On New Years Day Ryanair flight FR8164 from London Stansted to Malaga was delayed about an hour on departure. After reaching Spain the plane was further delayed half an hour on the tarmac. And an impatient passenger decided “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore.”
Two and a half years ago the Department of Justice announced that they were investigating the US airlines for unlawful collusion to limit capacity and increase airfares.
It struck me as bizarre to investigate airlines for collusion over pricing while prices were falling. And odder still for the government to sign off on mergers and anti-trust immunized joint ventures and find themselves ‘shocked’ that there’s less competition.
Last month Singapore Airlines announced new fare types going into effect January 20.
‘Economy lite’ fares — Singapore’s Basic Economy fare buckets Q, N, V, and K — aren’t just going to mean paid advance seat selection. While this wasn’t announced at the time, Singapore will also be imposing a 1.3% credit card surcharge to Economy Lite reservations originating in Singapore.
Cathay Pacific is reportedly cancelling its planned roll out of ‘dine on demand’ in business class and introducing ‘buy on board’ meals on some shorter economy flights in place of complimentary food.
Flight crew hated having to offer dine on demand, and charging for food in economy means big cost savings boarding far fewer meals on flights like Hong Kong – Manila and overnight flights to North Asia.
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.
Southwest is giving every employee $1000, giving an additional $5 million to charity and exercising options for 40 Boeing 737 MAX 8 (“15 firm orders in 2019 and 25 firm orders in 2020”). They’re crediting the tax reform bill for the moves.
American Airlines is also giving each employee $1000. It’ll cost American Airlines about $130 million or almost twice what it will cost Southwest because of American’s size. American also credits the tax reform bill.
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 Express Membership Rewards points have historically transferred to Hilton at a rate of 1000 -> 1500. So 1 Amex point was worth 1.5 Hilton points.
That’s not a rate I’d want to transfer at. I value Hilton points at 4/10ths of a cent and Amex points at 1.8 cents apiece. Sometimes they’d run bonuses where 1 Amex point would yield 2 Hilton, still not a great deal but better of course.
New higher-priced top redemption category, hotels can cost up to 70,000 points per night rather than 60,000.
499 hotels go up in category (cost more points to redeem) while 192 go down, more than a 2.5 to 1 ratio of increases to decreases. Most of the increases are in the U.S.
Commercial air safety has consistently improved for the past 35 years, but Trump has been in office just one year.
Oddly though his primary air travel safety initiative — spinning off air traffic control into an independent non-profit corporation, separating out regulation from the actual provision of air traffic services, an ICAO best practice the US currently fails to follow — failed to gain traction in 2017.
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 »
