Category Archives for General.
The line to get into the Delta Sky Clubs in Orlando and New York LaGuardia stretch through the terminal. Delta admits its pilot contract has made meltdown recovery harder, American adds premium economy hot entree pre-orders on some long routes, and politicians still want airport rules that do not apply to them.
Southwest CEO Bob Jordan says his top travel rule is never checking a bag, which is a revealing thing to hear from the head of an airline that’s now charging for checked bags.
Also, Delta is tightening its bag guarantee, JetBlue is adding more domestic first class seats, Hyatt is chasing growth through lower-end conversions.
Austin may finally be on the verge of landing its first nonstop flight to Asia, with Delta, Korean Air, and Samsung reportedly discussing service to Seoul. Also, newly released Delta deportation footage, Spirit’s branding problem, Lufthansa’s basic business fares.
Southwest had open seats on a lightly loaded flight, but one passenger says the airline still made her stay crammed into a full row and called her rude for asking to move. Plus Delta snack shrinkflation, American’s scuffed cabin ceilings, and Amex dropping Uber VIP.
United flight attendants still have not gotten a real new contract after 5.5 years, but their union dues are rising anyway. Alaska passengers stuck on the tarmac during a snowball fight, Citi killing ThankYou point sharing, American’s denser new cabin without seatback screens, and more airline absurdity.
American Airlines shut down airport customer service counters, but at Washington National the counter and signage were still sitting there when flights were canceled — sending passengers to line up for help that no longer existed. Also a Delta passenger’s lost $9,000 watch, Finnair blowing up a Hawaii award sweet spot, and the Dutch king’s final KLM 737 flight.
A short boarding video from an American Airlines flight captures two things at once: a flight attendant sees a phone aimed at a woman in front of the camera and quickly checks whether the pair are traveling together, defusing what looks like a potentially creepy situation. But the same clip also fuels the familiar complaint about American’s onboard culture — the front-galley posture and tone read as “couldn’t care less,” even while she’s trying to do something genuinely situationally aware.
A Marriott guest says they found crack pipes in a Dallas hotel room and received 10,000 points plus an apology from the property. Also X to launch a 6% interest account and 3% rebate debit card, American will serve Smash Kitchen condiments with its sliders, and one flight attendants tombstone joke is getting the reaction it deserves.
Southwest passengers are claiming the airline’s inflight Wi-Fi won’t load competitor airline sites or freezes on booking pages, and Southwest still hasn’t explained whether this is intentional blocking or just bad connectivity.
Toronto’s Billy Bishop jet expansion fight gets nastier, Austin’s South Terminal shuts down March 31, Emirates quietly improves partner award pricing, American shows off some creative speed tape.
Thrifty Traveler says it’s raising prices on March 14, but anyone who subscribes before then locks in the current annual rate for life as long as the membership stays active. If you’ve ever wanted a steady stream of premium-cabin award alerts and mistake-fare texts without monitoring deals all day, this is where the economics shift.
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 »
