About Gary Leff

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 »

More articles by Gary Leff »

Airline Told Customers Flights Were Cancelled Because Their Destination Was Closed, Even Though it Wasn’t

by Gary Leff

westjet plane taking off
May 26 2019

Airlines have an incentive to blame factors beyond their control for delays. If the cause is weather, air traffic control, or a similar issue they’re going to owe customers a lot less (if anything at all) compared to when a delay is ‘controllable’ or their fault — such as when a flight goes mechanical or when crew simply don’t show up. (EU rules are somewhat stricter.)

Customers can be sitting at their home airport and will get frustrated when they’re delayed by weather only to look out the window at blue skies, knowing weather is clear at their destination.

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Should Southwest Airlines Comp Drinks During Delays?

by Gary Leff

southwest plane
May 25 2019

Prior to deregulation the Civil Aeronautics Board ‘experimented’ with the idea of price competition and allowed airlines to undercut Southwest Airlines prices. Southwest, flying only inside Texas at the time, wasn’t subject to CAB price regulation.

Texas International Airlines (which would later acquire Continental, Eastern, People Express, and Frontier) along with Braniff started offering $13 fares between Houston and Dellas. Not to be undercut, Southwest introduced a two-tiered fare structure, rebating each customer paying full fare with a bottle of liquor. Southwest became the largest liquor distributor in the state of Texas.

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Your Credit Cards are Dirtier than the Bathrooms at New York’s Penn Station

by Gary Leff

phone in case that cleans germs
May 25 2019

A new study looked at germs on different forms of payment mechanisms and how they compare to some of the more disgusting things we can think of. And while little compared to a door handle of a McDonald’s in New York, or to a city parking meter, the credit cards, bills, and coins we use may be more germ-laden even than the bathrooms at New York Penn Station or a New York subway pole.

Testing “40 debit and credit cards, 27 different bill denominations, and 10 coins for germs” each surface “was swabbed with a handheld germ testing device and assigned a ‘germ score’ to rank the item on the disgusting scale.”

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Great New Zealand Business Class Award Availability, Just 49,000 Points Each Way

by Gary Leff

skyline
May 25 2019

Historically awards between the US and New Zealand have been one of the toughest things to book. Years ago Air New Zealand used to open up business class awards 60 days prior to flight. Then they stopped. With a couple of brief exceptions there really hasn’t been meaningful Air New Zealand business class award space in years.

Up until today, this was a unicorn. Or snuffaluffagus. There were rumors of Air New Zealand business class award space, but no one knew if it actually existed.

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