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 »

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United Now Pricing Awards as Low as 5000 Miles Each Way

by Gary Leff

united-plane
Mar 25 2019

At the beginning of 2019 I flagged that United removed its award chart tables from its website and rolled out premium economy awards without any award chart at all. This made me wonder whether United would eventually eliminate award charts entirely, as Delta has done, and move to align redemption more closely to the price of a ticket.

Interestingly United appears to be making reduced mileage awards available when ticket prices are low on short-distance routes like New York LaGuardia – Chicago, Los Angeles – Las Vegas, and slightly longer flights like Newark – Fort Lauderdale.

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Boeing 737 MAX Email Scam Can Infect Your Computer

by Gary Leff

airplane flying
Mar 25 2019

Police are warning about an email scam aimed at getting you to open an attachment that will infect your computer by preying on worries over the currently-grounded Boeing 737 MAX.

The email may be framed as coming from a “private analyst” and includes an attachment with “leaked data” that warns of another aircraft that will “go down soon” and encourages you to share the file with your contacts — not just infecting your computer, but virally infecting others as well via a trusted source (you).

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Why the FAA Delegates Certification to Boeing — and Why That’s a Good Thing

by Gary Leff

airplane flying
Mar 25 2019

One of the things many people have been shocked to learn, in the aftermath of the Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 MAX crash, is that the FAA delegates much of the certification process to the aircraft manufacturer.

People are shocked, shocked, that a company would be able to ‘self-certify’ and suggest this is some sort of dereliction of duty when nothing could be further from the truth.

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Is Transatlantic Low Cost Carrier Wow Air Toast?

by Gary Leff

wow plane
Mar 24 2019

For the last several years fares between the US and Europe have been available at incredibly low prices, driven down by a generation of ultra low cost carriers — deep discount airlines no longer just flying short haul routes, but operating across the Pond the way that Freddie Laker’s Skytrain service once pioneered.

There have been too many players flying too many seats at too low a price for too long, in a market that’s long been challenging, and airlines trying to make it in this environment have struggled. Wow Air could be next to fall.

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Have an Issue or Problem? Marriott’s New Campaign Promises to Do Nothing About It

by Gary Leff

hotel
Mar 24 2019

Maybe you’ve emailed Marriott, like I have, and gotten no response for months. Or perhaps you’ve called customer service, waited on hold, and gotten absolutely nowhere (or, in the case of one reader, been called a liar).

Now Marriott has you covered because their Le Meridien brand has launched a new campaign called “Dial 0 for Lip Service”.

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