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.
You used to be able to earn with Delta, Hilton, and JetBlue all at the same time when you spent money on Lyft rides. Then the Lyft-JetBlue partnership ended. Still, stacking earn with both Delta and Hilton for the same transaction was nice. But it appears that’s coming to an end July 1.
CBS This Morning Saturday co-host Dana Jacobson happened to be on board Delta flight DL1131 from Los Angeles to New York JFK on Thursday when the Boeing 757 was forced to divert to Detroit due to a raucous passenger reportedly drinking their own alcohol. She live-tweeted the experience, from people coming on board to the whole plane being offloaded, and captured video of the passenger being removed on a stretcher.
As the passenger is being taken off the plane she yells, “Did I get physical with anybody on the flight?” as though that would be the only justification for taking her off. Apparently she wanted the crew and law enforcement to wait for their drunk passenger to actually do harm before reacting to the situation.
With planes full again, there’s so much pressure to get out right at “D0” that one gate agent shared a story on social media of leaving people behind at the gate. There were seats available because some customers didn’t show, and the agent wasn’t able to put employees waiting to travel on the flight in their place – because it would have meant an extra couple of minutes, which the airline won’t abide.
First class comes at a higher price point than coach and comes bundled with additional services, including drink service. The irony of course is that the difference between first class and coach really shrunk throughout the pandemic.
Meal service hasn’t returned in earnest to most domestic flights up front, with packaged cold items the norm on many domestic flights – and even that was an improvement over what airlines had been serving. In other words, first class passengers saw more cost cuts than those who were just buying transportation. There’s ‘an aviation angle’ to the axe any writer has to grind. But it’s almost always wrong.
United Airlines is running a sweepstakes giving away free travel to people that have been vaccinated. But they won’t consider someone getting AstraZeneca shots to be vaccinated. Anyone who took AstraZeneca needs to follow the same mail-in route to enter as a vaccine refusenik.
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.
In February United Airlines made a splash ordering electric aircraft with the idea of transporting people from urban centers like Manhattan over to Newark. Now four months later American Airlines announces that it, too, is investing in urban air mobility, maybe.
The aircraft in question hasn’t had a test flight yet, but they’re touting that “certification of the aircraft [could come] as early as 2024” which means it will be farther out into the future than that.
On June 7 passengers on board an American Airlines flight 2511 from Los Angeles to Charlotte got rowdy after a flight delay. Crew were initially kind and apologized. However one flight attendant summoned his inner Howard Beale from the film Network and decided he wasn’t going to take it any more.
The whole cabin applauded.
It’s one thing when Delta is asking employees to volunteer to clean Sky Clubs at their Atlanta hub because contractors can’t find employees. It’s another thing when vulnerable passengers are left overnight to find for themselves.
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 »
