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 »

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Dog Poops On American Airlines Seat, Passengers Endure Horrific Stench For Entire Flight

Sep 30 2024

An American Airlines passenger brought a dog on board who defecated on the seat. The stench wafted through the cabin. Since the pet was outside of a carrier kept underneath the seat, either the airline wasn’t enforcing its pet in cabin rules or the passenger claimed this was a service animal and filled out the paperwork attesting to it.

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Southwest’s New Seat Policy Triggers Panic: Are Plus-Sized Passengers Losing Their Free Extra Seats?

airline seats
Sep 30 2024

No one seems more concerned with assigned seating on Southwest Airlines than the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance.

Of course Southwest is making a lot of changes to improve revenue, pushed by activist investor Elliott Management. They might choose to revise their policy of refunding extra seat purchases on flights that aren’t sold out. And they haven’t said they won’t do it!

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The Genius of U.S. Airport Departure Boards: Why The Rest Of The World Keeps Getting It Wrong

Sep 29 2024

For the most part, airport departure boards in the U.S. list flights alphabetically by destination. This makes sense. It makes it easy to find your flight, whether or not it’s on time, and what gate it’s leaving from.

In much of the rest of the world, it does not work like this. Departures boards are organized by departure time. You have to know your exact departure time to the minute in order to find your flight.

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Delta CEO Rips Into Pete Buttigieg, Says It Got Ugly: “You Can Imagine the Private Conversation We Had”

Sep 28 2024

After Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg called Ed Bastian, ‘reminding him about his airline’s responsibilities to passengers’, the airline became more reasonable covering costs for stranded passengers. Delta had previously refused to pay for tickets that travelers were stuck buying on other airlines.

However, CEO Bastian has put Buttigieg on blast over this.

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Mother Jones Editor Blasts Alaska Airlines Flight Attendant Over ‘Blessed’ Night Remark: ‘Creeping Christian Nationalism’?

Sep 28 2024

Clara Jeffery, editor-in-chief of Mother Jones which is often described as “left-leaning” or “far left,” took to social media to blast a union flight attendant at Alaska Airlines over their landing announcement where the editor complains that passengers were wished a “blessed” night prior to arrival in San Francisco.

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