Category Archives for Airlines.
I wrote the other day that the draft FAA bill being debate by the House included criminalizing passenger speech. If you ‘verbally assault’ an airline employee, you probably shouldn’t be allowed to fly, but this law will raise the stakes with law enforcement too.
That’s not all that’s in the bill that passed the House and now moves on to the Senate.
Two years ago I shared a trick to dealing with a stinky lavatory. You wouldn’t think this would be a major problem in the grand scheme of things, but it is — both from a passenger experience perspective but also for airline operations. British Airways once had to turn around a Dubai flight because the lavatory smelled so bad.
The kosher meal chicken was flavorful, spicy even, and the smoked whitefish was tasty. The pineapple upside down cake dessert was excellent.
The Muslim meal chicken was the spiciest food I’ve had on a US airline in a very long time, but it wasn’t just heat it was a complex heat. The dessert was a butterscotch tart which was delicious.
American has to be spending more on their special meals than on their regular meals.
I’m paranoid about getting sick. With as much travel as I do there’s no good time for it. So I absolutely hate when I’m stuck next to a passenger that’s coughing or sniffling or I encounter a lounge staff member with the flu handling food.
I want people to change their flights when they are sick. But mistakes are made when they’re forced to do it.
In this morning’s American Airlines earnings call one airline analyst asked, “Why not offer consumers a fair rate [for sale of miles]?” He was seeing some of the high prices charged for miles, and couldn’t imagine anyone taking advantage of those offers. In fact American does sell miles for a lot less than they used to, very regularly. This wasn’t mentioned in response.
Instead the airline talked about the loyalty program’s contribution to the business. But the underlying question really was, why not sacrifice margin for revenue growth?
On Sunday I wrote that Lufthansa first class awards had become bookable using partner miles. That’s significant because normally Lufthansa only makes first class award space available in advance to its own Miles & More members. Star Alliance partner frequent flyer programs can generally only book that space within 2 weeks of departure.
Now this has spread to San Francisco – Munich.
British Airways doesn’t have a competitive business class product. On their Boeing 777s seating is eight across, middle seats are especially intimate and passengers in the window climb over the feet of their seat opponents.
BA’s CEO suggests any new business class seat would need to take up more room, and that room would come at the expense of first class.
A woman with multiple sclerosis makes an annual trip to Europe with her husband, generally flying Delta which provides her “with a wheelchair that has straps to help her sit up straight.”
Only for her trip earlier this month from Atlanta to Amsterdam the woman says that Delta did not make that wheelchair available to her, so they “tied her to [a different type of] wheelchair with a “dirty blanket,” bruising her in the process.
It seems to me that airlines ought to refuse to transport customers who act uncivilly towards employees, and – union rules notwithstanding – should fire employees who act uncivilly towards customers. It also seems that law enforcement should be a last resort, not a first resort.
The Dallas Fort Worth A Terminal Admirals Club has been renovated, and I’m not sure it’s better than it used to be. Of course I think that was the one Admirals Club in the system that needed renovations the least in my opinion.
Not everyone agrees with me, because one employee kept walking through the lounge talking aloud to himself and engaging customers marveling at how nice he believes it is.
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 »
