Category Archives for Airlines.
Frontier Airlines cancelled its Miami – New York LaGuardia flight 2878 Sunday evening over a mask incident. The airline says that a ‘large group’ of passengers wouldn’t wear masks. The family, and some other passengers, dispute that characterization – say it was a maskless 18 month old who triggered the incident which caused the planeload of passengers to be rebooked for this morning.
At the beginning of February Delta devalued SkyMiles partner award pricing for the second time during the pandemic, and in a big way. Since the start of Covid-19 one way business class between the US and Europe on Air France and KLM went from 75,000 to 95,000 miles and now starts at 120,000 SkyMiles – for a 60% increase in less than a year at a time when flights are empty and prices low. Because they can.
Delta says they have no award charts any longer, but that isn’t true. They just hide their award charts. Mexico is a separate region from the United States, and while they’ve massively increased their award chart pricing for partner travel to and from the U.S., they haven’t (yet) done so for travel to and from Mexico.
Lufthansa will set up a Covid-19 vaccination site inside Moscow Domodedovo airport so that people can fly in, get the Sputnik V vaccine without clearing immigration or customs, and then fly back.
Ultimately we need more jabs in arms, the quicker the better, through whatever means necessary. Many governments have been more focused on who gets shots out of a limited supply than making sure people get shots, and increasing supply. That prolongs the pandemic and costs lives.
It seems to me that this take is both typical and likely wrong: “These new premium cabin mask exemptions are honestly, hilarious. Cathay Pacific’s logic here is essentially, as long as you lie at a 180° angle, you can’t get COVID.”
United Airlines will pay a $49 million fine to the federal government to resolve criminal fraud charges for falsifying records that allowed it to collect payments for transporting U.S. mail on time, when in fact it failed to do so.
United “falsified parcel delivery information…[b]etween 2012 and 2015..by submitting false delivery scan data to make it appear that United and partner airlines with which it worked were complying with the [on time mail delivery] requirements, when in fact they were not.”
American Airlines is bringing 11 pilots back to work after furlough. They’ll start requalification training on March 2, 2021. All of them have received a WARN Act notice, letting them know they may be re-furloughed at the start of April.
One thing that’s boosted how much money American Airlines keeps for itself out of the second bailout is voluntary leaves. They’ve convinced employees to go on unpaid leaves. Many thought they would collect unemployment, understanding that American would not contest these claims.
I’ve heard from several Executive Platinum passengers recently who have received texts from Admirals Club agents shortly before they arrived at the airport. These usually welcome them and let them know the status of the club and Covid procedures. The texts aren’t from an automated system – they’re from an agent in the Admirals Club, which I think is a really nice touch.
And it’s gets better.
Andreas Wuchner was checking in with British Airways at London Heathrow airport for a flight to Zurich when he slipped in a puddle of Bailey’s liqueur and hit his head when he came down.
British Airways has to pay him approximately $180,000 in strict liability, and he’s now pursuing additional damages for negligence. It took over three years to get this far.
American Airlines, like many other travel companies, has reduced requirements for earning elite status in 2021. However they haven’t done nearly enough considering that business travel won’t restart for some time.
American Airlines knows this and is cold calling customers, and following up with an email, offering to sell bundles of elite qualifying miles, segments, and qualifying dollars at a variety of price points.
Amazon’s former head of visual effects for Amazon Studios, Marc Sadeghi, is suing the company saying he was fired for upgrading a flight to New Zealand despite a medical condition he claims made coach travel impossible. If he wins, upgrades as a disability accommodation could become the emotional support animals of the 2020s.
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 »
