Kyle’s own flights - as the shutdown took a nasty turn with thousands of delays and cancellations. Shutdown or not, the guys dig into all the strategies they use to get through air travel disruptions (relatively) unscathed. Tune in for tips for booking, tracking your flights, and how to get things back on track. They also discuss what’s next after the shutdown (hopefully) ends, give some kudos to Bilt 2.0, chastise Qatar for going “basic”, and review their Palm Springs company retreat!
Almost everything went wrong in air travel over the past week and change - including for Gunnar and Kyle’s own flights - as the shutdown took a nasty turn with thousands of delays and cancellations. Shutdown or not, the guys dig into all the strategies they use to get through air travel disruptions (relatively) unscathed. Tune in for tips for booking, tracking your flights, and how to get things back on track. They also discuss what’s next after the shutdown (hopefully) ends, give some kudos to Bilt 2.0, chastise Qatar for going “basic”, and review their Palm Springs company retreat!
Thanks to HotelSlash for sponsoring this episode of the show! Try it out today: Use promo code THRIFTYTRAVELER for a free 90-day trial – plus, get $20 off your first prepaid booking!
00:00 - Gunnar and Kyle both survived some brutal delays
02:36 - Government shutdown update: Recapping a brutal week in the skies & what’s ahead
08:50 - Something Hot: Bilt Rewards is making more big moves with Bilt 2.0
14:45 - Something Cold: Qatar Airways begins charging for seat selection in business class
19:04 - A word from our sponsor: HotelSlash, the easiest way to book a cheaper hotel stay - & rebook when prices drop
20:00 - What to do when things go wrong in travel: Everything we do to protect ourselves during meltdowns, shutdowns, bad weather & bad luck.
55:00 - Listener Question: A recap of our team trip to Palm Springs & an important book in our studio
1:00:30 - On the Spot: Kyle’s trip to NYC and our impressive friends & listeners
Produced and edited by Sylvia Thomas
Show music: “All That” by Benjamin Tissot
Yo, welcome to the show. I'm your host, Gunnar Olson, and as always, I'm here with Thrifty Travelers Executive Editor. Kyle Potter and Kyle. I'm afraid that between the two of us, we've exhausted all of our travel luck for the year because last week you successfully flew home from Newark after 5:00 PM which is a feat in and of itself.
And then I flew Delta during their meltdown on Sunday through a snowstorm in Detroit. On my way back from East Lansing. Both of us hit delays. My three and a half hours on the tarmac in Detroit was a real treat, a real low light of my trip, but we both made it. So are you afraid that you burned through all of your good mojo for the year flying back from Newark and making it home?
Yeah. I'm not getting on a plane at least until 2026. There's, I was so sure that my flight home from Newark, which has been one of, if not the single worst airport in the United States over the last 40 plus days I was so sure that was gonna get canceled altogether, and I was gonna be stuck in beautiful Newark, New Jersey overnight, if not longer, and made it home with with about a two hour delay.
So, yeah, I'm not pushing my luck.
I knew things were gonna be bad on Sunday morning. I, I woke up in East Lansing and looked out my window and it was just nuuk snow outside. I was like, oh, man, here we go. And of course we didn't even take off until after my connecting flight left for Minneapolis outta Detroit.
So I got on the next one though. My, my, delta app tried to rebook me through Cleveland, Detroit, to Cleveland to Minneapolis on the way home, and I went into a Sky Club and found an agent who was wearing a premium services pin and was like, is there anything we can do about this?
Hey, let's talk about Cleveland.
How about, no?
Yeah, Cleveland's not gonna work for me. Okay. We have a lot to get to today. Our main topic is going to be. What to do when things go wrong in travel, which could come in handy over the next few days as the air system slowly recovers, but also as the winter and kind of busy holiday season approaches.
I think this is a pretty evergreen topic and these are all just good tools to have in your belt Overall, we're gonna do a full shutdown update. We're gonna talk about a way to earn points on your mortgage. We're gonna talk about Qatar Airways going basic, and we're also gonna chat about what our team got up to during our company retreat in Palm Springs.
Did I get overserved at the pool in front of all my coworkers? You're gonna have to stay tuned to find out. Only Kyle knows the answer to that right now.
Oh, I'm gonna give an
answer. All right, welcome back to the Thrifty Traveler Podcast.
Okay, Kyle, to start the show, I need to find something out. So as we're taping this, it appears this now historic government shutdown has an end in sight, but as of right now, the shutdown has just officially mangled US airspace in our extra mile topic later. Like I said, we're gonna show you all of what we do when things go wrong for our travels, which of course is top of mind for both of us this week and, and many other people who are heading out into the skies.
But this stuff can be useful at any time. Air travel delays and cancellations hit. Whenever, and they can be especially gnarly during the holiday travel season, then during kind of winter storm season as well. But first I just wanna talk about the challenges we're facing this week, Kyle. So what's the latest on the shutdown?
Well, so we're, we're recording this on Monday when, you know, it seems like there's going to be a final vote at some point this week, perhaps before this episode actually drops on Thursday morning to reopen the government, which means the shutdown will, will come to a close. But you know, as we're talking right now, it's very clear.
And let's caveat, this could change quickly, but it seems pretty likely that the trouble in air travel that we've seen, especially over the weekend, which was really brutal, is just going to continue. So Sunday was. Easily among the worst days in air travel that we've seen in the United States in the last two years, probably the single worst day when you talk about both delays and cancellations since the day, one of the CrowdStrike outage in the summer of 2024, when basically every single airline in the United States and some are brought, had to halt all traffic for most of that day.
So we saw on this past Sunday more than, or almost 3000 cancellations and more than 10,000 delays. That is just brutal. And the problem is, is this is what we've been talking about for weeks as, as FA. A. Staffing shortages got worse and worse and airports had to start to slow down inbound and outbound traffic in order to cope with that is that eventually the bill comes due and eventually airlines are f can't catch up to, to having all of their crews in their planes out of place.
And it starts to snowball. And that's really what we started to see this weekend, which means, you know, sure the government may may reopen and paychecks may start flowing, but that's no guarantee that the air traffic controllers, some of whom might have left the workforce altogether are gonna be back on the job first thing Wednesday or Thursday or Friday.
This is going to take time and in the meantime, you know, there are still going to be more challenge for challenges for airlines to get back on track.
Yeah, I think that is a, a really important point here is that this is not going to reset overnight. This is, there's no reset button for all of this.
These crews have to eventually get back to where they started, and they need to kinda realign everything in their networks. And so that means that, you know, a cancellation that happened on Sunday could be touching a flight that's happening the following Sunday. You know, these things happen in, in kind of a long period of time.
So be patient and expect some more disruptions as we go forward. But I guess my question to you, Kyle, is as an expert in this, how long are these disruptions going to last?
