Category Archives for Airlines.
Air France KLM Flying Blue is offering status matches up to Platinum, the level required to redeem points for first class awards on Air France. They’ll even match United Platinum and American Platinum Pro members to Flying Blue Platinum.
Marriott Platinum, Titanium, and Ambassador members receive free Cathay Pacific silver status for a year.
American Airlines is working on an order for new planes. However it may not just be for narrowbody planes as I and others have reported.
There’s discussion of a widebody order potentially as well – even for the Airbus A350 as a replacement for aging Boeing 777-200s. An announcement, at least for new smaller planes, may come as soon as March 4 which is the airline’s upcoming Investor Day.
A passenger shared to Reddit his experience at the Delta Air Lines Sky Club at New York LaGuardia where kids had run amok. These lounges have become far more expensive. The airline bans basic economy passengers from entering and even their own elite passengers in economy who are flying internationally, to cut down on crowding. Maybe they should impose age restrictions, too?
Major U.S. airlines ran to the government to try to quash competition and a better inflight product option for passengers. Their first attempt, with the Department of Transportation, may not be working. But their next play with TSA can be done in secret and stands a better chance.
It is time to end differential tax treatment for airfares versus fees, since that creates a perverse incentive to shift customer spending from fares into fees. Any politician who rails against airline fees without addressing the role they have in legislating the tax code is unserious.
There’s been a tremendous increase in interest in Brisbane, a major Australian city near the Gold Coast. About a year and a half ago, United Airlines launched a non-stop from San Francisco – and then in the past two weeks we got announcements of new Brisbane service from both American Airlines (Dallas) and Delta (Los Angeles). That will mean a huge increase in seats between the U.S. and Brisbane. Competition is going to get bloody. How can this make sense?
Air China, which currently owns 30% of Cathay Pacific, is considering taking control of the Hong Kong-based airline. The Chinese flag carrier and Star Alliance member could cause a realignment of global airline alliances, moving Cathay from oneworld (American Airlines, British Airways) over to Star (United, Air Canada).
“Don’t cut in line” really only doesn’t apply when you’re trying to make a connecting flight. Here everyone was polite and maintained standards of civility – something all too rare in modern air travel!
Just a few months ago, JetBlue had a big plan for growth. Now they’re shrinking quickly. They offered buy out packages to non-union employees to reduce staff count. And now they’re offering to pay pilots not to fly.
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 »
