Category Archives for Airlines.
Turkish Airlines has abruptly replaced both its chairman and CEO despite strong financial results and no public scandal, framing the exits as retirements while offering little real explanation. The succession appears to have been arranged at a high political level, but the choice of an insider commercial CEO and finance-focused chair also suggests continuity in airlinr strategy.
American Airlines is not just raising bag fees. Basic economy fares matter to elites because business travelers are also leisure travelers, and they’re also stripping away some of the most important status benefits on these fares.
United mechanics say their own union let United turn a contract wage-reset formula into a black box, leaving employees short of raises that were supposed to keep them ahead of peers at American and Delta. A judge just threw out most of the case, but the ruling still leaves mechanics one narrow path to challenge the pay process through a grievance on their own.
Airlines keep pointing to higher fuel costs when they raise bag fees, and that is rhetorically powerful because passengers understandably expect lower costs to mean lower prices. But that is not how airline pricing really works: fees are one tool carriers use to manage total revenue, and they have no reason to promise those fees will fall just because one input cost does.
A passenger boarded a flight with a boarding pass for seat 27E, only to discover that there was no 27E on the aircraft at all. The most likely explanation is a last-minute aircraft swap that changed the seat map without giving the traveler a new boarding pass.
American Airlines delayed a flight because its pilot was stuck in line at Starbucks, which says less about the pilot than it does about the airline’s coffee. For years, cheap onboard coffee has had a hidden operational cost: when crews go hunting for something better in the terminal, passengers wait.
United flight attendants are finally getting a raise after more than five years without one, and this tentative deal will likely pass after last summer’s overwhelming rejection. But the new agreement also shows the cost of delay: compared to the deal they turned down, each crewmember is effectively giving up thousands in retro pay and lost boarding pay gains while just getting back to industry-standard wages overall.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy says he is open to airline mergers and framed the issue in unmistakably political terms, saying President Trump “loves to see big deals happen.” He’s signaling that the administration is more open to consolidation than the last one, and speculation abounds over what happens to Spirit Airlines and especially JetBlue.
Etihad is selling seats for half price not because Gulf fuel is cheap, but because demand to and through the UAE has weakened enough that the airline is cutting fares to fill planes. It has slashed some fares by up to 50% through June even as Emirates and Qatar have not matched those discounts.
I’m rooting for them each time they add something new, because competition benefits all of us even if you don’t make bookings through Rove – but I find I do occasionally use their shopping portal (when it offers the best deal) and they offer points for booking hotels that still earn hotel points and elite status credit, also.
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 »