Let me, let me just get my crystal ball quick from under the table where I keep it in our podcast studio. No, I don't. I, I don't know.
I do think that it would be wise to expect significant issues, at least through the rest of this week. Is it gonna be as bad as it was on Sunday with 10,000 delays in almost 3000 cancellations? Gosh, I hope not. But that's, that's not out of the cards. It really depends on how and if airlines can recover and if airlines, despite the fact that the, the government shutdown may be drawing to a close, if they're forced to continue ramping up their mandated cancellations by the federal government, you know, that that decision that the FAA made late last week to force airlines to cut 3, 4, 5, and then 10% of their flights if that, that's just going to exacerbate things.
So it's possible that this continues at this scale that we've been seeing, you know, within the past few days, all week and then beyond. And then I think the big question is, is once we get past this week, and once we get into mid and late November and importantly Thanksgiving, how. How well equipped is air traffic control in our national airspace to return to business as usual.
So over the weekend US Department of Transportation secretary Sean Duffy, said that in normal times they lose three or four-ish controllers a day to exiting the workforce, to retirements, to taking a new career, whatever. And that recently, that has gotten as high as 15 to 20 a day. And throughout the last 40 plus days of this government shutdown, they have been unable to recruit and train new air traffic controllers, which means, and this is what.
Secretary Duffy said this is going to have ramifications far beyond the shutdown and just how big those are remains to be seen. I will say, I mean, especially because Thanksgiving is the busiest of busy travel seasons, there's always the, the possibility that there's gonna be bad weather. So I don't think we're out the woods yet.
I I really don't think that things are gonna be as ugly as they have been within the last week or so once we get to Thanksgiving. But people are gonna need to be really patient and really vigilant for issues because we're not out of this yet.
Yeah. Sunday, November 30th, the Sunday after Thanksgiving is always the busiest travel day of the year.
And that is a day that I would avoid flying on at all costs at this point. Yeah. Is an absolute no go for me. But yeah. We'll. This is to be seen how long this is gonna last. We'll definitely be covering it here and@thriftytraveler.com. We have a, an update every single day on everything that's going on.
But check your flights and be in the know. We will talk about later on in the extra mile topic on some of the best ways to handle these issues as they arise. Alright, let's get into something hot and something cold. It's the good and the bad news and travel news from the last week. And we'll start with our something hot, which is.
Bill rewards, is it a travel company? A bank, a housing company? What, what, how would you describe what Bill rewards is?
I mean, on paper I would say it's a travel rewards ecosystem. In practice, it seems like they're trying to just take over everyone's daily life because everything that they're doing, I mean, they're doing everything.
They're doing everything everywhere, all at once. They're trying to be top of wallet, top of mind, to not just earn points on rent, but at some point your mortgage. Right. And new credit cards. New ways to earn more points on dining, on your online shopping. I mean it, what, where does this end? I don't know.
Yeah, exactly. So I'll pause here to note that Built is a sponsor of the show, not this episode in particular, but several other episodes of the Thrift Traveler podcast, including last week. Our agreement does not in any way impact how we're gonna cover this company. We'll always cover them objectively, so.
Objectively, Kyle Built Card 2.0 is one of their two big announcements from last week. What do you think?
This is, this is big news. So we've known for a while that built was going to move away from just their sole current built Wells Fargo card and move into a new suite of cards, but we never really knew much of the details.
And I'll say we don't know all of the details yet, but we do know that sometime early next, or early next year in February, built is going to introduce not one, not two, but three different co-branded credit cards. They'll continue with a no annual fee card. They will move to a kind of middle of the market, $95 a year card with additional perks.
And then of course, because you can't talk about travel, we're talking about premium travel, they're introducing a $495 annual fee card. So this is, this is a big change. Current built Wells Fargo card holders. Your card will stay active until then, and then you'll be given the option to switch into one of these new products once this comes around.
But the, the old built Wells Fargo card is gone. You can't apply for it anymore. So a lot of change on the credit card front.
A lot of change there. So what else did Bill announce this last week?
The, the biggest thing is, is points on mortgage. This has been, I mean, from the moment that Bill hit the scene years ago as a way to earn points on your rent payments, the question has always been, what about my mortgage?
And we've gotten drips and little bits of information over the last few months about Yes, we're working on it. Yes, it's going to happen early 2026. And, and what we heard initially just a couple of weeks ago was that built was going to partner with one mortgage provider, United Wholesale Mortgage, which on the one hand is the single largest mortgage provider in the country.
But on the other hand, if you don't have a united mortgage, it's not super relevant to you. Right? And, and what we found out is, well, we still don't have some very key specifics, namely. How many points you can earn on your mortgage. You know, what's the per dollar figure? Is there a cap on this? We don't know any of that, but we do know that as they roll out these new credit cards, you will be able to earn points on any mortgage from any mortgage provider with one of these three new credit cards coming out early next year.
So that's big, you know, that opens the door to earn some incredibly valuable points on, you know, the single biggest expense that any American has right now.
Yeah, I think, built has a really impressive roster of transfer partners. And so spending built points has always been something that makes that Val makes that currency really, really valuable.
I do think that some people wish that there were some easier ways to. Earn build points because they, for instance, until now, haven't done signup bonuses for their credit cards or anything like that, but they are introducing a new good way to earn besides the mortgages, and that's through one of our favorite shopping portals, right?
Yeah. This, this partnership with Rakuten could be a game changer. Right. You know, reten has been our number one recommendation to, as a shopping portal, to earn points on your online shopping. And for years you've been able to earn American Express membership rewards points. So you can link your Amex account if you have an Amex Platinum or an Amex Gold card.
And instead of earning cash back, earn, you know, a significant amount of points instead to your Amex account. And now built is getting into the system as a partner to earn built points instead. And you know, to your point for. For as easy as it is to earn Amex points through credit cards in your daily spending and big bonuses built is just not there.
That's the number one knock against them. So, you know, given the choice to do this versus American Express, that's, that's pretty tempting with one really, really important caveat, which is that you know, you need a, some level of built status, which means you need to be spending through the program pretty heavily in order to earn like the full one-to-one cash back to points using Rakuten.
Except for, you know, entry level they call 'em blue members can do that within the first, I think. Six months. So there's a window here to do that. And, and earn, you know, a dollar of cash back for every, or a a hundred built points for every dollar of cash back you earn through Rakuten.
Yeah, some, something good, something hot.
Lots of good built news from the last week. We wanna have a bigger picture conversation about built sometime in the future on this show as well. But for now, we just wanted to touch on these two really good news stories for people who wanna play in this ecosystem. Let's see how long they can stay in the something hot column and not get into the something called column, which we will pivot to now.
