United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby, who was smart enough to take a private jet rather than his own airline when he needed to travel from New York to Denver this week, shared an internal letter with his company’s employees explaining what happened as their operation melted down over the past week.
Kirby blames bad weather, FAA air traffic control staffing, and… Canada (yes, really).
Most U.S. airlines commit to covering the cost of hotel and meals during long delays that they are responsible for, like mechanicals and lack of crew to operate the flight.
Generally meal costs of some kind will be covered on delays of 3 hours or more, with $12 being a common amount.
A Philadelphia-based American Airlines flight attendant named Jace was diagnosed with testicular cancer less than a year into his job. While his doctors wanted him to get surgery and chemotherapy right away, taking the full time off for treatment might mean losing his job.
According to the flight attendants union at American, he “shared his diagnosis with his manager [who told him] he didn’t qualify for FMLA” back in December when this happened.
A coalition could form to make this legislation viable by bundling rules that would prevent card issuers from discriminating against guns and other disfavored businesses.
At a minimum, Republican legislators concerned about movement in the direction of banning certain types of transactions from incumbent card networks could lead them to support legislation they believe reduces the relative power of those networks.
A passenger flying Spirit Airlines out of Orlando wound up facing an attempted murder charge after putting a police officer in a chokehold on Tuesday.
A group of people at Spirit’s ticket counter were yelling at the airline’s check-in counter staff, and even went behind the desk – grabbing the computer keyboard and typing away.
Emirates flight 176 from St. Petersburg, Russia to Dubai caught fire while still on the ground prior to departure. It’s being reported that the fire was in an engine of the Boeing 777, and that passengers were evacuated. The flight currently shows a 3 a.m. estimated departure time, four hours late, but that seems.. optimistic?
Judging from video of the incident I’d have to speculate that it’s not one of the plane’s engines but its auxiliary power unit.
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby himself gave up trying to fly United when he needed to go from their Newark hub to their hub at Denver. He flew private out of Teterboro.
The airline says that United “did not pay for his flight.” However Kirby apologizes for abandoning solidarity with his employees and customers trying to get through the morass.
An interesting twitter thread asks for the ‘cheapest thing you do’ and a business broker makes the claim that “points cards” for hotel chains “usually give you lobby privileges.” That’s simply not true, although people use hotel lobbies for meetings and to work all the time having nothing to do with their loyalty program memberships or co-brand rewards cards.
United Airlines sells a burger in coach that’s hugely controversial. Some passengers swear by it, and think it’s the best $10 they could ever spend in coach. They’ll even order it up in premium cabins. I wonder if that’s more a matter of individual taste than a statement of quality.
In mid-May United started offering a first class burger, and trying something bold: serving fries with it. That may be a traditional pairing, but it’s something tough to do as a re-heat on board.
A premium offering in Admirals Clubs or several years has been guacamole and chips, but that’s available not because American is willing to make that (very modest) investment but because the credit card that offers club membership is a Mastercard and Mastercard pays for the avocados.
If you want chicken nuggets inside an Admirals Club, they have those! But they’ll charge you for it. Indeed, they’ll overcharge you for it.
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 »
