Winter is a rough time for the US travel industry all around. Business travel dries up and hotel occupancy falls. That’s not good for airlines either. Leisure travel is heavy around the holidays, and among passengers looking to escape the cold, but weather wreaks havoc across the system.
Even if you’re flying from Miami to Los Angeles your inbound aircraft might be coming from snowing Chicago O’Hare.
China Southern has become a stepchild within the SkyTeam alliance, with Delta taking an equity stake in China Eastern and China Eastern taking an equity stake in Air France. Moreover with Delta’s Korean Air joint venture, China Southern Guangzhou connections become less important still.
American Airlines took an equity stake in China Southern (natch) but their codesharing relationship was limited by SkyTeam rules.
I’ve previously suggested that frequent flyer executives have their compensation paid out in airline miles. Then their incentives would be aligned with their customers to support the value of the currency.
Do you think airline employees would accept their pay in travel vouchers? If not then why should investors?
Uber has announced a new loyalty program called Uber Rewards. It’s an improvement for customers because there’s earning for Uber transactions — you get rebates you did not get before — and better treatment for frequent Uber riders.
On Monday Spanish language El Pais reported that British Airways parent company IAG was in talks with that country’s government about ensuring the airline conglomerate would be a European – rather than UK – company once Britain leaves the EU, if no bilateral aviation deal is done in time.
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.
American Airlines is rolling out new menus for domestic first class lunches and dinners this week, and will be flying starting Wednesday. New breakfasts follow next year.
Here’s what’s for lunch and dinner starting tomorrow — we can expect these meals, designed by chef Julian Barsotti, to be standard fare for the next year. That should give me plenty of time to try the new lunch cheeseburger.
Capital One miles will transfer to airline frequent flyer programs starting next month. I love when programs make their miles worth more, without taking anything away from customers at all.
You earn 1.5 frequent flyer miles per dollar in the airline program of your choice (out of these 12 to start) or you can still use the card for 2% rebates towards travel.
Last year I wrote about Motel 6s in Phoenix working with ICE to get their guests deported. When Motel 6 would ‘leave the light on’ it was really the police siren light accompanying La Migra. Motel 6 Phoenix – Northern Avenue, Credit: Motel 6 At one Motel 6 the hotel would fax guests lists over to the police without even having been asked to do so. At another property “anyone who didn’t look American” would get reported to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The chain which was sold by Accor to Blackstone Group in 2012 has agreed to pay $7.6 million to settle a class action lawsuit for violating the privacy rights of its guests. Up to $5.6 million will go to Motel 6 guests who faced immigration removal proceedings after their personal information was shared.…
Two weeks ago American AAdvantage launched award ‘web specials’.
American has loaded several routes into web specials. This includes longer haul travel, and even includes Hawaii, at a variety of discounted prices.
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 »
