ok I get this offer in the mail: We are pleased to inform you that as a selected Amex Cardmember you can automatically receive a FREE Airline Companion Ticket worth up to $550 just for trying a FREE 2-month club membership in Travel+Leisure Elite Traveler, our exclusive membership club which entitles you to exclusive access to special travel savings, premium services and amenities, and other select membership benefits. Call and cancel in the first two months to not be charged and you can keep the Airline Companion Travel Ticket no matter what! Has anyone else done this deal? Is it legit? Thats all the info it gives me. Sounds fine to me I just hope there isnt something its not telling me. Any advice?
I haven't tried this particular deal, but I have used the privileges associated with my AMEX card to buy one/get one airline ticket with relative ease. I suspect that since it is AMEX, it is legitimate.
Which card do you have? I wonder if I have any preset BOGO deals with Airline tickets to begin with...
It's a damn ripoff. It's not free because you have to purchase a ticket with their fares. They send you a pamphlet with different zones and fares, but the fares are only estimates so it could cost you much more when you book a flight. A trip from LA to Austin would've cost 400 bucks last year, so maybe it's 500 with todays oil prices. Totally not worth it even for 2 people.
The free companion tickets have never been worth it for me, the price that Amex asks has always been more than booking separately. And if you fly international they require to you fly business class to qualify. Nice perk of carrying the certain amex cards, but IMO it's never been worth using..
Generally it costs around $450 each to fly from Minnesota to IAH (mainly because NWA has no competition into the Houston market). We got two tickets for $450. In addition, we got two tickets for around $300 (total) from MSP to Boston last October, so it has worked out well for me. On both occasions, I checked out the flights on NWA and AA web sites prior to contacting AMEX and on both occasions, AMEX quoted the same price. Also, I looked into the international option knowing that you have to fly business or first class and (had the dates worked out), we could have flown a bit cheaper in business class to Mexico with the AMEX BOGO deal than we could have in coach.
I used the travel companion thru American Express last year. The only drawback is that there are blackout dates. Basically, you can't use the travel companion during holidays. As far as prices, it isn't American Express set prices. You pay what the airlines charge. I bought one coach class ticket from Houston to LAX for $325 and got my companion ticket for free. I think this is worth it for people that do a lot of cross country or International flying. It's totally legit.
