Category Archives for Airlines.
siTwo months ago American Airlines stopped using Gate Gourmet for catering at LAX when listeria was found at their facility.
Now American Airlines is bringing Gate Gourmet back for most domestic flights. My sense is that going cold turkey (sandwiches, hah) on Gate Gourmet was probably an overreaction in the first place. There weren’t any reports of sickness.
In the aftermath of the David Dao dragging incident in April, several airlines revamped their policies around paying denied boarding compensation. In September Delta paid out $4000 in travel credit to a woman flying to South Bend, Indiana for a Georgia Bulldogs – Notre Dame game. She still made it in the night before the game.
On December 19th American Airlines flight AA150 from Chicago O’Hare to Paris went mechanical just prior to boarding. Instead of cancelling or delaying the flight to the next day, they swapped out the planned Boeing 787-9 with 285 seats for a Boeing 787-8 which has just 226 seats.
In the U.S. it used to be common for airlines to roll back unpopular changes after a customer outcry. Airlines were afraid of losing business.
It’s especially gratifying to see an airline — anywhere in the world — make a change, get pushback, and quickly reverse itself.
Delta Airlines is being sued for discrimination against Jewish employees and nonrev passengers flying to Israel.
Flight attendants claim to have been fired, denied advancement, or suspended because of their Jewish faith or over friendships with Jews. Delta vigorously denies the claim. It’s not the first time Delta has been accused of anti-semitism.
Two and a half years ago the Department of Justice announced that they were investigating the US airlines for unlawful collusion to limit capacity and increase airfares.
It struck me as bizarre to investigate airlines for collusion over pricing while prices were falling. And odder still for the government to sign off on mergers and anti-trust immunized joint ventures and find themselves ‘shocked’ that there’s less competition.
Last month Singapore Airlines announced new fare types going into effect January 20.
‘Economy lite’ fares — Singapore’s Basic Economy fare buckets Q, N, V, and K — aren’t just going to mean paid advance seat selection. While this wasn’t announced at the time, Singapore will also be imposing a 1.3% credit card surcharge to Economy Lite reservations originating in Singapore.
Southwest is giving every employee $1000, giving an additional $5 million to charity and exercising options for 40 Boeing 737 MAX 8 (“15 firm orders in 2019 and 25 firm orders in 2020”). They’re crediting the tax reform bill for the moves.
American Airlines is also giving each employee $1000. It’ll cost American Airlines about $130 million or almost twice what it will cost Southwest because of American’s size. American also credits the tax reform bill.
British Airways cuts have effectively destroyed its brand. What was once viewed as a quality international carrier is largely to be avoided when possible.
Here’s a leak of just how British Airways will cram more seats into short haul planes flying in and out of London Heathrow.
Delta will no longer allow Skymiles members (at least those members in the U.S.) to hold awards over the phone. If you book by phone, you have to ticket immediately. And booking over the phone just became more limited, as non-elites can only make telephone award reservations between 8am and 10pm Eastern. Holding awards for 48 hours is still possible online. Awards on Delta as well as parter airlines Hawaiian, Alaska, Continental, and Northwest are bookable online.. sort of, sometimes, when the website works and prices out awards correctly. Of course, that means that awards on other partners like Air France, Aeroflot, and Korean cannot be held at all. This is a really annoying change. Finding awards can be challenging at times. Sometimes it takes humans because the online technology is lacking. You find flights…
One Mile at a Time points to a Wall Street Journal piece on the coming three-tiered structure of the Delta Skymiles redemption program. Earlier in the month I wrote that the coming three-tiered structure would be bringing back ‘last seat availability’ to the Skymiles program; that the highest third tier would mean more miles but at least true redemption for any seat, as offered by most other frequent flyer programs. Delta’s earlier removal of this option was a real affront, but the hope was that this was temporary. The Wall Street Journal piece, though, either misrepresents the coming change or suggests that Delta won’t be bringing back last seat availability. Delta also plans to increase the number of “tiers” in its SkyMiles plan this spring. Instead of offering domestic tickets for either 25,000 or 50,000…
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 »