I believe this will be Qatar Airways debut in something cold. We don't really talk about Qatar Airways in any sort of negative light 'cause they do a lot of really fun things in points and miles. For our money Qatar, or for our points, Qatar always operates what we think is the best business class experience in the world with Q Suites 70,000 obvio each way.
If you book way out in advance is how you can book these seats and we couldn't recommend more that you do. So what I'm talking about is while this is one of the best redemptions in the sky, Qatar just attached a big stupid caveat on it. What am I talking about, Kyle?
We're talking about basic business class, which that, that phrase is just a little nauseating, right?
Yeah. So going forward, all award tickets on Qatar Airways, you're not gonna get a seed assignment. When you book, you have to pay. And then I think the question is how much further does this go? You know, whether. Whether, you know, they strip out lounge access from award tickets, I don't know. But it's a bummer to, you know, spend 70,000 points, 85,000 points if you're making a connection onward to, you know, India or Southeast Asia or wherever, and then have to pay an additional a hundred plus dollars in order to pick which seat you want rather than get assigned something randomly.
It's just, it's really frustrating. It's, it's troubling for two reasons. One is just, it's another expense, and just a couple of years ago, Qatar and British Airways and all the Avios programs raised the surcharges that you pay. So instead of paying a hundred or so dollars for a nonstop flight in surcharges to fly between the US and Doha, you're now paying $250 and then closer to $400 if you're making a connection.
And so you just add onto that, you know, the cost of picking a seat. It's just really annoying. Bigger picture though. I just worry, you know, for an airline whose pedigree is as high as Qatar Airways, like what kind of permission does this give every other airline in the world to start doing this? Because they can all point at Qatar Airways the, which has been the number one or number two ranked airline, at least by Sky Tracks, which take it or leave it.
But in this case it, it holds up. It has been the number one or number two ranked airline for basically the last decade. And if they're doing this, you can bet every other airline in the world is going to do something like this in relatively short order. So that part's just kind of troubling.
Yeah, they, they will unfortunately set the table for everyone else to copy them.
One note on this this does exclude Qatar status holders. So if you do have some status with the airline or I believe reciprocal status with some of their partners, you can get around these seat selection fees. But yeah, this is a bummer. I don't have a ton else to say about it other than we wanted to make sure that we note it and don't let.
Don't let the airlines come up with these policies and not and go unseen with it. I guess we just want to make sure we call them out and let everybody know exactly what you're getting when you're spending your hard earned points on a Q Suite seat.
Yeah, that, that status exception is important I think, especially for, for US based travelers.
If you have one world emerald or sapphire status, you also can get this seat selection fee waived. So there is an avenue here, at least for a select few to avoid paying this. I don't know that we know for sure yet whether this is going to apply if you're redeeming like American Advantage Miles or Alaska mileage or Alaska Atmos Miles, excuse me.
But that's kind of a moot point because, you know, this is the single one of, if not the single best business class seat in the world, it has become virtually impossible to book unless if you're using British Airways or Qatar Avios 360 plus days in advance because it's just you, you won't find any seats using American advantage Miles or Alaska miles these days.
It's borderline impossible. So I don't know that it really matters in the end anyway.
Yeah. Okay. We have a lot more to get to today. We want to talk about all of the best ways to handle delays and cancellations in the sky and then figure out once and for all if I got too drunk in front of my coworkers in Palm Springs.
We'll be right back.
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Okay, welcome back. Let's dig into the extra mile where we go a little deeper on travel topics. And I think the most important travel topic on the top of minds for everybody this week is what to do when things go wrong in travel. You and I both battled through some delays recently this past week, but of course it gets a lot worse than that.
Sometimes your flight just gets outright canceled and you misconnect and things happen all over the skies all the time, not just during big meltdowns, during shutdowns or during winter storms. So let's start at the beginning. I wanna do this kind of through the booking process. So we'll start with some processes you go through when you're booking your flights, maybe what you should do between booking and travel.
And then we'll talk about the day of travel and some of the things we do to protect ourselves there. So Kyle, when you're booking your flights, what are one or two things that you do to. Make sure that you're protected,
right? I mean, there's no getting away from sounding like a broken record here.
The number one thing is just to book the first flight of the day. This is the best decision that you can make in good times and bad to protect yourself from the prospect of disruptions, because the longer the day goes on, the more likely that these problems are gonna cascade in your flight. The odds are greater that it's going to be affected as these problems start to mount.
So you get on that first flight of that day. You know, I would say at the latest 9:00 AM. That's the best decision that you can make. I do not love waking up at 4:30 AM and making my way to the airport, but every single time I do it, I feel like I look back at what happens with the rest of the flights that day.
At least in times when things are starting to go off the rails and I'm like, you know what? This was so worth it because, you know, my flight might have ended up being delayed by another couple hours or more had I not taken that seven or 8:00 AM flight.
Yeah. The data analysis I did a few months ago now was that the early morning flights operate 30% better than the flights do at the end of the day in tough times.
So like for instance, in the peak summer months in the south and southeast or kind of during these winter storms, the plane that is parked at your airport overnight is almost always going to leave on time the next day. And the planes that are coming in or making six or seven domestic stops before they get to you for your 7:00 PM flight, that's where you get in trouble.
It's too many variables. Just take the plane that's been sitting there overnight.
I, I had a, a flight that, that it was the first flight of the day. This was a couple of months ago. It, it took off on time, but then we had to divert back to the airport due to a mechanical issue. But because it was so early in the morning, there was still a spare plane for them to put us on.
Had that happened just a couple hours later, I guarantee you that would not have worked, and I would have missed my connecting flight. Yeah.
All right. First flight of the day is, is our number one with the bullet. Always advice. We always take the first flight of the day. One, I, one thing I always would recommend too, especially if you can foresee that things might get a little tricky if you're booking in those, you know, if, if you're booking in the south and southeast the summer, you're booking in the upper Midwest in the winter booking a flexible fare is something that I would always recommend book main cabin or better just to make sure that you're covered and, and to make sure that if you need to change your flight to that first flight of the day, you have some protection there.
So, anything else on what fares to book Kyle?
No, I mean, I think especially when it, it's a really important trip. There is the prospect for problems based on the time of year or where you're traveling. I think to your point, the south and the summer, I would say the east, anything in and out of the east coast, basically year round.
And the Midwest during the winter, having, giving yourself the flexibility to change without. Paying a fee or a change period or cancel your flight without paying a fee and getting a credit for the amount that you paid. Being able to make a same day change with at least reasonable fees if you can do it at all.
I mean, basic economy fairs in many cases are 70, 80, even a hundred dollars cheaper round trip. So I understand that, you know, especially for somebody listening to the Thrifty Traveler Podcast, that seems like it worth it. It's worth it, and it can be, but you know, when you're worried about things going wrong, this just gives you a lot more power to change and pivot quickly without paying for it in the long run.
