Global Impact Travel
 

This is the travel agency used by Citi Thank You Network. Some of the other threads discuss this agency peripherally but I thought they "deserved" their own thread.

Experiences seem to have been mixed overall. At this moment I have been on hold for 1 hour and 5 minutes, so I am not enthused.

Suggestions for best times to reach them without a long wait? Anyone had success redeeming by email, as they claim is possible? Any alternate contact phone number than the one given out by the Thank You Redemption people (877 529-2737)?

Edited to add more questions:

Other than the stated restrictions for restricted tickets (14 day advance, Sat night stay, etc), what other restrictions have successful or unsuccessful travel redeemers encountered? Max ticket price? Only certain fare classes? Only certain airlines?

Are the tickets booked into consolidator fare classes that would not be eligible for mileage accrual on most airlines? Or into discounted fare classes?

August 15 05 Edited to add: Some answers obtained:

I was able to get through after quite a long hold: nearly 2 hours.

They explained that there are no dollar limits to the tickets purchased; they book into non-consolidator fare classes; any airline is allowable.

For a restricted ticket: 14 day adv. purchase, Sat night stay required, max 30 day stay, no open jaw/circle/stopovers, non-refundable.

The biggest restriction appears to be: Global Travel is only allotted (don't understand that) so many seats per flight. Without having enough points in my account, they could not look up availability for me so once I've tried to redeem I will post back.

This is a good idea for people to post their redemption experiences. Can see which booking classes need to be available and which airlines are actually available. I believe that they have special negotiated rates with certain airlines which they may prefer to book people on.

Award type: 50k economy to Europe
Date: July 2005
Number of days redeemed in advance of trip: 14 days
Lowest prevailing price: $845 (via AA)
Airline redeemed on: AA
Prevailing price for booked flight: $845
Taxes charged by Global Impact: $129
Earned full miles: Yes

For me, I redeemed a 50k award to Europe exactly 14 days before my trip during mid-July (peak season for this route). I prefer flying on AA, so I used various price search engines to determine the prevailing price and which airlines were cheapest. I was flexible in my choice of dates, so I chose a date on which AA was coming up the cheapest.

Basically when you call, you specify your origination, your destination, and your travel dates. I was only given one flight option which was on AA. Unfortunately, I did not query other days. Using ITN/CWT, I could see the flight on the way over was wide open, but the flight on the way back had only one spot open in V class. After I booked my flight, the price on AA.com actually jumped to $1300 as I snagged the last V fare (and this flight was very full--I got op-upped to J on the way back!).

I mentioned on a different thread that I believe that GI uses AAdvantage Incentive Travel certificates for AA. The rep mentioned something about a certificate that they have with AA, and they didn't know at the time of booking how much the taxes were going to be (which certainly would not be the case if they were actually buying a ticket). Oh, and GI booked me into V class (which is also the class that these certs use). He said that the certificate they have with AA only says the taxes are between $100 and $150. Incidentally, the taxes are billed directly by GI, and on my AA ticket receipt, the taxes were paid by an Amex (presumably GI's card).

Hope this helps (and would love to see other people's experiences!).

definitive answer on earning FFP miles?
 

Anyone else definitely earn or definitely NOT earn FF miles in their program of choice after flying on a ticket paid for with Thank You points via Global Impact Travel?

I'm weighing whether to buy a ticket during the holidays but if the miles don't post then Mrs. Psychtobe wouldn't make her status, and it would be too late in the year to do a MR.

Good thread by psychtobe as there is very little info and experiences on Global Impact. What surprises me the most is that they require only 60k economy to Asia. Normally most airlines need around 90k for this segment. Is this too good to be true :confused:

I called Global Impact and they answered the phone in 2 minutes. I spoke with a very friendly agent who first suggested an AA flight (logical, since I wanted to fly PDX-DFW), but readily agreed to look up a connecting CO flight (equal in price to the AA flight) and booked me on my desired flights: 21DEC PDX-IAH-DFW and 26DEC DFW-IAH-PDX for 25,000 points. She believes these flights earn FF miles but cannot guarantee. I looked up my reservation at continental.com and the tickets are booked into mileage-earning fare classes. These are the same tickets that were available at Orbitz and Travelocity and Continental.com for $319 + $31.80 taxes. They charged me $54.06 in taxes.

I can't believe how different this experience was from my previous attempt. Bizarre but a big ^ to GI Travel! If we earn miles it would be a bonus, but even without, 25,000 points for holiday travel is a great deal.

Award type: 25k economy w/i lower 48 states
Date: December 21-26 2005
Number of days redeemed in advance of trip: 75 days
Lowest prevailing price: $351 (incl taxes; AA or CO)
Airline redeemed on: CO
Prevailing price for booked flight: $351
Taxes charged by Global Impact: $54
Earned full miles: we'll see.
Fare class of flights: U, I, W

Positive experience on my end
 

Using a prior poster's template I'll post my experience - I had a 3-5 minute hold time with Global Impact; I called about 7 am Pacific time during the week.

