Monthly Archives for May 2018.
In January China flexed its muscles against Marriott at a time that the US President began making rumblings of a trade war. They shut down Marriott’s booking engines in the country. Marriott Marriott fired an hourly worker who rather innocuously ‘liked’ a tweet about Tibet and even removed a banned book from one of their hotels.
At the time I wrote that China would be cracking down on airlines, too.
Later this month Chase will be adding a new card to the Ink family, that seems more the equivalent of the Freedom Unlimited, offering 1.5 points per dollar on all spend.
I don’t believe that Chase will ever make money on its Sapphire Reserve product. They’re effectively spending all of the interchange on rewards and benefits, and any margin must be coming from customers paying an APR — but with the high income, high credit, and high assets Chase reports about Sapphire Reserve cardmembers you’d expect even that to be a smaller group of customers than usual.
So it’s not surprising that we see the bank looking for cost savings.
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.
Currently Phoenix Airport’s terminal 4 B concourse has a Priority Pass-accessible “The Club” lounge. It opened in 2014 and it quite small, 2985 square feet. It has food and drink, but the furniture is dated and there are no restrooms inside the lounge.
This space — and an additional 7000 square feet — will be turned into a new lounge. The airport’s RFP provides clues as to whose lounge it will be.
Last fall I wrote that American was changing how they wait list mileage upgrades and systemwide upgrades. Companions would begin inheriting their upgrade sponsor’s elite status for upgrade priority effective January 1.
That didn’t happen, the IT wasn’t ready. However it’s now gone into effect.
Wednesday United’s website indicated they were eliminating full meals on flights under 4 hours outside of dinner time. I reached out to United and they confirmed the change. This looks like a major cut to me.
Last Friday 50 crocodiles were found at London’s Heathrow airport. The saltwater crocodiles were all about one year old and were supposed to be headed for a farm where they would be bred for their meat. In my experience crocodiles taste like chicken.
These crocs originated in Malaysia and were being shipped illegally — because of how they were packed.
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.
While it’s not clear yet what the shakeup will mean, a union official says planned strikes Monday and Tuesday will “probably” go forward.
For now the unions have a scalp. It’s unclear whether the company appoints someone more conciliatory and caves to wage demands, or whether they’ll dig in to maintain a line on costs.
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 »