Do you get more questions? About travel insurance than anything else in this line of work, Kyle, how many, how many times a week do you get a question about travel insurance? It is the most surefire question I get from like tangential friends and family out there who wanna know Oh yeah. Travel questions.
It's, it's, it's constant. And you know what? For good reason, when we're talking about stuff like this, about a government shutdown or a winter storm or yeah, it's, it is nonstop. Do you need travel insurance? Maybe? It, it, it would feel foolish right now in, in the wake of what we've been seeing to say, no, it's not worth it.
That's said. Travel insurance, you need to read the fine print and you need to read the fine print before you actually buy it or before you charge your flights to a premium travel credit card that has built in travel coverage to make sure that you're getting what you're getting. And so, you know, just as we've gone through this shutdown and, and people have gotten stuck somewhere overnight and counted on the fact that they bought that travel insurance policy, or they used that Chase Sapphire card with built-in travel coverage and assumed that they would be covered for, you know, a $300 hotel stay because they got stuck in New York or in LA overnight.
We come to find out it's not so cut and dry because you know, it really does come down to the fine print of what situations are covered and which are not so. I, I do still think it's worth keeping in mind, but yeah, you, you really gotta read that fine print of whatever you're buying or whatever you're using to make your covered for what you hope to be covered for, because that is not always the case.
Surprise, surprise with insurance, right?
Yeah. And it's not enough to hold the card. You have to book the travel that's affected with that card and, and there are just, there are a lot of fine print details that honestly, I don't, I don't really have time for. My version of travel insurance is I book main cabin and I book directly with the airline whenever possible.
And that brings me to my next point is. Especially in times like this, it helps a lot to have your booking made directly with the airline because they're the ones who are most likely to help you when the poop hits the fan. You always wanna be talking with the person that you booked with and not having, you know, chase Ping ponging you back and forth between Delta or American's website and then back to their agents and back to some Delta agents.
And then you have a lot of people passing you around on phone lines, and that's not how to get things done when things go bad.
Yeah, you, you gotta cut out the middleman. I mean, I think that is good evergreen advice, even when skies are blue and everything is fine, but you know, especially when you are concerned about disruptions or you need to get home for the holidays and, you know, there is the prospect of bad weather, whatever the case may be, it's just so, so important to cut out the middleman, make sure you can deal directly with the airline, whether it's on the phone, via text, or in person at the airport, at a desk or in a lounge.
Because, you know, if you book that ticket through Expedia or somewhere else, these people are not gonna be able to help you. And you gotta call, you gotta pick up the phone and call somebody thousands, if not tens of thousands of miles away to try to help you out when timing is everything. It's just, it's not worth whatever minimal amount you may save on that ticket on the front end.
Yeah, absolutely. Last piece of booking advice from me is just to. Flex your points and miles in times like this, especially I think when you have 500, $600 tied up in something, it, the stakes feel really high when things go wrong and you're looking at that amount of money and am I gonna get that back?
And then I may have to pay that again to get on a different flight. When it comes to points and miles, this is exactly where they shine. It's just like ultimately flexible and you're way, way less out of pocket, even if you're, you know, flying long haul international where the taxes and fees are a little higher.
But like, for instance, my, my flights this weekend booked with points and miles. I had $6 in cash, you know, just the taxes and fees tied up and that's it. So I, I think they're especially good for booking alternative flights, which is something we'll talk about in this next section too. But just having points and miles as like a, a.
Security blanket as a form of insurance in and of itself is a, a way that I like to use it. Points and miles can take you all around the world in business class, in all these incredibly luxurious ways, but also in a pinch it can get you and your wife, you know, home for a last minute funeral or on an alternative flight that after your, you know, other flight got canceled.
So points and miles are important for that and, and that's how I like to use them in times like this.
I think there's an important wrinkle here, especially in. Under the umbrella of what we're talking about of when things go wrong and whether you know, or you think or you're worried about things going wrong.
I would say use points of Miles, absolutely. But I would skew really hard towards booking through one of the major US airline programs rather than booking a, you know, rather than booking a Delta flight using Air France, KLM, flying blue miles. Sure, that may save you a couple thousand points or, or whatever, but booking with Delta Sky Miles instead using United Miles to fly United, using American Advantage Miles to book that American flight.
Is is really important for two reasons. If you end up just not taking the trip altogether, none of these airlines charge cancellation fees to get your miles back. But probably more importantly, if something does go wrong and you need to change or rebook that flight, it's gonna be much easier to do that.
In many cases, you can just do it through your smartphone app with that airline versus, you know, if you're flying Delta from Minneapolis to Chicago and you use 6,500 Air France, KLM flying blue miles, that trip needs to change. You have to pay a cancellation fee, which is minimal on many of these kind of partner airline award booking workarounds.
But also, you know, if something goes wrong, again, you have to deal with Air France in order to change that ticket. So it's just, it, especially when, when the prospect of things going wrong is high, it's, it's not worth the savings. It's much better to book directly with the airline using that airline miles.
Okay. Let's talk about this kind of middle section, the lead up to your travels between. Booking and actually flying. What are you doing in that time when you see that things are starting to go wrong?
I am looking in the mirror and I'm saying Kyle poop's about to hit the fan. No, honestly, I think expectations are the most important thing in travel.
And you know, I think a lot, a lot of what people have dealt with these last few weeks with the shutdown, what people deal with in the winter is born out of the fact that they go into their travel day assuming that their plane is gonna take off at 8:05 AM exactly when they book it, and it's gonna land at 11:49 AM exactly when it was scheduled to land.
And that is just not how travel works sometimes, especially when things start to go sideways. So I think just going into the tra your travel day, your travel week. Expecting or at least bracing for the possibility that things are going to go wrong and you're gonna have to pivot. That is gonna get you thinking about some of the other things we're gonna talk about, about looking into alternatives and backups, and also just much more better mentally prepared to deal with these curve balls as they come.
Because if you're not ready for it, you're gonna be caught pretty flat-footed.
So what are you watching? What, what helps you determine how things are going and where do you, where are you getting that information?
I mean, right now it's been all over the news, right? With the shutdown. But in, in normal times, I think the best thing to do in the days leading up to your flight is to check a service like flight aware.com and look at the daily rundown of delays and cancellations within the United States and see which airports might be struggling more than others to get planes on and off the ground on time.
Because, you know. If you're departing on a Tuesday and you look at the, the data on a Monday and you see that your airline has delayed 30 plus percent of flights, it's a pretty safe bet that there's gonna be a spillover effect into Tuesday as a result of that. So that can just get you in the right frame of mind for expecting just how bad or hopefully not so bad things may be when you actually wind up at the airport.
Yeah, that's a really good point. I would also say, you know, keep an eye on the airline websites. 'cause that brings me to our next point, which is travel waivers and how. Important these can be and how useful they can be. I was on, you know, six different news channels last Thursday as these things started to cascade and delays in cancellations got really bad and people were asking a lot of questions.
