Monthly Archives for April 2019.
Delta’s CEO seemingly told employees that their 767s would get new suites in business class with doors. Unfortunately this is not what’s happening. There’s going to be a new seat, better than the current 767 seat, but uncompetitive compared to what other airlines will be flying on some similar routes.
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.
In February a man downed 4 bottles of Stella Artois at London’s Gatwick airport before a 9 a.m. easyJet flight to Egypt for his honeymoon.
He boarded the plane smoking an e-cigarette and was told he had to stop vaping. He responded to the flight attendant’s instruction with a homophobic outburst — before “knock[ing] out one of the cabin crew..with two punches” and sending him to the ground and then proceeding to attack a second flight attendant who responded to the situation. He’ll be spending 7 months in jail, will his new spouse wait for him?
Faster dinner service on short late night flights makes sense and United still has some of the best bedding in business class in the world — customers should be able to benefit from it with sleep. It will make even more sense once a Polaris lounge opens at Washington Dulles for passengers to have dinner in prior to flights. It’s just that United seems to take every opportunity to find ways to shave from their product, which isn’t what they said they were doing and disappoints me.
It’s a fools errand for airlines like American or United to offer a lowest common denominator product. When a business produces a commodity product, the lowest cost producer wins. Spirit is at a great advantage because American and United will always have higher costs.
Given their cost structure legacy airlines need to earn a revenue premium. And customers are already beginning to make buying decisions on more than schedule and price a trend that is only going to become more pronounced as passengers are presented with information during the booking process on what to expect from their flights like seat power and high speed internet.
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.
“Resort fees” are extra charges, on top of a room rate, that aren’t optional. In other words they’re part of the price of a room, but the hotel advertises a lower price instead. That’s on face deceptive.
I understand the logic of charging a resort fee in a market where everyone else is doing it. If a hotel charges a $250 room rate and a $30 resort fee, that’s $280 a night. If another hotel charges $270 a night they’re actually $10 cheaper — but appear at first glance to the consumer to be more expensive. Once resort fees are standard in a market, a hotel loses by not charging them.
What’s become especially egregious in recent years is the spread of resort fees to new markets, under different marketing. City hotels aren’t resorts and instead they promote “destination fees.”
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.
On March 16th a Lithuanian man was flying from Vilnius, Lithuania to Bergamo, Italy and found he had the entire Boeing 737-800 to himself. He found the 925 mile flight to be a ‘once in a lifetime experience’.
Chris McGinnis conducted an interesting interview with United Airlines President Scott Kirby.
There’s a lot here for United flyers, especially those based on the West Coast. For me, though, three things especially stood out.
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 »
