Playing cards

Now, a first-of-its-kind travel credit card that would benefit frequent flyers the most

What is it?
A travel credit card launched jointly by Thomas Cook and ICICI Bank.

Why are we writing about it?
It's the first-ever credit card in the country that has been designed keeping travellers in mind. The card's USP "" well, it is accepted by a whole range of travel service providers and can be used to pay for almost all types of travel services.

So, you can use the card to pay for your air tickets (a discount of five per cent is available on domestic air tickets), book a holiday package, buy travel insurance, and make hotel bookings. And since it is a MasterCard, it is accepted at 25 million locations around the world, which include more than 1 million ATMs worldwide.

What's in it for you?
As an introductory offer, once the card is issued, you get a free air ticket to any destination in India. You also get a discount of Rs 5,000 on any of Thomas Cook's group international holiday packages and a travel inconvenience insurance. And everytime you spend Rs 100 on the card to purchase any of Thomas Cook's travel products, you get six reward points; you earn four points if you make your purchases elsewhere.

Once at least 600 points are accumulated, they can be redeemed on Thomas Cook holiday packages, hotel stays, air tickets, airline upgrades and can even be converted into frequent flyer miles on popular airlines like Lufthansa, Qantas, Singapore Airlines, Emirates, Jet Airways, Kingfisher Airlines and others.

In fact, if you accumulate enough points, you can even win yourself a free trip around the world. This is like what most airline frequent flyer programmes offer, but better as the airline group includes almost all the airlines around the world.

The card also entitles you access to MasterCard travel lounges at airports across the world and a tempting 10 per cent discount at any of Flamingo's duty free outlets. And if this is not enough, Thomas Cook also provides an additional card for free.

What are the damages?
To secure a Thomas Cook Titanium MasterCard, you need to pick up an application form from any of the Thomas Cook or ICICI Bank outlets across the country and pay a lifetime fee of Rs 1,500.

Take it or leave it?
Take it if you are a frequent flyer. The fact that you can redeem your points on almost all airlines across the globe is reason enough. And if you're worried about raking up a huge bill, well, the first 52 days of the credit period will be interest free.

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SNIPPETS

Free fly
After trying out almost all single digit numbers, Air Deccan is now offering 5,00,000 tickets for free starting April 14. The offer is valid for travel on all of Air Deccan's 350 flights to 64 destinations across the country and for travel between July 1 and October 27. However, like every other discount offer, the price does not include taxes and surcharges.

Go low
It's only apt that a low cost carrier's (LCC) website be equipped with a low fare finder. Well, the only LCC in India to do so is GoAir. Its wesbite, www.goair.in, has a new feature called Low Fare Finder.

As the name suggests, once the destination and the date of travel are chosen, the feature displays fares for a few days before, after and on the day of travel chosen by you. You can alter your travel date, if you wish to, another day if a lower fare is available.

Desert deal
Most Gulf airlines are not a part of any airline alliance. Why? Because they have got spanking new aircraft to connect the whole world. Emirates and Etihad are now planning to double their flights to Down Under by 2011.

Under an agreement between Australia and the United Arab Emirates, the airlines will be able to double the number of weekly flights to Australia to 112 from the present 56. Australian airlines will be able to operate more services out of the UAE to Europe, Africa and the Middle East as well.

Indian connection
Indian has boosted its Gulf operations by launching a new daily service from Ahmedabad to Muscat via Mumbai for the first time. Indian, which along with Air India and Alliance Air, exclusively enjoys the Gulf routes, has to augment its Gulf operations as the Indian government may soon ease its restrictions on these money-spinning routes.

The three-year ban on private airlines will end this December when Jet and Sahara are most likely to start flying to the Middle East. With the introduction of this daily service to Muscat, Indian now flies to the Middle East from eight Indian cities "" Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai, Kochi, Kozhikode and Hyderabad. All together, the carrier links 16 cities in India to eight cities in the Gulf.