And the, the first thing I tell anybody who asks is, did your airline issue a travel waiver? American Delta and United almost always do, especially when things like this happen and like during winter storms for instance. And, you know, are you taking advantage of it? Because the travel waiver essentially means you can change or cancel your flight, no questions asked.
And when you make those changes, you don't have to pay change fees, which are a thing of the past anyway. Or in many cases the different, the flight. Cost difference, right? So you can change to whatever flight of the day you want. You could change to another day. If you wanna make your flight a little better and pick a better time for you, you can do that.
Or you can book that first flight of the day, which is what I recommended that everybody do. But these travel waivers are very powerful. And when the airlines issue them, I recommend almost always, unless you have already booked the perfect flight that you should take advantage always when travel waivers are issued.
Yeah, I mean the, the perfect example of this is you. Winter storms don't come out of nowhere, right? We typically get 3, 4, 5 days warning and like clockwork. Every single major airline in the country and some of the smaller ones even will come out with these waivers that allow you to do exactly what you're talking about, change to a different flight without paying a fee.
Or a fair difference. And there's typically a pretty wide window to do this, which means let's say you're scheduled to fly out on a Wednesday, but that's the day that the storm is supposed to begin. These waivers can allow you to depart on Tuesday instead without paying more to get outta town before that storm actually hits.
But the biggest thing with this is you have to move really quickly because look, there are a limited amount of seats out there, and the longer that you let the, that you kind of m and haw about whether to do this, the more likely that one of your fellow passengers that was supposed to be on your original flight has already taken a seat that you might have taken instead.
So you gotta beat 'em to it. You gotta be decisive. You have to do these things quickly, especially for that first flight of the day, because that's what a lot of people are gonna wind up moving to.
Yeah, exactly. Okay, let's talk about, we've, we've hinted at this a few times, alternative flights. I mentioned that the best way to book an alternative flight, if, you know, I mean this is the problem, is if you're booking an alternative flight, a lot of cases you're doing this at the last minute.
If you are really really on top of things and you wanna book an alternative flight five or six months out where you can actually get a good deal on it, probably smart, especially if it's fully refundable. But I don't think a lot of people have the bandwidth or the points stockpiled or the money to wanna do that in general.
But if and when you use this, how do you do it? Yeah. It, it really is primarily day of. So maybe I'm not the best example here, but you know, I'll put it this way. As, as I was in the Uber going to Newark to fly home last week, started getting the first of what became several delay notifications of 30, 40 minutes or more, and it just kind of kept coming and coming.
But once I got that first one, I was like, okay, this isn't great. So let's start thinking about what the backups are. So, you know, you pull up Google flights, you look at, all right, I'm flying outta Newark. Is there, what does it look like tomorrow morning in case that's what I need to suggest moving to if my flight does get canceled, or is there anything departing from LaGuardia or JFK?
So if you're flying in or out of a market that has several different airports, you can start casting a wider net. Really importantly, Google Flights, part of the reason why we love it is it allows you to search for up to seven airports at one time, both departing and arriving to, so you can cast a wide net in one single search.
You, yeah, you just gotta start looking into this stuff as soon as possible. And, and you know, to your point, especially if you're booking a backup, not just, and, and not just, you need to change your flight, but a backup in case your, your number one flight ends up, you know, being disrupted, using points for that is really important because, you know, you can easily cancel that and just get all your miles back again, if you're booking through one of the major US airline programs.
Yeah. Make sure to make a note of that flight so you don't lose out on that money with a no-show fee or something like that. The way that I do this, I, I typically don't book alternatives proactively, but what I, I have talked about on the show many times my strategy of booking and rebooking flights, I don't need to cancel.
As soon as I rebook for something better, I don't cancel the other one immediately. I'll just let both reservations exist. All the way up until travel if I don't need the points. So for instance, when we're going down to we're going down to Dallas to connect to Finland later this year which actually we're gonna talk a little bit more on the show next week about this upcoming trip of mine.
But I had an American flight that I booked down to Dallas and then the Delta flight came on with sky miles much, much cheaper. I'm just gonna hold both reservations 'cause that's a flight in the middle of December. It could be right in the middle of winter storm season. And who knows what could happen with either one of those.
So I'm just gonna hold both until either I need those AA points back or you know, or until we get to the day of travel and then I can dump it and get all those points redeposited. So it's not as proactive a thing for me as it's just, I don't cancel flights immediately when I book a redundant one, just 'cause it is good to have options.
Yeah, that's a, that's a good point. One last thing. As much as, you know, booking a backup flight with points is probably the best way to stay flexible and not be out money. There are two airlines that really stand out for those kinda last minute backup flights, just in case I need 'em. So there is the 24 hour rule.
In the United States, you have up to 24 hours in some, some cases more to cancel a flight for a full re refund within 24 hours of booking. But most airlines say that that doesn't apply if you're booking within three to seven days of departure, which really kind of mixes the value of the 24 hour rule for this situation, except both Delta and Southwest don't have that policy at all.
Which means, you know, if you're flying American and American looks like it's on the verge of a meltdown and you wanna book a backup flight, but you're not sure and you're seeing things that day and there's a Delta flight that looks reasonable, that can get you to where you need to go, but you're hoping you don't need to take it, you can book that Delta flight with your credit card.
If it turns out you don't need it, you can still cancel it within that 24 hour window for a full refund. Same goes with Southwest.
Nice. Good points there as well. Okay. I want to do another plug for flighty. Our favorite app. They do not sponsor the show, but flighty, I mean, you should,
they may. They may as well.
Well, at this point, why, why would they we're giving 'em free press anyway.
That's right. Flighty is flight tracking app. It tracks every little detail of every one of my upcoming flights and past flights. And most importantly for this discussion has really solid data around predicting delays and understanding where your plane is coming from.
Kind of future casting. This delay in Omaha is gonna affect this next flight to Detroit, which is gonna affect my flight from Lansing to Detroit and, and so on and so forth. And it, it, you know, predicts like two days in advance if there are issues coming up. And it basically, the data is just kind of unmatched in the way they deliver it is in this beautiful format.
I can't speak highly enough about flighty. It's saved me so many times from delays and cancellations as well. Why do you love it in times like this,
for everything that you just said? I mean, the information is power, knowledge is power. And Flighty delivers that in a, in an easy to understand and more immediate fashion than anything else.
I mean, I have lost track of the number of times that I've gotten a notification from flighty. 10, 15, 30 minutes, an hour or more before I get an email from the airline or before I get a push notification from the airline. And you know, especially when things start to go sideways, literally seconds matter.
I mean, if you can get a 10 minute heads up on the fact that your flight is about to be canceled before Delta or American, or United actually send that notification, that gives you 10 minutes to cut the line in front of everybody else long before they even start thinking about, oh shoot, I have to find a replacement flight.
