You don’t see a whole lot of advertising from US airlines these days. Perhaps that’s because decisions about whom to fly are made on the basis of corporate contracts, frequent flyer programs, schedule or lowest price. American spent a bit of money on ads during bankruptcy and in conjunction with Disney’s Planes. But beyond that, it’s a rarity. It used to be much more common, you could hardly watch television without it. Even five years ago it was ubiquitous. Sometimes New York heats up with airline ads, ContinentalUnited needs to convince that Newark is really New York, Delta needs to convince you that they’re the biggest and baddest even though before acquiring a minority stake in Virgin Atlantic they had only three daily flights to Heathrow. If you aren’t in New York, though, do you…
About Gary Leff
Bits ‘n Pieces for August 30, 2013
News and Notes from Around the Interweb: United MileagePlus is auctioning a seat on the upcoming Star MegaDO frequent flyer adventure trip. The package includes airfare to Toronto and back from San Francisco, and lodging during the events. Current bid is just 51,000 miles. Frequent Miler reports that Marriott status challenges are no longer available. The Star MegaDO this year gives you Marriott Platinum status, United Premier Golds and above now get Marriott Gold as well. The Ritz-Carlton Rewards Visa is an easy (though not cheap) path to Gold as well. A few folks have commented on old posts that Hyatt appears to have removed a bunch of hotels from participation in their stay certificates program (a technique for saving big on hotels). Lucky provides coverage as well. I’ve pinged the person who runs the…
Breaking: American-US Airways Merger Gets a November Trial Date, Merger Not Killed Off By Attrition
American and US Airways wanted a November 12 trial date to adjudicate the Department of Justice’s anti-trust lawsuit. DOJ first wanted a February date, and then when that represented a conflict with the judge’s calendar they suggested March. My original guess about the DOJ suit when it was filed was that, regardless of the legal merits, the biggest risk to the merger was endless delays in the courts — companies can’t make long term plans or investments while they don’t know their futures. A March trial date would have meant the DOJ effectively would have won its anti-trust suit by default. Today the judge in the case ruled to set a November 25th trial date, which means that the anti-trust claims will ultimately either be settled or adjudicated on the merits. In other words, the…
National Car Rental’s Technology and Travel Discussion Highlights Online
I learned quite a bit hosting the National Car Rental-sponsored Google Hangout discussion of travel and technology earlier in the month. (I also hosted a @NationalPro twitter chat on travel and technology earlier that day.) National was promoting their new mobile app, of course, which I’ve found to be really functional (and was something on my personal wish list since I rent from National frequently and they hadn’t had an app before). But what came together was a really good discussion of travel and tech, and the reason I wanted to be involved in the first place was the other folks who were joining — people like JohnnyJet, Chris McGinnis, and Scott Mackenzie in addition to Rob Connors from National. First off, I was exposed to Google Hangout for the first time, which is a…
Managing Flight Delays and Cancellations
I thought I would share my thinking process for a delayed flight this morning, how I kept abreast of flight status, and how I made a decision to change flights. Some of y’all are going to find this to be a rather pedantic post. If you’re an expert, feel free to skip this post. There wasn’t any great jeopardy involved, it’s about a simple domestic trip. Hopefully some might find the thinking process I used useful. Flying today I had a planned 55 minute connection in Dallas. I got an email that my outbound flight was delayed 17 minutes, giving me a 38 minute connection. I looked up my flight on FlightAware. I used that site to “Track Inbound Flight” to see the status of the flight that was on its way to DC that…
Double Points on Amtrak Between September 9 and October 31
Amtrak Guest Rewards is going to be running double points earning for Amtrak travel between September 9 and October 31. Amtrak points-earning isn’t especially generous on a “dollars required to earn comparable free travel basis” — on non-Acela Express routes you earn 2 points per dollar spent normally, and a roundtrip coach ticket between Washington DC and New York runs 8000 points. That means you need to spend $4000, or perhaps make 25 roundtrips, before getting a free ticket. Double points helps, of course, but shouldn’t sway the majority of folks make plans to choose train rather than air (or other transport methods). The link for the offer is not yet live, but registration will become available no later than September 9 at AmtrakGuestRewards.com/DoubleDays. You can join the 30,000+ people who see these deals and…
The Singapore Airlines San Francisco Lounge is More US Than Asia
The Singapore Airlines check-in procedure provides a better experience than their San Francisco lounge does. Walking up to the first class check-in counter, a Singapore Airlines agent approached me to walk me the rest of the way to the counter. Unnecessary, but certainly first class service. It’s the only touch of first class on the ground that’s offered, as you’re sent off on your way to the lounge which is upstairs and down a long barren corridor. It’s not a tiny lounge but it really isn’t big enough to host Star Alliance elites and premium cabin passengers headed to Singapore, there are just too many eligible passengers for the size of the lounge and the place gets busy. There’s seating, but it’s not spacious or peaceful. I imagine it’s really packed when San Francisco –…
Here’s Why Today’s American AAdvantage Fuel Surcharge Award Glitch Shouldn’t Scare You
This morning American appeared to be starting to collect fuel surcharges on international award tickets (and not just on British Airways and Iberia award travel). This was sounding as though they were going to spread this out across all of their airline partners, and would have meant new out of pocket cash costs of several hundred dollars per ticket. Within a few hours, American explained that this was all a mistake, that there were some changes which were supposed to apply to revenue tickets only but that accidentally affected some award travel as well — it was unintentional and would be fixed. Specifically, American said: Last night, in a routine effort to better align American to industry standards with other global carriers, American begin collecting carrier-imposed surcharges on tickets for travel on other carrier’s metal.…
Bits ‘n Pieces for August 28, 2013
News and notes from around the interweb: How can I avoid extra fees on award tickets? “The entire frequent flyer universe breathes a collective sigh of relief.” @gster78 tweeted that he successfully used this advice to get out of a non-refundable advance purchase booking. Sometimes the shelf life on blog posts is longer than I think! Hyatt is buying the Peabody Orlando attached to the Orlando convention center. When the transaction closes (expected October 1) it will be rebranded a Hyatt Regency. Unless I am mistaken this 1,641 room hotel will have the most guest rooms of any Hyatt. (Update: As pointed out by many of you emailing me, the Hyatt Regency on Wacker Street in Chicago remains the largest.) I frequently have bunches of web browser windows open throughout the day, things I intend…
No New Fuel Surcharges on American AAdvantage Awards!
There are no new fuel surcharges on American AAdvantage awards. American issued the following statement: Last night, in a routine effort to better align American to industry standards with other global carriers, American begin collecting carrier-imposed surcharges on tickets for travel on other carrier’s metal. This change was intended for revenue tickets only, but the surcharge was erroneously added to AAdvantage award redemptions on other airlines as well. Except in the cases of British Airways and Iberia (where American currently collects these surcharges), no carrier-imposed surcharges will be applied when redeeming AAdvantage miles for award travel on other carriers. Any customers who encountered this fee in error will be fully refunded. This morning I posted that American was beginning to collect fuel surcharges on award tickets on more of their airline partners. I priced out…
