Category Archives for Airlines.
Economy class passengers are often derisively referred to as ‘self-loading cargo’.
So perhaps the idea isn’t entirely original, but in an off the record talk the CEO of Qantas says if there is a new class of service “Qantas is likely to be the airline that creates it.”
Cathay Pacific will give uniformed staff the option of wearing pants for the first time. This required extensive talks between the airline and its flight attendants union.
Clearly the role of the flight attendant has changed over time and societal attitudes have changed too. The very first airline flight attendant was hired by United Airlines as an onboard nurse. That persona morphed into a hypersexualized one….
Delta made some changes to the elite qualifying miles you earn flying Aeromexico effective for travel April 1 onward. And they made the change retroactive for customers who had already purchased tickets for future travel.
However if you know the secret handshake you can get them to honor the miles that were promised at the time of purchase.
Air India is warning staff that they’ll get in trouble if they keep upgrading friends and family to business class. The Chairman of the airline sent a memo to employees, It has come to my knowledge that operating crew carry out upgrades to business and first class unofficially during the flight for their friends and relatives. This is viewed seriously. …It is reiterated once again that officials/crew members responsible for all such unauthorised upgrades shall face strict disciplinary action. Air India Boeing 787 Apparently the concern is just that putting friends and family into empty business class seats trades off with selling onboard upgrades. I hadn’t been aware that Air India allows onboard upgrades for a fee. That opens a whole different avenue for crew corruption. I imagine that passengers are far more likely to…
El Al is suing the government of Israel — the Civil Aviation Authority, the Prime Minister, and the Transportation Minister. They’re also suing Air India.
That’s because Saudi Arabia (and not the government of Israel) is allowing Air India to traverse its airspace on flights between India and Israel.
At last Thursday’s American Airlines employee Q&A with management, someone asked American’s CEO Doug Parker how to talk to people who prefer Southwest over American ‘for their flexibility’.
Doug Parker told the employee “well you’ve got to find some new friends, first of all.” But he also did a fantastic job explaining how American thinks about its business, and its pricing strategies.
At American’s employee town hall last week a 26 year Dallas-based flight attendant asked if “any airline strives to be number one other than from the bottom line standpoint and for our shareholders?”
He said it “used to be nice” at the end of a flight “when people weren’t so crammed in” so he wanted to know “Do we strive to be number one at all or are we just striving to fill every seat and the bottom line?”
American Airlines sent out a press release today touting new service to Mexico, the Caribbean and Latin America. There are several new routes. There are new flights that didn’t make the release. But they didn’t talk about the service they’re eliminating…
At the beginning of February I shared the strong rumor that Air New Zealand would announce Auckland – Chicago non-stop. They’ve just done that, and alongside United has announced their San Francisco – Auckland will become year-round rather than seasonal.
Sunday’s Air France regional HOP flight A5-235 from Paris-Orly to Aurillac experienced a loud noise that could be heard inside the cabin. It turned out there were large cracks and holes in the plane’s fuselage.
Sleeping passengers were awakened by the noise on this 265 mile domestic flight.
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 »