Now I gotta go talk to this Delta or this American agent. I mean, that time is invaluable to get where you need to go and get that plan sorted out without going through those long lines and get on the number one replacement flight that you can before that starts to fill up.
Yeah, we heard from a listener this week too.
Nicole Payne reached out to us and just thanked us for our enthusiasm around flighty 'cause she downloaded it. She was notified of a five hour delay in Mendoza, which gave her and her husband more time to explore the city center. She said, thanks to flighty my husband and I spent most of that time roaming city center.
Now sipping Malbec in the lounge. Sounds really, really lovely. Nicole. And another good example.
Do you think she had two Malbecs?
I hope she
had two Mals. She followed your advice one time. She might as well follow it a second time
with a five hour delay, I would bet that she had time to. Now, if, if you don't have flighty, you don't wanna pay for Flighty Pro.
Notably with flighty, you get your first flight free with all the data and everything. So if you wanna just try it out and you know you've got some tricky travel coming up in the next few weeks, give it a go for that first flight. I would bet you that they earn your money. They also offer like a, like a weekly, like a week long subscription as well.
If you're not looking to book that lifetime membership like I did. But if you don't have flight eat. You can also dig into with some of the airline apps, some of them, the more tech savvy airlines that is. There is the Where's my plane feature on their apps where you can just go ahead and, and take a look at where those flights are coming from and then you kind of gotta do some manual digging on flight aware or whatever to see how things are going at those airports.
The beauty of flight is that it puts it all there for you, but if you need. To see some of this information. You don't want to join Flighty flight Aware has a little bit of this data. You just gotta go hunt it down for yourself.
Yeah. Or Flight Radar 24 is another popular tracking service. If you can get the tail number for your plane from your smartphone app, from your airline, you can plug it in and track its progress from its previous route.
A little bit of re reverse engineering required. I mean, there's a reason why you and I both gladly pay for flighty. You know, I think especially for people who are traveling, I dunno, four or five times a year or more, it really pays for itself in terms of the ease of mind, the quick notifications and then just like a lot of other cool features that don't have anything to do with what we're talking about today.
Yeah, for sure. Okay, let's head to the airport. What are we doing the day of to protect ourselves in chaotic times? Considering this was both of us last week, what's I guess, what's your top tip? Where are you starting?
I, I just have a thing. I need to be at the airport two hours early. If I'm not there, I feel like it, it doesn't matter that it takes me a grand total of typically three minutes or less to actually clear security.
It's just, it makes me feel good. But, you know, especially when, you know, I have prepared myself for the likelihood of problems. It's just really important to get there earlier. I mean, it's the, the, the cliche better safe than sorry. Right? You, if you, if you can get to the airport earlier, worst case, you've got a little bit more time in the lounge.
But the last thing you want, especially when the prospect for problems is high, is to be trying to cut the line through security and then run to the gate. I mean, your whole travel day is just starting off on the wrong foot if you're not getting to the airport. That little bit, at least that little bit earlier, whatever that means to you.
You know, if you're a, I get to the airport. At 45 minutes before so I can get to the gate before the boarding door closes. I'm not saying you need to get there three hours in advance, but I'm saying just give yourself a little bit of a longer puffer.
Yeah. J not to sound like a football coach, but control what you can control when you travel.
The, one of the only things you can control is how early you get to the airport. And if you get stuck in a, like what we saw last week in Houston, three plus hour, TSA lines, and if, if you showed up 45 minutes before your flight and then you're, you know, got your palms up asking what's wrong? How, how could this have happened to me?
Well, guess what? You could have gotten to the airport a little earlier and controlled something like that. Also. Who wants that stress? I don't wanna soak my shirt before I get on the flight. Anyway.
You're doing that anyway.
Yeah. Every single podcast, another thing, another tip. Just avoid check bags if you can at all costs.
I know that's, you know, I have a newfound respect for how hard it is to not check bags now that I have an infant. But if you can avoid those lines, which are often the nastiest at the airport, TSA lines always get kind of a bad wrap. But man, those check bag lines, especially if you don't have status, can get really nasty.
And that's a big time waster. And then that's also just pre-security stress. You know, my stress goes away so fast as soon as I'm through the security line and everything before that is just soaked shirt watch.
Well, and there's, there's pre security stress. There's post flight stress of is my bag going to make it?
I mean, you know, if you have your carry on with you at all times, you just don't have to worry about these things. And you know, especially as the busy holiday travel season gets underway, I mean. Most people are checking one, if not two bags, and if you don't have to be one of them, you can cut that line altogether and just continue on with your travel day.
Again, you know, there certainly are plenty of situations in which it's not possible. If you're flying home for Christmas and you need to pack presents and those presents will only fit in a checked bag. I get it. This is not to shame people who do truly need to check a bag, but just ask yourself, do you need a checked bag for three nights at home for Thanksgiving?
If the answer is yes, ask yourself one more time. Are you sure about that? You sure you need seven pairs of shoes? If the answer to that is no, probably not. Just try it. Try it out, especially on a short, low stakes trip and see if you can make the transition to carry on when you can.
Yep. Very, very smart.
Okay, I wanna talk about lounges and lounge access, which is something that we both preach quite a bit and it's not just 'cause we're bougie boys. Because lounges have a lot of utility for one, we just talked about getting to the airport early. If you don't have someplace to go, sometimes getting to the airport early is an expensive proposition.
You can go and spend quite a bit of money at an airport, restaurant or sitting around twiddling your thumbs, doing nothing in the concourse. That's not fun. Going to an airport lounge is, at least you're getting free food. I can't always stand up for the quality of said food, but it's, it's free. And you have a place to be which is always nice too.
But I think the. Best agents at the airport are often in the lounge as well, taking care of the premium passengers, the quote unquote premium passengers and I, I had this happen to me this weekend when I was flying back from Lansing, missed my connection in Detroit, and I get a notification on the Delta app that they want me to connect through Cleveland on the way back to Minneapolis, they had me, Detroit to Cleveland on another CRJ.
And then back up from Cleveland to Minneapolis. And that sounded like the worst time of my whole life. So I went into the Delta Sky Club and I found an agent in there and she was wearing a premium services pin. And I asked her, I said, I know there's a nonstop to Minneapolis at nine o'clock, and I would be super grateful if you could put me on the standby list for that flight.
And she click clacked for two seconds and goes, you're confirmed. Not even standby, just you're on the flight. Got you. And I said, thank you very much and left the lounge. Didn't have a bite, didn't have a sip of coffee, nothing. But whatever that lounge visit is worth on my, the credit card that I pay for, it was more than worth it to not have to get delayed into Cleveland and then delayed outta Cleveland on my way home to Minneapolis.
