Category Archives for Airlines.
When American Airlines announced the suspension of most meal service in late March, it made sense. This substantially reduced interactions between customers and flight attendants.
At the time the airline said this suspension would last through April 30. I assumed it would be suspended indefinitely. However it turns out that American is bringing back some catering on flights less than 2200 miles effective May 1. This is available to all passengers in all cabins.
Delta is going to cap the number of seats they sell in each cabin of their aircraft through June 30, to promote social distancing. Delta will also require customers to wear face masks starting May 4.
To show how quickly things are changing – the modern day equivalent of one being as a thousand years and a thousand years one day – it was only Monday that American announced flight attendants would be required to wear masks and that starting May 1 they’d begin to roll out complimentary masks for customers as an option, subject to supply chain and operational constraints.
Indeed it was just six weeks ago that American still disciplined flight attendants who wore masks.
American Airlines lost over $2.2 billion in the first quarter, even though things didn’t begin to go south until March. They’re pulling in new cash everywhere they can, cutting costs, and expect not to have any difficulty securing not just payroll protection grants from the U.S. treasury but also subsidized loans.
Those financial metrics aren’t what I’m most interested in at this point, nor the $40 billion in debt they could soon be carrying. Those issues are well covered elsewhere. I wanted to highlight 6 other things last may get less play in broader coverage.
As part of raising funds on the private market and from the U.S. government, the airline had its unencumbered assets appraised. Parker reported that the value of these assets came back at $10 billion “excluding the AAdvantage program.”
During the airline’s earnings call Parker was pressed on what appraisals found the AAdvantage program to be worth.
Delta lawyers submitted a filing to the Department of Transportation in which they make the case that travel is unsafe and flights should be limited if at all possible.
That’s not the position Delta takes in public or emphasizes with employees. But it’s a convenient argument to make when they’re trying to reduce their service obligations under the federal airline bailout.
The French government has placed several conditions on the 7.5 billion euro bailout it’s providing. The biggest one is that the airline will no longer be allowed to sell purely domestic trips between Paris and domestic cities that are within a 2.5 hour train ride of the capital.
United is effectively saying that they will not provide refunds for cancelled flights, only for significant delays, because cancelled flights do not exist. They are treating DOT rules – which specifically provide for two separate reasons for a refund – as though they only provide for one.
If an airline used to fly 8 times a day between two cities, and now flies just 3 times a day, that airline has cancelled 5 flights even though the airline can still accommodate the customer. United disagrees, but that is absurd on its face.
The Essential Air Service program pays airlines to fly routes that aren’t economically viable. Now the program will pay airlines to not fly those same routes.
Airlines are cancelling flights and downsizing their operations because of the global coronavirus pandemic. When they don’t fly the flights they’ve sold, they have to refund customers’ money.
The European Union’s rule 261 applies and requires these refunds. The E.U. reiterated that last month. However European airlines have been ignoring this and not processing refunds, at least for their European customers.
Now 12 European nations are siding with airlines against their people.
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 »
