Airlines

Category Archives for Airlines.

A Flight Attendant Served A Passenger Food And Cocktails, Then He Handed Her This Note

by Gary Leff

Sep 15 2020

At the beginning of the month a passenger handed a flight attendant ‘the worst note ever’. It was so bad – calling the crewmember “a glorified MAID” a “mask nazi” who should be “cleaning motel rooms for $2 tips and meth” and that her life is “a waste.” – that American Airlines suspended the customer’s flying privileges.

Now, if two data points are enough to make a trend, you’re going to be hearing a lot about another customer note given to flight attendant Ariel Ladner on board American Airlines from Tampa to Dallas Monday afternoon.

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Delta Opens The Curtain On SkyMiles As It Prepares To Mortgage The Program For $6.5 Billion

by Gary Leff

Sep 14 2020

Delta and United are raising money in private markets against their loyalty programs. American Airlines is using its AAdvantage program to securitize a subsidized government CARES Act loan. These moves underscore that the frequent flyer programs remain one of the most attractive assets held by airlines, even during the pandemic.

Raising money on the programs though means disclosing much more information than they’re using to offering.

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Southwest’s CEO Says Business Travel Won’t Return For A Decade. He’s Wrong.

by Gary Leff

Sep 14 2020

I’ve been overall a pessimist about business travel, but Southwest’s CEO takes it too far, arguing that he “wouldn’t be surprised to see business travel languish for a decade before it gets back to 2019 levels.”

Sure, he’s signaling that with their relatively strong balance sheet and largely domestic travel exposure they’re better-positioned than rivals to withstand a long travel recession. But we’re already starting to see cracks in the ‘indefinite work from home’ model.

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Take A Photo On A Flight In India, Your Airline May Lose The Right To Operate The Route For Two Weeks

by Gary Leff

Sep 13 2020

With India rounding towards 5 million lab-confirmed cases of Covid-19, hundreds of millions of cases based on antibody testing and where lockdown may have increased virus spread, and most foreign nationals banned from entering the country, the government has chosen an odd time to care about the scourge of… inflight photography.

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Will Pandemic Airline Furloughs Reduce Worker Appetite For Unions?

by Gary Leff

United Flight Attendants Campaigning in Union Election Outside San Francisco United Club
Sep 12 2020

In a shrinking industry airline unions become akin to a Ponzi scheme, benefiting the first in at the expense of those who joined later. When American Airlines took payroll support money from the government, they paid senior flight attendants to stay home while making junior cabin crew work all of the flights. And while neither Southwest nor Delta are furloughing any flight attendants, it’s the junior crewmembers at American and United that are losing their jobs at the beginning of October.

One British Airways union is even appealing to the company to furlough workers – from a rival union.

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Will Airlines Ending Change Fees Mean More Overbookings – And Involuntary Denied Boardings?

by Gary Leff

Sep 12 2020

With U.S. airlines eliminating change fees on domestic trips (excluding basic economy fares), will that least to more cancellations? And will higher cancellation rates mean that airlines need to overbook flights more than before?

If more people can change plans without penalty, will we have more people changing plans – so more people not taking the seats they’ve booked? Will that mean airlines need to sell even more seats for each flight to make up for it?

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