So you're gonna sit here with a straight face and tell me that you did not have a red wine in the lounge.
Nope. I had, I did not. I can tell you that with a straight face, I was clean and sober Sunday morning. The stakes were too high. Although on my third hour on the tarmac at Detroit, I decided that I probably made a mistake and I could have have used two red wines, even though it was nine in the morning to get myself home that day.
But I think that's just one of the great parts about going into an airline specific lounge. Obviously the other lounges, you're not going to have airline specific agents in there, but at least you have a place with wifi where you can connect and, and talk to the airlines and things like that as well. So, just, I, I extoll the virtues of going to the lounge all the time. And it's not, 'cause I'm a bougie boy, it's really not that expensive for how many perks I get out of it.
You're really trying to turn bougie boy into a thing. We'll see. We'll see. Let us know. podcast@thriftytraveler.com. What do you think of Gunner, the bougie boy?
I, I think your story is really important for three reasons. One, lounge access is, is good for a variety of reasons because if you end up stuck at the airport an extra two or three hours, it makes those two or three hours a lot better and a lot less expensive than they would be out in the terminal two.
Well, part of one, one A, let's call it you know, the dedicated on hand help with agents who are almost always better trained than the folks you'll find out in the terminal and a shorter line to actually get that help that you need. So that's really, really important. Two is that you, you presented a solution that you wanted, which I think is maybe the single best thing to do when things start to go sideways, is not just say, what can you do for me to tell somebody, to find somebody who can help you out and say, I want you to do this for me.
Is this possible you're gonna get to the best solution for you much quicker and not get that Detroit to Cleveland to Minneapolis solution instead, if you can present your own solution of what's gonna work for you. And then three. And probably the most important thing in all of this is just to be kind.
I mean, you, you said you asked, and I trust you. Could you please put me on this 9:00 AM direct flight instead, kindness is a superpower. These people, whoever you're asking to help, you are empowered to help you, and I guarantee you, they are going to be more likely to help you quickly if you are kind and nice and warm, and don't make them feel like it's their fault that you're having a bad day at the airport.
It is not the support agent's fault that your flight got canceled or delayed. It is not the gate agent's fault. It is not the flight attendant's fault. It is not the pilot's fault,
but I, I just, I mean, we can't speak to that enough. You know, when talking to customer service agents, it doesn't always have to be in person.
I, I would also recommend seeking out some alternative forms here. What I usually like, for instance, once my wife had a flight canceled and I told her First thing you need to go do is go get in line, go get yourself physically in line, and then start calling. Or texting from line. You know, just give yourself as many options as you can.
So what she did was she went and went into the Sky Club, got into the customer service line, and then started messaging Delta on text message. They have a very slick text message operation most of the major airlines do now where you're texting with a live person, usually you have to get through like one or two quick prompts where they're trying to just send you back to the website.
And then if you just say, I need to talk to a representative, you just chat with them quickly. And a lot of times the line's a lot shorter, so I would highly recommend that. And then also reaching out on social media. The social media admins on those accounts are often agents that are empowered as well.
Mm-hmm. So they can connect you with somebody right away. But cast a big net. See how many different ways you can connect with people. If there's a massive line, you don't need to just stand there and twiddle your thumbs. Start working on your own stuff so you or at least making that time in line worthwhile.
Yeah, all of the above. Get as many irons in the fire as you can. 'cause you never know which one is gonna pay off first. So, you know, if you have status, especially high status with an airline, get on hold while you stand in line as you're tapping out a text message as you're sending a direct message on, on Twitter or on Facebook or wherever.
You never know which, which one you're gonna get a response from first. But also, you know, those four different agents could tell you four different things. So then you can get the, get to the resolution that's actually gonna work for you, or try again if you don't get the answer that you need in order to get home that night or the next morning or whatever.
Mm-hmm.
One last word to the wise about contacting customer service, and then we'll move on. Don't Google. Delta customer service to go find the phone number. There are a lot of scams out there. Oh
yeah. So many scams
where if, if you Google just, you know, what's the Delta customer service line?
There's a different line that comes up. They pay for that search, and then you start giving them personal details and they take it and run. So make sure you're going to Delta's app to find the customer service button. I just have the Delta customer Service saved in my phone. I have it for several airlines.
That's a smart way to do things too. In the Flighty app, they have a little section with all of the actual contact information you know, the phone numbers and the social media accounts and everything. That's also a really great place to find those things as well. But don't just do a quick Google and, and punch in that first number that you see, because someone might be just taking your data and running away.
Anything else, any other ways you can think of to protect yourself? When. Delays in cancellations rear their head, Kyle.
No. You know what I, I really do think the most important thing is, and I'm really glad that, you know, you saw for the most part people taking it in stride, dealing with the punches, whatever cliche you want to use here, because that does mean that people are going into this with the right expectations that as bad as the last few weeks have been, people went into those flights over the weekend saying, you know what?
There's a good chance that this goes sideways and I'm just gonna deal with it. And I think everybody needs more of that attitude regardless of what time of year shutdown or not. Things do go wrong in air travel. It is a miracle. It is a miracle every single time a metal tube gets off the ground at 500 miles per hour and gets to 35,000 feet and then back on the ground safely and doing that thousands upon thousands of time times a day.
Generally speaking on time. Is incredible. And so you just gotta expect things are gonna go wrong.
Yeah, that's really good perspective. Let's talk to some listeners. You ready for that?
Yeah, let's do it.
Okay. So sometimes in this line of work, Kyle, we get feedback from our listeners or readers or subscribers that kind of pulls at the heartstrings.
You know, like this can be an emotional job for us. Travel's emotional for a lot of people and we're always really honored and blown away by some of the things we hear out there. And this is one of them. So my guy, Matthew Johnson, writes us with an email subject line that just says. Never too much Canada.
And gosh, if that didn't just really stop me and bring me to tears the other day when I read that, Kyle, he just said that Canada's his favorite country and he's seen way more of it than even I have. And, oh, that's my warning sign.
No, I just, I needed to do that. We gotta, we gotta bring back the Canada button as often as possible.
The readers have spoken.
Listen back to last week's episode for a primer on what this new button here is the Canada button. But basically Matthew, your beauty and my new favorite listener. Thanks for reaching out. We have two questions this week. Two actual questions from Shiloh. Okay. First, Shiloh wrote us and asked us about our Palm Spring Strip.
Shiloh asks, where'd you stay? How was the airport? Where'd you eat? I have been going there since before I could walk, and it's still easily one of my favorite cities in the world. Would love to know what you guys did there. So Shiloh is not coming at us out of. Curiosity, but with some judgment ready to go.
Because Shiloh is a Palm Springs veteran and has definitely some ideas and some opinions on what we did there. This new segment is called Row Star Trip. Yeah. How'd we do Shiloh. All right. Any highlights for you, Kyle?
