Best Travel Hacks

• Get a PriorityPass Card which gives you access to lounges at hundreds of airports worldwide. The next time you have a long layover, a cancelled or delayed flight, head to the lounge for free wi-fi, convenient power plugs to juice your laptop, free food and drink, and free magazines/newspapers. Bonus: You might spot celebrities, business leaders and world-leaders in the lounges at major airports. Recently, I sat across from Kofi Annan at the Houston Airport during a layover.

• If you don't live in the US but travel there frequently, buy a $100 T-Mobile SIM card for your unlocked iPhone or your Android device. The credit is good for 6 months and gets you over 1100 minutes. T-Mobile also recently launched Daily Web Passes for $1.50 per day for unlimited data. Bonus tip: If you have unlimited long distance in your home phone number, set call forwarding to your TMobile number while traveling to ensure you don't miss any calls.
• Join FoundersCard, get massive discounts at swanky hotels in major cities (The Standard, W Hotels, St. Regis, SLS in LA, etc.), and elite status on some of the airlines & Starwood Hotels, and discounts on Virgin America, America Airlines and Virgin Atlantic Flights, among tons of other business benefits - including a nice discount on your monthly AT&T Wireless Bill. Use FCSPX10 to get it for $149/year. Disclosure: I'm a member, and we offer discounts on 99designs for FoundersCard members.
• Buy an annual travel insurance policy. I have mine through AAA, and its less than $100/year and covers me on all trips under 4 weeks in duration with an unlimited number of trips per year. It's a lot cheaper than adding insurance during checkout at your favorite online booking site for each trip that you make. Bonus tip: Baggage insurance is a scam as it won't cover anything valuable that gets lost by the airlines or stolen during your trip.
• If your flight gets cancelled/delayed or you're likely to miss a connection, pick up the phone and rebook your flight. Don't wait in a long que at the "customer service" counter... by the time its your turn, the remaining seats on the "next flight out" are probably already done. The agents at the counter will be rushed, and won't investigate all available routing options because they see 50+ irritated people behind you. I would have missed the Indianapolis Superbowl if I hadn't picked up the phone and gotten re-routed via Phoenix.
• Don't forget Southwest & Jetblue. If you're like 90% of people and use Kayak or Expedia to research your flights, you're missing out on some of the most reliable and efficient carriers in the country. Always check Southwest and Jetblue to see if they fly where you need to go.
• Book the first flight in the morning. These are the least likely to be delayed, and if the flight gets cancelled or otherwise screwed up you're still going to get to the destination on the same-day rather than being forced to overnight at a crappy airport hotel.