Category Archives for Airlines.
Air France charged a passenger $583 at Paris Charles de Gaulle because its records claimed he skipped his outbound flight — even though he says he was onboard and has selfies, the boarding pass, airport receipts, and a KLM delay email to show it. Air France and KLM keep trusting the bad record over the evidence, which means the fastest fix may be to go full GDPR and force them to correct the underlying data.
Delta’s reliability problems are showing up where they can least afford them: New York–Los Angeles, the premium transcon route packed with business travelers and high-profile customers. An internal note to pilots asks them to help make up for increased delays and plunging net promoter scores among customers by making extra efforts at communication during disruptions.
Admirals Clubs and Flagship Lounges are adding Friday sweets this summer — dirty sodas, made-to-order sundaes, and ice cream sandwiches — a small but telling sign of how much airline lounges have changed as credit cards, premium travel, and leisure passengers reshape the business.
Southwest’s CEO is now openly talking about first class, airport lounges, and long-haul international flying — the very things the airline spent decades not being. The reason is ncredit card economics. Aspirational destinations, premium products, and lounges will drive Chase cardholders spending, including on a new premium card product..
American Airlines CEO Robert Isom says the airline has caught up at selling first class upgrades instead of giving them away. That may be good merchandising, but it guts the core value of elite status: if American will sell the seat for $40, the customer spending tens of thousands chasing upgrades is being told exactly where they stand.
United passengers say they were trapped on Newark tarmacs for seven hours or more during weather delays, with one San Francisco-bound flight sitting 7.5 hours before being canceled for the night — and United offering just a $200 voucher. Federal rules generally require domestic passengers to be given a real chance to deplane after three hours, making these delays exactly the kind of incident the DOT tarmac-delay rule was supposed to prevent.
Delta is using AI to price tickets. United wants to use it to better explain what is actually happening when your flight goes sideways. If Kirby delivers on maintenance videos and improved plain-English delay updates for every flight, that is the rare airline AI project passengers may actually like.
Scott Kirby says United is not buying American Airlines or JetBlue — and calls a JetBlue deal “mathematically not doable.” But a bankruptcy scenario, recently floated by JetBlue’s founder, would change the math.
Alaska Airlines accepted FAA findings that intoxicated passengers were allowed to board 11 flights, triggering a proposed $165,000 fine. But the bigger fight may be over what gets blamed next: first class predeparture drinks, even though the real problem appears to be spotting drunk passengers before they ever reach the aircraft door.
Air Canada says Seats.aero’s automated award-search scraping is computer fraud. Seats.aero says Air Canada is trying to block a useful award tool and shut down competition — and now the fight is expanding from website terms and trademarks into antitrust, tortious interference, and unfair competition claims.
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 »
