Airlines

Category Archives for Airlines.

Delta Air Lines Risks Killing American Express Deal Golden Goose With SkyMiles Changes

by Gary Leff

Sep 14 2023

Delta says that nearly 1% of GDP is currently being charged to their Amex cards, why would they risk this? A lot of Delta cards are going to be cancelled since they no longer have unlimited or any access to Sky Clubs, and since the thresholds for earning status are so high.

There will be some people who double down on their Delta Amex cards, but at the end of the status chase if they can put hundreds of thousands of dollars of spend on those cards, they will have… Delta SkyMiles instead of more valuable rewards currencies they could have earned. The opportunity cost is high!

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Southwest Airlines Reveals They Have A Problem At Orange County’s Airport

by Gary Leff

Sep 14 2023

Southwest is the largest airline at the airport. They were allocated 44 daily departures for 2023, down from 57 flights in 2022. Basically the airport guesses how full flights will be, and applies that percentage to back into the current 11.8 million allowable passengers. And that determines how many flights they’ll permit.

Apparently they’ve been filling too many seats, because Southwest Airlines let employees know that they have a problem to manage in Orange County.

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Frontier Airlines CEO Says You’re Lazy, So He Has To Cut Costs

by Gary Leff

A small number of free miles in your choice of programs
Sep 14 2023

Spirit Airlines lost its relentless focus on costs, but Frontier Airlines still has it. Frontier is the U.S. Franke airline now and it’s headed by Spirit’s former marketing chief, Barry Biffle. Flight attendant training is done at a truck stop in Wyoming because it’s cheap.

United’s CEO Scott Kirby says airlines are overstaffed by 10%. Biffle will actually do something about it.

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Delta SkyMiles And Sky Club Changes Leak Early

by Gary Leff

Sep 13 2023

Delta is changing how elite status is earned, eliminating the use of three metrics (dollars, qualifying miles, and segments) to focus on only a single metric (dollars) while allowing some activities other than flying to count towards those dollars. And they’re restricting credit card access to their Sky Clubs – limiting the number of cardmember visits, and not allowing visits when traveling on a basic economy fare.

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Broken American Airlines Seats Forces Elite Flyer Next To Meth Head

by Gary Leff

Sep 12 2023

Gate agents are asked to do more with less than ever before. During the pandemic, American moved to single agent boarding where narrowbody aircraft that are less than 80% full get just one gate agent rather than two. They have to make all of the announcements, deal with standbys and upgrades, check boarding passes at the gate, and also deal with gate checking bags. They’re supposed to do passenger breath checks, too?

And they’re going to get called in if the flight pushes back even one minute late. No time to notice if a passenger is high on meth!

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