Category Archives for Airlines.
Last fall the ‘new Alitalia’ ITA Airways offered to give elite status to anyone with a pulse. Many may have skipped that at the time, since the new airline wasn’t yet a part of the SkyTeam (or any) alliance so it was still somewhat speculative what the benefit to do so would be.
Now they’re once again status matching through April 15. Status will be valid through April 15, 2023. There are 3 steps.
Southwest Airlines doesn’t offer Basic Economy. All of their fares all cancellation while retaining full credit towards a new ticket, and they do not charge for two checked bags. They promised not to take anything away from the lowest fares even as they rolled out a new, more expensive fare type. And that’s exactly what they’ve done.
The 7 day moving average of confirmed Covid-19 cases is down over 96% from peak. Hospitalizations are at their lowest level since the start of the pandemic. We have vaccines and boosters and monoclonal antibodies and small molecule inhibitors – ways to prevent severe disease and to treat it – tools we were only beginning to have when restrictions were put in place.
Anyone advocating continued restrictions has the burden to lay out the off ramp. Under what specific conditions and metrics would they actually support an end to emergency pandemic rules?
American Airlines and JetBlue introduced reciprocal elite benefits this past fall. The major omission was reciprocal access to extra legroom seats, largely a function of JetBlue not even offering those to their own elite members.
However JetBlue has been rethinking its elite benefits and now both JetBlue and American elites gain access to extra legroom seats on both airlines along with additional new benefits.
Earn with any Avios program. Transfer Avios between programs. This makes Qatar Airways Privilege Club, already a useful program, much more relevant to audiences around the world.
Air New Zealand is launching three day a week Auckland – New York JFK service September 17th using a Boeing 787-9.
At 8,828 miles this will be the world’s third longest flight. It will clock in at 16 hours northbound and nearly 17 and a half hours southbound.
At a recent internal question and answer session with pilots, Vice President of Network and Schedule Planning Brian Znotins shared how American is thinking about using the Airbus A321XLR in Charlotte and how it will trade off with existing widebody service.
Outgoing American Airlines CEO Doug Parker answered the question once and for all about what American will do when the federal government no longer requires masks on planes – American will lift its requirement, too. In fact he no longer sees it as an airline requirement at all, just a federal one.
Here’s what Parker told a gathering of employees in a Crew News internal questiona and answer session.
China Eastern flight MU5735 from Kunming to Guangzhou, operated by six year old Boeing 737-800 registration B-1791, crashed near Wuzhou, China. After descending at a rate of over 30,000 feet per minute, the 123 passengers and 9 crew are presumed not to have survived though rescue crews are on the scene.
With the federal transportation mask mandate expected to come to an end in less than a month, we can expect to see many of the thousands of passengers banned by airlines over masks to return to the skies. That’s because, unlike bans for violent or other abusive behavior, banks over masks were often considered temporary.
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 »
