Monthly Archives for August 2018.
Assuming the transaction closes Aeroplan members will still have an Air Canada relationship in two years, and access to Star Alliance in two years. And this gives Canadian members more of the certainty they’re looking for.
What I don’t like in this document is that it suggests customers will be reassured their existing itineraries will still be honored if they actually ask. I can certainly see the ‘87% of passengers’ American says fly at most once a year not understanding this and not explicitly asking, agreeing to be moved to a less desirable itinerary thinking they have no choice.
When Marriott’s acquisition of Starwood first closed, they immediately allowed you to link accounts. That gave you the ability to status match and it gave you the ability to move points between accounts at a ratio of 1 Starpoint to 3 Marriott points. Linking accounts does not and will not ever automatically combine them.
Marriott tells me they are “now rolling out [the ability to combine accounts] in batches to our members through tomorrow. As a result, when members log in and see the prompt they will have the opportunity to combine their accounts.”
A lot of people are unhappy with how Marriott is handling travel packages. Over the weekend Marriott shared the new chart for how legacy travel package certificates work in the new program.
Marriott listened to the feedback that came in quickly over the weekend and is already making an adjustment.
Starwood Preferred Guest has moved onto the Marriott IT platform. Marriott brought their system down on Saturday to transition everything over. (Loyalty programs always do these things on Saturdays for good reason.)
IT is hard, and things haven’t gone as smoothly as we would have hoped. Awards haven’t been redeemable at all properties, and for some it’s been sporadic. However for the most part systems are now largely functional on Monday afternoon. But not for members whose accounts have the wrong status.
Effective September 1 the New York JFK lounge will have 35% more space because they’re converting the attached B concourse Admirals club to become part of the Flagship lounge. This adds 7000 square feet to the existing 19,541 square foot Flagship lounge footprint.
That means the only Admirals Club at JFK will be the C concourse lounge. However most domestic flights — which is what most Admirals Club passengers are flying — depart out of the satellite C concourse and as a result the B club which was renovated last summer doesn’t ever seem busy.
At American Airlines nothing is more important than ‘D0’ it often seems as if American would be happy if they could eliminate customers from the equation and just run their operation they’d be happy.
D0 means flights departing exactly on-time. And they’re willing to sacrifice most everything else for that goal. Gate agents can skip processing upgrades. Flight attendants get called in if they delay a flight for catering to bring servingware for international first class.
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.
Meghan Markle flew to Toronto on Air Canada — not British Airways.
The Duchess of Sussex lived in Toronto when she filmed the USA television series Suits. There’s no comment on her choice of airlines, but her brother in law has been known to fly Ryanair over British Airways.
A male model is suing Lufthansa for $8 million because he fell down because of “wet and oily residue” while boarding a London – Munich flight in 2012.
Nick Harrold says that he hasn’t been able to get any modeling work since he now has a “disfiguring squint.”
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 »
