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 »

The Craziest TSA Checkpoint Story I’ve Ever Heard (Yes, Drugs Were Involved)

by Gary Leff

lego tsa agents
Feb 10 2019

A woman screams “I know my rights” as she shoved past a TSA checkpoint in Orlando. I know her rights too, that’s one that no court has recognized. But it’s also not where the story starts to get weird, or where it stops.

The 38 year old woman drove up to curbside at Orlando International airport departures on Wednesday at about 8:30 p.m. She went inside and demanded at the Southwest Airlines ticket counter “to be checked in for a flight and to have her truck parked.”

You can probably guess where this one eventually ends, but not how it gets there.

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After 20 Years of Trying Pakistan No Longer Plans to Privatize the World’s Worst Airline

by Gary Leff

pakitstan international airlines
Feb 09 2019

Pakistan International Airlines is the worst airline in the world. Best known for sacrificing a goat for safety and flying with more passengers than seats (and making customers stand for 1700 miles), the airline’s former CEO was actually detained as a result of his efforts to provide good seats and service by wet leasing aircraft from SriLankan.

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Airline Sues Customers Who Don’t Take All the Flights They Book

by Gary Leff

airplane
Feb 09 2019

Airlines have fought against ‘throwaway ticketing’ for years. A ticket on United Airlines to Chicago might be super expensive, but connecting through Chicago to Milwaukee may be cheap. So passengers might buy a ticket to Milwaukee and just get off in Chicago and not board their final connection.

This past fall though we learned that United Airlines was threatening passengers with sending them to collections for the fare the carrier believes that they lost. They’re threatening to trash their customers’ credit report with a dubious debt, since the passenger never agreed to pay a different fare in the first place.

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Southwest Looking For New Services They Can Charge Extra For

by Gary Leff

airline cabin
Feb 09 2019

Southwest Airlines doesn’t charge checked bag fees or change fees, and they’ve been profitable 46 years in a row. They don’t offer assigned seats, but generate $400 million a year in early boarding charges which let customers have a better shot at the seats they want. That’s an improvement for those customers compared to the airline’s base product.

While they continue to eschew bag and change fees, there’s talk of adding extras that they could charge… extra for.

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Miss Manners: Kids in Business Class are A-OK

by Gary Leff

Feb 09 2019

Readers have lots of opinions of whether young kids belong on planes in the first place. If there’s anything close to an official word, though, you’d expect it from the columnist who calls herself Miss Manners. And she declares that “It is public transport: There is nothing prohibitive about who sits in which class except for the cost itself.”

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Milwaukee Renames Its Airport, Stripping Father of the Air Force of His Rank (Again)

by Gary Leff

Feb 08 2019

Putting Milwaukee in the airport name emphasizes where it is but I don’t think anyone was confused about the Milwaukee airport’s location. The idea that this rebranding is going to “help[..] more people recognize MKE as an option” when they want to fly to Milwaukee seems to me patently absurd.

Meanwhile the irony of an airport named for General Mitchell – who had his title of General stripped by the military — having his title stripped from the airport that honors him is a bit too much.

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United “Re-Banks” Its Denver Hub Next Week. What Does That Mean for Travelers?

by Gary Leff

united plane docked
Feb 08 2019

Banked hubs are costly to an airline, there’s a lot of activity, a lot of downtime, and they wind up paying people to stand around. But they’re attractive for selling tickets — shorter connecting times mean flights filter up to the top of search. Customers want to get where they’re going quickly. The problem is during irregular operations — bad weather can delay flight departures, then there are no gates for arriving flights, and challenges connecting cascade.

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Marriott’s New 2019 Award Category Changes are Out, Increases Outnumber Decreases 9-to-1

by Gary Leff

outside dining
Feb 08 2019

When Marriott launched its new program back in August they re-adjusted the redemption categories hotels were assigned to, after having done the same thing just months earlier. Moreover they ‘pre-announced’ about 60 hotels that would become more expensive in 2019 with the introduction of a new higher category 8.

Now they’ve announced 2019 category changes which go into effect March 5. Here’s what the changes look like and how to lock in lower pricing now.

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