We, we all stayed at a great boutique hotel, not quite in kind of the downtown area, a little bit south of there called Dive Palm Springs.
I think that was really great. A lot of great meals. I think maybe my favorite was farm Palm Springs. Great farm to table restaurant with kind of a pre prefix, am I saying that right? Meal? What? Oh, you're the wrong person to ask. You're not a bougie boy.
No, I'm not a bougie boy.
Okay, well, let's move, let's move on.
I don't eat at restaurants. That's my travel budget.
Yeah, we, we did some great hiking including at the Ariel Tramway. That was a lot of fun. A couple of us rented e-bikes and kind of tooled our way across the city. We saw Leonardo DiCaprio's house and a couple of other, just a lot of really, of the city's cool fifties and sixties architecture.
Yeah, it was a blast.
We some of my favorite parts, we ate that, this Mexican place called Tak slash Kila, TAC slash. Q-U-I-L-A. I had some insanely good shrimp fajitas. The waiter the entire night was extremely worried about my spice tolerance. Every time I ordered something goes Eno. That's very spicy.
And if you could see how I look on YouTube, you know exactly why he said that to me so many times. But pretty insulted by the end of the night that every time I ordered something I was like, can I have the chocolate ice cream? He was like, Senor. I don't know. But that was an awesome, awesome meal there too.
We also, a few of us went on a hike at Tikis Canyon, which is a beautiful area on the Agua Caliente native reservation there. That was pretty cool. A few of our coworkers went to the zoo. We did not neither of us went on that expedition, but apparently the zoo there is really cool. And then on the last day before our flight out, we went to the Palm Springs Air Museum which is a really cool museum attached to the airport where we did a lot of nerding out about some airplanes and things like that.
But they also had a night hawk stealth bomber in in a little tented, what am I trying to say?
Hanger.
Hanger. Oh my god.
You are an aviation professional.
An aviation professional. It's called a hanger. It's, it's a little airplane tent as, as I would explain
it. Metal airplane tent, I believe is the technical term.
Anyway, it was very, very cool. And the Palm Springs Airport, because you asked Shiloh also very cool, open air. Also extremely easy. It was, you know, through security and two minutes and out into the courtyard have a two glasses of red wine before we headed home. So it was pretty cool.
Anything else on Palm Springs?
No, it was a great trip.
Okay. Another question from Shiloh, and you kind of have to be on YouTube to see this one. Shiloh asks, I need to know the story about the Thrifty Traveling book on your bookshelf. Is that a coincidence? Is that the inspiration for the site name? So here's the Thrifty Traveling book right below the on air sign.
You could see it under our YouTube. What is the story behind Mary's book? Kyle?
You know, I would say Shiloh and anybody else who's curious, really go back and listen to, to, I think episode three, the interview we did with our founder and CEO Jared. You know, we tell the whole story about how we are not the original Thrifty travel.
The original Thrifty Traveler is Mary Van Muir, who is the author of this book, thrifty Traveling. A wonderful woman who gave us a lot of insight, who gave Jared a lot of insight, I should say, in kind of setting up the company and what to do. After purchasing the name Thrifty Traveler from her, Mary Van Muir passed away in 2016.
But you can see a lot of the fingerprints of the advice that she gave Jared all across the company, including this podcast and getting ourselves out there. So yeah, that, that book is by her.
Yeah, that is the, the inspiration part of the inspiration for this whole company. So, another good question from you, Shiloh, if you'd like us to answer your questions on the show or you have any feedback or Shiloh, if you wanna roast our trip, hit us back up at podcast@thriftytraveler.com.
We might feature your question in next week's show. Okay. To close the show. As always, it's on the spot and I'm putting you on the spot this week. Kyle, you ready?
Fine.
Okay. Kyle, you are nothing if not a man of the people.
You are the only person who has ever said
that. You're so much more than your polished demeanor and effortless style you put on your Prada Chinos, one leg at a time, just like everybody else.
What's a Chino?
When there's air traffic control delays, your private jet has to wait its turn. No special treatment. Okay. And as a man of the people you rubbed elbows with some regular people out there last week, in your travels to New York City people we affectionately refer to as gen pop out in the world.
So you and our marketing manager, McKenna, had a meetup with some TT fans this week. How, how was that?
It was great. Yeah. McKenna and I were out in New York last week and met up with a handful of premium subscribers for a little happy hour in Chelsea. It was a great time. Mark, Mike, Carla. L Elton Zach, thank you all for, for coming out.
A couple of quick highlights. Carla is a, I would say a super fan of the podcast. She's hit our email inbox a a couple of times, so it was great to to see her. She, for as much as we've talked about our spreadsheets, she puts us to shame. I think we saw like 14 of her, probably 72 different spreadsheets that he, she has on her phone to catalog everything from the next trip, the entire trip, the trips that she and her family have planned, not just through 2026, but into 2031 as well as all of her credit cards and miles and everything.
It is impressive. And then mark a longtime premium subscriber was making his way to Marrakesh on a Delta one deal that we sent a couple of weeks ago from. Across the United States to Marrakesh and Delta one for 170,000 delta sky miles round trip. So it was great of him to stop by before he makes that trip.
But he also dropped something that I don't think I've ever heard somebody put it quite so accurately before. I don't know. I, I had never realized, I think he said some, some version of this is my fantasy football, that, you know, for all of the time that, that a lot of that millions of Americans spend thinking analytically about which fantasy football players to play each week and, and how to add and drop.
And I'm going to make myself look like an idiot. 'cause I've never played fantasy football. But to that point, this is my fantasy football.
That's really cool.
It really stuck with me. Yeah. So thanks Mark. Thanks for that Pearl.
I like that. I like that. Mark, you are a, a RB one for us every day of the week and I am simply a flex in fantasy football parlance, but I really like the way they think about that with fantasy football.
All right, well thrifty Travelers who went and met Kyle, thank you for giving Kyle A. Little bit of time. You know, he really needs it and he needed a little bit of the affection that you threw his way, so thank you. And Carla specifically, thanks for listening. That's really cool. Right, I think this gonna be it for the show.
Let's do it. Let's wrap it up. Let's get outta here. Thanks so much for listening to the show. Rate us five stars in your podcast platform of choice. If you would please and like, and subscribe to the show on YouTube. There you can see Mary's book in the background here underneath our on-air sign. Send this episode to someone you know who needs a vacation, or somebody who is traveling in the next week or two here.
If you have feedback, hit us at podcast@thriftytraveler.com. I'd love to hear from you there. Tell us about the team, Kyle.
This episode was produced by your favorite host who does not want to go to Cleveland, Gunnar. Olson was produced and edited by Sylvia Thomas and edited on video by Kyle Thomas. Our theme music is by Benjamin Tissot.
See you next week.
See ya.