Category Archives for Airlines.
Southeast Asian low cost carrier AirAsia has been a success (except for their restaurant chain). AirAsiaX, the long haul version of the airline, has struggled.
The airline had plenty of empty seats even before coronavirus, so they’re selling a one year all you can fly pass for 499 MYR (about US$118) offering “Australia, Japan, India and more.”
Delta has announced new routes and flights out of Seattle showing that they aren’t going to take American’s re-invigorated partnership with Alaska Airlines lying down.
Competition is good, and has been great for Seattle residents since Delta and Alaska began their breakup and Delta built up their own hub at the Pacific Northwest airport. Delta will grow their Seattle service to 190 peak daily departures to 56 destinations for summer 2020, with new service coming beyond that as well.
Star Alliance member TAP Air Portugal has 280,000 frequent flyer members in the U.S. market, growing at about 12,000 members per month, and now serves 9 North American cities with 81 weekly flights. They’re even launching Boston to the Azores in June. And they acknowledge that their Miles & Go program “hasn’t been as relevant as it should be.” They aim to change that.
They are offering status matches up to their top elite tier, mileage on sale for less than 9/10ths of a cent apiece, 25% discounts on award redemption, and miles just for joining the program and referring others to join as well.
American Airlines launches their new uniform with about 50,000 employees putting on their new attire today. This comes after the new 2016 Twin Hill uniforms led to thousands of complaints about irritation and worse from another manufacturer.
As a result of these issues American’s employees have been allowed to use a makeshift combination of old uniforms, including old US Airways uniforms and some off the shelf options. This will be the first time, hopefully, that all legacy American Airlines and US Airways employees all have the same look and keep it.
American Airlines has come out with their own convoluted copycat of waiving change fees on new ticket purchases. It is simultaneously less generous and also more strategically useful than what JetBlue and Alaska have done in the face of weak bookings resulting from coronavirus fears.
American Airlines flight AA198 from New York JFK to Milan was cancelled Saturday evening after crewmembers refused to make the trip to Northern Italy over coronavirus fears. On Saturday the U.S. government raised the alert for travel to Northern Italy to its highest level.
I like business class awards at a discount, and 50% off premium economy can be useful. However 25% off premium economy from Seattle is only moderately useful and really only if you’re based in Seattle. 25% off economy redemptions aren’t great since you do pay some carrier-imposed surcharges. I need to see at least 50% off economy to suggest the awards as worth pursuing.
United Airlines is cracking down on flight attendants posting photos of themselves online posing inside of overhead bins, known as the “Overhead Bin Challenge.”
It’s understandable that an airline wouldn’t want to have to take a maintenance delay if an overhead bin was damaged. And HR is certainly going to prefer to tell employees not to do it – it’s harder to sue the airline for an injury that way. On the other hand, heaven forbid a United Airlines flight attendant look like they’re having fun at their job… Last summer Southwest Airlines, for their part, backed up their flight attendant’s “brief moment of fun.”
American Airlines gutted their partnership with Alaska Airlines and the most recent stage of the breakup was just announced in the fall so I was genuinely surprised by the about-face announced in mid-February of a newly-energized partnership including oneworld alliance membership for Alaska.
On Wednesday American’s CEO Doug Parker held one of the airline’s monthly ‘Crew News’ employee question and answer sessions, a recording of which was shared with View From The Wing. During his introduction Parker talked about the strategic shift that this represents.
Since this morning we’ve learned that Amazon is telling employees to defer non-essential domestic business travel. After mentioning this on Twitter I’ve seen others reply that their companies are doing the same and pulling out of trade shows. The value of going to trade shows drops (they are a perfect example of network effects) and the reduction in travel spreads, along with a further reduction in economy activity. A 12% selloff in the markets over the last week may not be wrong.
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 »