Award type: 30k economy to Caribbean (Punta Cana)(2 tickets)
Date: December 2005
Number of days redeemed in advance of trip: 5 months (August 2005)
Lowest prevailing price: I don't remember the lowest price, but for the schedule I wanted, our tickets together would have been over $1700 (incl. taxes)
Airline redeemed on: AA (1st choice airline)
Prevailing price for booked flight: Over $1700 (incl. taxes)
Taxes charged by Global Impact: $270
Earned full miles: YES (as of December 15, 2005)
Earned PremierPass points for flying: NO
Choice of flights from Global Impact versus flights available on AA.com - 1st
Fare Class: V (all flights)


I did pay for the taxes (about $200) for tickets booked through Aadvantage website (60k miles from LAS-CUN) INADVERTENTLY with the PremierPass card right after I received it in December 2004, I sure was surprised to see the extra 12K points in my account the next month!

(also, just edited my post to add fare class and for clarity -- but I want to add that based on my experience and other posters, I think that GI is "steering" people to American when they redeem their thank you points for flights, which makes sense when you consider all of the joint ventures that Citi and AA have.)

Welcome to Flyertalk Tanya! Sounds like you got a fantastic deal. 2.4c/point. If you earned these points with a PremierPass card, you effectively earned 4.8% back on your purchases. Very nice... ^ Could I ask which booking code your tickets were booked into? If you go to AA.com and look in My Reservations, you should see a column for your itinerary labeled Cabin | Booking Code. I would guess V but just want to be sure.

Regarding earning flight points on award tickets, so far I've gotten the points for a UA award ticket and an AS award ticket (booked through NW). I did not get flight points for my flight booked through Global Impact though. Can't win 'em all I guess. :D

Tickets through Global Impact
 

You wrote:
Could I ask which booking code your tickets were booked into? If you go to AA.com and look in My Reservations, you should see a column for your itinerary labeled Cabin | Booking Code. I would guess V but just want to be sure.

I write:
Yes, we are booked on V class all the way from LAS-MIA-SJU-PUJ and PUJ-MIA-LAS.

I might add that I too have seen points posted to my Citi statement BEFORE I took the actual flight (I tend to book my vacations at least 3-4 months in advance due to work) but my Global Impact points were charged by a company called Valley Travel out of California (???) Points for this award flight have not "popped up" in my TY account yet but the card was just charged last statement. I have noticed that there is a 1-2 month lag between buying the ticket (having the card charged) and getting the points, the actual flight dates seem to have nothing to do with it.

I called the agency last week to check for availability 2 award tickets to Asia. I'm very surprise to be told that the seats are capacity-control and based on availability. I have to redeem 60K (standard award) + 18K (extra points base on ticket prices) if I want to travel on the quoted date. :(

Could I ask what dates were you looking at, which airline they quoted you, and the routing? It's interesting that this is the second instance of them willing to let you buy up to better availability. The previous example I thought they were just converting the points at a 1 TY point = $0.01 rate and physically buying the ticket (this is also a standard option from Global Impact). I wonder if that is the case here as well. Though $780 base fare to Asia seems pretty cheap.

The direct line to the travel redemptions (GI) is 1800-752-6923

I also got a reply email from [email protected] with the form necessary to request a travel redemption. I will try to paste it below, or you can email them yourself and ask for the form. When I booked my reservation, I just called and got through rather than using the form. I was told that Monday is their busiest day, and all other times I called, I got through in under 5 minutes.

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My requested routing SDF-SGN on 12/10-1/10. The agent informed me the cheapest airlines for that routing and date is United which is definitely not my first choice. In addition, they stated that because my requested dates are around the holiday, therefore, the 60K miles will not enough to redeem the ticket. If I still want to go on the date and routing, they want to take additional 18K from my account which I refused. For travel award, I don't think they use the conventional 1 TY point = $0.01 rate because doing so will never enough to cover the ticket price for any award ticket. I guess they do the convertion of $0.02 instead.

The part about the holidays is simply not correct. I redeemed for travel on 21 DEC - 26 DEC using the standard 25k miles. My airline of choice was the cheapest available ticket at the time which I think helps a great deal, as acf573 has pointed out.

If anyone can ever pin down GI regarding their exact policy I sure would like to see it.

Anybody have luck on the PremierPass Elite companion benefit?

I am going NYC-Las in Jan and found a Delta L class fare non stop both ways for ~$320. I call GI and they tell me the best they can do is AA from EWR with a stop for $600 and change. Is this normal? If so, big thumbs down to GI and that entire companion ticket "benefit"

It's typically hit or miss. If you can find a great deal on the internet, it's hardly the case that GI can match that. Additionally, if you fly out of a competitive market, again GI probably won't be able to help. I have compared prices a few times with GI, and the savings don't amount to much.