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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African American Woman Made To Feel She Didn’t Belong In First Class, Kicked Off Over Bubble Guppies

Nov 29 2021

A Florida-based attorney flying American Airlines says her two year old was watching Bubble Guppies quietly, but without headphones. The aircraft was taxiing out, turned around and her family was kicked off the aircraft. She says she was told several times she ‘was in first class’ and felt, as a black woman, that she was being told she didn’t belong.

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Reprice Your JetBlue Tickets Now Using $50 Off $100 Each Way Discount

Nov 29 2021

JetBlue has a Cyber Monday deal of $50 off each one way of $100 or more (or $100 off a $200+ roundtrip).

While this ostensibly ‘isn’t valid on prior bookings’ as long as your existing trips aren’t in basic economy you don’t face change fees. As a result you can cancel your trip, bank the credits, and use those credits to rebook at the lower price.

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Sometimes Hotels Play Games With Inventory, Here’s How To Call Them On It

Nov 27 2021

A reader reached out to me about the Park Hyatt St. Kitts. The hotel appeared to be selling standard suites for the week between Christmas and New Year’s. As a Globalist (top tier elite) he wanted to book a room and confirm a suite.

However he reported that the hotel responded to Hyatt, when they tried to confirm the suite, that the suites weren’t actually available and that the inventory was a glitch.

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Which Major Hotel Program Is Best?

Park Hyatt New York Proves Why Hotel Loyalty Makes Sense
Nov 27 2021

There are two elements to loyalty marketing: recognition and reward. The former is the elite program, how you treat your best customers. The latter is rebate for their spend.

We can make some overall claims about best that will not apply to every member, every time, with their own subjective preferences. We can do this by looking at the overall earn-and-burn program, and by comparing the major elite benefits each program offers.

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Airlines Ban Passengers For Bad Behavior That Takes Place On Other Carriers

Nov 27 2021

In September Delta Air Lines proposed that passengers banned from any airline over mask violations should be banned from all airlines. Of course each airline has its own standard for adding passengers to such a list.

And that’s something American Airlines CEO Doug Parker pointed out in response to an employee question this past week at an internal Crew News session with executives, a recording of which was reviewed by View From The Wing. Yet where there’s egregious behavior that becomes public, airlines will ban a passenger even when their actions took place on another airline.

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