Category Archives for Airlines.
Based on comments by American Airlines top executives at an employee meeting last week, the airline is working on a Tokyo Haneda shuttle schedule at LAX. They’re preparing to send Boeing 787s into the Pacific. And they’re looking forward to new Boeing 787 aircraft deliveries that they intend to fly 7000 miles – to places like India and Africa.
Austin has been one of the fastest growing airports in the country in recent years. This year they increased the number of available gates at the airport by 37%. While the amount of long haul international flying is limited, there’s London service from British Airways and Norwegian and Lufthansa started flying to Frankfurt back in May.
Delta has named Austin a focus city. While the largest airlines at Austin, in order, are Southwest, American, United and then Delta the addition of new gates will allow Delta to grow – and the gap between the three large U.S. legacy airlines isn’t that large to begin with.
United shared this morning that they’re revamping their confirmed regional and global upgrade certificates that Platinum elites and higher are able to take advantage of effective December 4. They’re introducing a new upgrade points system to replace certificates called PlusPoints, and existing banked certificates will convert to PlusPoints at that time.
I received a briefing on the changes from Luc Bondar, United’s Vice President of Loyalty who is in charge of MileagePlus. Here’s how upgrades are changing.
The Airbus A220 has been a popular aircraft. Delta was able to buy a large number of them cheap before Airbus took over sales of the program from Bombardier. It has a low cost of operations and can fly surprisingly long distances. The wide fuselage makes it a passenger favorite for comfort because each seat gets extra width.
American Airlines doesn’t have an interest in the A220. Instead, American plans to pick up more Airbus A319s on the used market super cheap – a cost driven down, in part, by the growing popularity of the A220.
Monday through Friday of this week American Airlines will be testing a new signature cocktail for premium cabins. There are two different beverages they’re trying out and are soliciting customer feedback.
Two Muslim men had their American Eagle flight cancelled last Saturday because one of the men – an AAdvantage Executive Platinum member – used the plane’s lavatory while the flight was delayed on the ground, and because passengers and crew don’t like flying with Muslims.
The cause of the concern? When the man visited the lavatory he flushed twice.
The six things I had to consider and three extra steps I had to take to book an upcoming trip to Paris with my wife and young daughter.
With more satellite internet installs than any other airline, even if they had to throttle speeds on legacy US Airways 2Ku planes, they could grab the mantle of being the digital airline by getting out in front of Delta’s free wifi delays.
Based on past conversations with American executives who have briefed me on their connectivity plans, it seems unlikely to me that they’ll seize the opportunity of a Delta delay.
Unless Delta has proof that the passenger vandalized their own baggage tag, they should apologize. But none of us should think that the slur represents the company’s values, and indeed a majority of corporate interests are usually best-served by espousing progressive values.
Delta CEO Ed Bastian told Bloomberg that the SkyTeam, of which Delta is a part, hasn’t “brought a lot of great value to customers..[or] to member airlines” and so they’re trying to create their “own international network of carriers” with Delta “as the centerpiece.”
The Atlanta-based carriers is shifting away from an alliance focus and “taking a different approach” where they use local airline brands that can operate in local markets around the world and influence those airlines to be more efficient.
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 »
