Monthly Archives for May 2015.
No more route or codeshare restrictions, you can now earn American miles for all Etihad flights on paid eligible fares. That’s good news for the American-Etihad relationship, and the likelihood of maintaining that relationship.
The El Al and Saudia frequent flyer programs were co-winners of an award at the Freddies in Atlanta last week. Here’s the story that led to that, and the staging of the presentation.
Adam Aron no longer has ‘interim’ in his Chief Executive Officer title at Starwood. He launched Pan Am’s first frequent flyer program. As Hyatt’s Chief Marketing Officer he launched Gold Passport. I had the pleasure of interviewing him on stage at the Travel Executive Summit on Thursday in Atlanta. Aron was Senior Vice President of Marketing at United and I got to tell the story about his economy meals partnership with McDonalds (the associated happy meal toys available on United’s Orlando flights are still available for sale on eBay). United replaced the galley carts to keep the burger warm while the lettuce and bun stayed cool. He was CEO of Norwegian Cruise Lines, of a chain of ski resorts, and later went into private equity. He became part owner and CEO of the Philadelphia 76ers.…
A credit card executive from one bank tells about being denied the signup bonus for a card from another issuer. Barclaycard and American Express partner in an unexpected way. And what will we see when the United-Chase deal comes up for renewal?
Reports are that American AAdvantage million milers now receive a higher upgrade priority…
Partner award travel on Korean Air using Delta miles has blackout dates, and those are now more transparent – published in the SkyMiles terms and conditions. Here’s what that means.
United’s lawsuit against Skiplagged, the site that helps consumers save money on airfare through ‘throwaway ticketing’, has been dismissed on jurisdictional grounds. But United is warning their customers that they’ll shut down mileage accounts if you try it.
A collection of interesting links you’ll want to see, many you’ll want to click.
When IHG swallowed Kimpton, I wrote: “I want to be an IHG Rewards Club Platinum” said no Kimpton elite member, ever…
Conventional wisdom is that Starwood is going to do a deal, and the most likely candidate is IHG. Some say Starwood could buy IHG. I could see IHG buying Starwood. IHG is the bigger hotel chain, though Starwood’s market cap is much higher (nearly $15 billion versus ~ $10 billion).
Starwood has struggled to generate growth and Wall Street isn’t happy. Fundamentally that’s why their CEO Frits van Paasschen was out in February…
UFB Direct’s American AAdvantage-earning debit card will reduce earnings effective June 1. Instead of 1 mile per $2 spent on the card, it will offer 1 mile per $3 spent on the card. In addition they will no longer reward miles for “supermarkets, grocery stores, super stores, wholesale stores, discount stores, USPS, and financial or money transfer institutions.” I already found the card and account not to be especially compelling at 1:2. This effectively takes it off the table in my view. That isn’t surprising. Debit cards are no longer financial windfalls for banks. It’s no longer worth incentivizing transactions since the Durbin amendment to Dodd Frank financial reform eliminated the profit for banks from debit transactions. The rewards debit card is almost entirely a thing of the past. Oddly, though the Suntrust Delta debit…
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
