Monthly Archives

Oct 12 2016

ProPublica came out with a piece this week on the American-US Airways merger, airline consolidation in general, that suggests lobbying played an undue influence in the Justice Department’s decision to settle and stop blocking consolidation — the upshot being “you’re paying for it.”

I’ve gotten about two dozen emails and tweets about it, and I’ve responded with some thoughts, but given the volume of interest the piece and some concerns about make sense to share more broadly.

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Oct 12 2016

After Qatar Airways placed an order for up to 100 Boeing planes on Friday, Delta CEO Ed Bastian returned to his soap box crusading against having to compete against smaller and less successful airlines that he claims are as subsidized as Delta is.

But this time he seems to just be making stuff up.

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Oct 12 2016

The benefit is $100 off the total price for everyone on the itinerary. So if your fare is less than $100 per person, you’re still going to get $100 off. Take an $80 roundtrip, $160 for 2 passengers, your net cost is $60 for both.

Here’s how you book.

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Oct 12 2016

In the middle of last month updated flight search on their website. That upended the way they display flights for sale. But it also changed award search, too.

No, they didn’t add any new partners for online booking. But they did screw up the award calendar. Limiting your search to American Airlines flights doesn’t actually limit your search to American Airlines flights anymore.

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Oct 12 2016

A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.

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Oct 11 2016

Last month there were 2 offers of 500 Virgin America miles each for signing up for emails.

Now there’s another one: 500 Elevate points if you sign up for the Virgin Produced newsletter by October 26. That’s easy points worth $11, that should become Alaska Airlines miles if you don’t redeem them first.

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Oct 11 2016

Delta announced this evening that Richard Anderson, who stepped down as CEO in May but remained the airline’s Chairman, “has elected to retire as executive chairman effective this date.”

They did not offer any reason.

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Oct 11 2016

Wyndham had a crazy day, opening with a really amazing offer that members could redeem all of their Starwood points for charitable donations, and receive 4 Wyndham Rewards points per Starwood point for doing it — plus a status match through 2017.

They pulled the promotion before it even officially started. My biggest concern — other than that they kind of looked like the gang who couldn’t shoot straight — was that people might have already started redeeming their Starwood points for charitable donations and would wind up with nothing from Wyndham to show for it.

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Oct 11 2016

Delta is offering discounts on domestic economy awards to and from New York if you book by tomorrow October 12 for travel betwen December 1 and December 20.

Awards start at just 5000 miles. But paid fares are even better…

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Oct 11 2016

Back in August United announced new change fees for awards and new limits award stopovers. They eliminated round the world awards as well. This was a devaluation, but — at least based on the announcement — seemed to be in areas where United was more generous than the competition.

It turns out the changes were more draconian than what United announced.

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