Category Archives for Airlines.
A month ago I wrote that American would be introducing ‘seat coupons’. Presumably this means that non-elites may be able to earn preferred seat assignments on American Airlines.
Apparently the functionality is now live.
An American Airlines flight attendant shares her Phoenix – Dallas story. The airline’s CEO Doug Parker was on the flight. She was serving predeparture beverages – sparkling water, gin and tonics – when her drink tray went flying.
However she had “a tray of about 8 drinks on it” when a passenger right in front of her “stops in the aisle and backs up,” they “hit[..] the tray and the drinks go flying.” And they went all over… CEO Doug Parker!
A former senior loyalty executive with extensive knowledge of United’s MileagePlus program told me that yesterday’s elimination of award charts was “the day United died.”
United has now followed Delta in ending transparent award pricing, leaving American and Alaska as the only major US carriers with award charts.
American has some of the most complex routing rules of any frequent flyer program. They do not publish those rules publicly. So it’s important to lay out what goes into determining how many miles an award costs, so you know what to expect (and how to save your miles).
You need to know about maximum permitted mileage, the most direct routing rule, and the prohibition on travel between two regions via a third region unless there’s an exception allowing you to do so.
Yesterday’s United Express flight UA4390 from Knoxville to Houston diverted to Dallas after two screens in the cockpit of the Bombardier CRJ-200 shut down during flight and couldn’t be restarted.
The plane had taken off on time at 7:36 p.m. without indication of an issue. About an hour and a half into the two hour flight passengers were told they’d be diverting. When they landed the captain explained what happened – and the scary story was captured on video.
Airlines don’t like it when you check a bag to a connecting city rather than to your final destination. It turns out though that you can short check bags, it’s just tough. Generally speaking airlines will let you do it on connections of 6-12 hours, and will require you to do it on 12+ hour connections (they don’t want to hold the bag that long).
I was interested to learn the official American Airlines policy for short-checking bags, and unsurprisingly it’s very much linked to hidden city ticketing. The policy was just updated last month,
Now United is following Delta, eliminating award charts. Prices won’t go higher for travel, though, until November 15 and members may see lower prices today.
United is also eliminating close-in booking fees that range $25 – $75 for some members based on elite status for any award travel November 15, 2019 onward.
I know how I’m betting this turns out, based on nearly 20 years watching and studying this space. I’d love, however, to be wrong.
It’s difficult to get hired on as an employee in many professions in Australia because it’s so difficult to get fired, and because benefits can be so generous. Frequently workers are taken on as contractors rather than employees.
Qantas has learned this over and over, for instance when a flight attendant was awarded six months’ pay because the government determined it was ‘harsh’ to fire him after he was found with “a can and a bottle of beer in his jacket, two 50ml bottles of vodka in his trousers and a 50ml bottle of gin in his bag” as he got off a flight.
Here’s what it actually takes to get fired without a big pay off in Australia.
Delta’s CEO seemingly told employees that their 767s would get new suites in business class with doors. Unfortunately this is not what’s happening. There’s going to be a new seat, better than the current 767 seat, but uncompetitive compared to what other airlines will be flying on some similar routes.
Faster dinner service on short late night flights makes sense and United still has some of the best bedding in business class in the world — customers should be able to benefit from it with sleep. It will make even more sense once a Polaris lounge opens at Washington Dulles for passengers to have dinner in prior to flights. It’s just that United seems to take every opportunity to find ways to shave from their product, which isn’t what they said they were doing and disappoints me.
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 »
