Travel Hacking - Tip #4 - Topguest Foursquare Hack

UPDATE: YOU CAN NOW AUTO CHECK-IN on FOURSQUARE

Topguest partners with foursquare and a number of travel partners (hotels and airlines) to award points for check-ins with your smartphone.  e.g. register with Topguest and connect your foursquare account and you get 50 points when you check in with foursquare at or near a Hilton hotel. Topguest offers many check-in bonuses so you could potentially earn hundreds of thousands of points per year with this hack.  It depends on how much time you are willing to put in, but a few minutes per day can easily earn you hundreds of free miles per day.  


This is a great way to make some extra points when you are traveling and taking flights and staying at hotels etc but why limit yourself to bonus points when you are traveling when you can get bonus points everyday with a little hack.  


e.g. With United and Continental - You can get up to 100 mileage points every day = 36,500 free miles per year = up to 2 free domestic US return flights = per person. You can also sign up family members to multiply the bonus many more times.


What you need - First register with each of these Topguest partners if you want to maximize your miles or focus on just a few of your favs: e.g. 


           TopGuest United (Update 06/17: Link redirects to topguest with no option to enter United#)


If you decide to just focus on United miles do the following:


1.) Sign up for a free United Airlines frequent flier account if you don’t already have one


2.) Sign up for a new foursquare account (even if you already have one) and use the gmail hack so you don’t need to use a new email account (optional). Important: You need to use the same name in the new foursquare profile as you have for your United Airlines profile e.g. if your United profile has your name as Joseph Bloggs your new foursquare profile name should be Joseph Bloggs (this will ensure your miles get credited without any issues.)


3.) Register with TopGuest United and connect your new foursquare account


4.) If you are lucky enough to live or work or commute within a few miles of one of ‘these’ airports you simply need launch the foursquare app and login using the account you connected on the TopGuest - United link.  Then select the airport and check-in. You will get a confirmation email shortly afterwards confirming you just earned 50 miles. Points usually show up within 24 hours.


If you are nowhere near one of these airports, you need to use the hack to spoof your location first then check-in as above. Open multiple foursquare accounts and link different United / Continental accounts or hotel accounts to repeat the above bonus / reward many times.


Enjoy the miles/points and let me know how you get on.


UPDATE: YOU CAN NOW AUTO CHECK-IN on FOURSQUARE


Check out the rest of my travel hacking tips here.


Tags: .Travel Hacking - Tip #4 - Topguest Foursquare Hack..
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17 comments:

  1. Roland G. - San Antonio, TXApril 29, 2012 4:14 pm

    You mentioned in the Travel Hacking #3 post that you receive 200 miles a day through the United or Continental Foursquare check-in? Do you do this by checking into the same airport 4 times throughout the day (with 4 different foursquare accts) or by checking into 4 different airports (with 4 different foursquare accts)? Also, are all four Foursquare accounts link to the same United/Continental account or are they dispersed between several United/Continental accounts? Is it even possible to have more than one United/Continental account? Also, is 4 check-ins per day the limit or is it only limited by the number of different foursquare accts you have?

    Thanks for the help. I have already started using the check-in hack to get 50points/day for myself and my family. Great site - glad I stumbled upon it.

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  2. @ Roland: I signed up with Topguest before the United and Continental merger so I had 2 separate accounts and so far I am still getting 50 points per check-in. 50 from United, 50 from Continental x times 2 with my wife = 200 per day.

    I am playing it safe by using a separate foursquare account for each check-in = 4 accounts but only 1 email account using the gmail hack. I alternate between 2 airports so as not to draw too much attention but others have had no issues using the same airport each day.

    You could technically repeat this with new United accounts but it might draw attention if they were all under the same name so maybe sign-up some relatives instead.

    Let me know if you have any more Q's and thanks for dropping by

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  3. If I have 1 United account, let's say account # 12345 and I have multiple four square accounts under different aliases (John Smith, Justin Jackson, etc.) but all four Square accounts are linked to my United account #12345 - would that raise any suspicions or cause any reg flags to go up??? Do they notice if multiple four square accounts are linked to the same United account # or Hilton HHonors account #, etc.??

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  4. @ Anony: You can't sign up the same United account more than once

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  5. Just found your blog. Great stuff!

    Quick question about TopGuest partner signups... When I go to sign up, say, Priority Club, it doesn't give me the option to link to foursquare... just Facebook. Does the hack work for Facebook as well?

    Thanks of sharing these great hacks!

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  6. @Scottman: the default is facebook but you have an 4 options (tabs) to choose from above - the 2nd tab is foursquare

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  7. Hi, great information!

    I just signed up through the process you've described here and I accidentally thought you said to sign up United multiple times. I did get the first 50 miles for checking in through a confirmation email, but haven't gotten one again. I made sure the last linkage between Topguest and United was the email account I want to use. Should I expect an email every day for 50 miles? My 4Square account is checking me in automatically so that's not an issue. I also haven't gotten an email for Hilton either.

    Thanks a lot!

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  8. @Anony: yes you should get an email everyday for 50 miles (sometimes there is a lag of a few days) - You need to select Hilton DoubleTree per the T&C - Check the update link at the start of the above blog post for clarifications

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  9. The United Topguest link doesn't seem to be working. Do you have another link?

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  10. @ nanazy: It appears the United link has been taken down and redirected to the Topguest site - I fear this hack may have been exposed :-(

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  11. i wish i discovered this sooner. my account was deactivated by topguest for "abusing their TOS." I was checking in at each of the travel partners every day earning my points. If I do this whole thing now, topguest wont accept my hilton/bestwestern/wyndham/etc account numbers. Should I set up NEW accounts with each of the partners and then ask the partners to merge my accounts?

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  12. Not only has the United link been taken down, it appears we're no longer earning miles anymore for any check-ins even if you've already set up an account before! Can you confirm too Paddy? I haven't gotten any miles since June 16th :(((

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  13. @ Anony: Yes - I would try that - even if they won't merge a/c's you will eventually have enough points to get a free flight / night from the 2nd a/c

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  14. @ Brandon: June 16th for me too (but there has a been a few days lag before - fingers and toes crossed)

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  15. Just had my TopGuest account shut down. I followed all your steps so that I was auto4sq checking into one location per day for hilton hhonors account. I got an email this morning and the account was suspended shortly after. Have you heard of others being shut down? I don't see how what I was doing was any different than if an employee who worked there checked in everyday at work (I mean...what I was doing was breaking their T&C, but you know what I mean).

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  16. @ State: I haven't heard of anyone being shut down for just one a/c (using the same email for more than one a/c raises the possibility however)

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  17. It seems everyone is being suspended even casual check-ins are being booted out - the jig is up :-(

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PLEASE enter a made up NAME/URL e.g. "Bob99" instead of Anonymous - it makes it easier for me to answer your question and you do want to make my life easier right?

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