Monthly Archives for December 2017.
SkyTeam member and Delta vassal Aeromexico is publishing an amazing fare from New York to Chile. You can fly most any time in business class for under $1100 roundtrip. And if you catch Aeromexico 787s you’ve got a fully flat business class product.
Singapore Airlines has announced ‘new fare types’ that will go into effect January 20th.
They’re introducing higher award change fees, the elimination of upgrades on the cheapest premium economy and business class fares, and seat selection fees on the cheapest coach tickets. At the same time more economy fares will become upgradeable (at a higher mileage cost) and the cheapest coach fares will earn a lot more miles.
Order your whisky neat you’ll get a full pour and the bartender won’t try to give you something cheaper than what you’re ordering. Add a few drops of water or some ice if you’d like after that.
In 40 hours I enjoyed tasting whiskey and eating some great food. I didn’t try any hot chicken, didn’t check out any of the music scene, but that’s alright I’ve definitely decided Nashville is worth returning to.
Qantas today has announced new Melbourne – San Francisco service with a Boeing 787, although we don’t yet have a launch date beyond “late 2018.”
This move surprises me because it front runs any renewed application for a new joint venture with American, and raises the bar for how much service and what new routes would be offered in the absence of such a deal (even if the total number of flights doesn’t grow).
With airberlin going out of business we saw several airlines offering to status match elite members of the topbonus frequent flyer program. Two among them are oneworld members Finnair and Iberia. Iberia is also proactively working to poach Lufthansa elites through this program as well.
LAN and Royal Jordanian offer status match programs anyway but those require flight(s) with those carriers. The Finnair offer was silver with a challenge for Gold. Iberia though offers a straight tier match.
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.
Delta’s relatively strong operational performance has led to a sort of self-delusion. They even lied about not cancelling any flights over the Thanksgiving weekend, their operational performance was very good but they couldn’t resist the temptation to overclaim. They seem to have lost all sense of humility over at Virginia Avenue. And that’s when bad things happen. Especially at an airline.
VietJet’s CEO became Southeast Asia’s first self-made female billionaire last year. And the airline’s CEO sees bikini campaigns and onboard stunts as empowering, even feminist given conservative Vietnamese mores.
When Delta re-upped its co-brand card agreement it set a bar that other airlines have tried to chase with their own bank issuer arrangements. American Express was willing to back the truck up to Virginia Avenue since it was set to lose its Costco cobrand and desperately needed to lock in its next-largest co-brand deal. (Shortly thereafter they re-upped their next largest, Starwood, as well.)
Revenue from American Express has continued to grow as spend on their products has grown. As Delta shared this week at is Investor Day 2017 revenue from American Express will total $3 billion. And they’re projecting out continued straight-line growth.
American lost its India reach when Delta outfoxed American and blocked its Jet Airways relationship. Now Delta is outmaneuvering American again with a WestJet joint venture and now American is losing its reach into Canada too.
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 »
