Category Archives for General.
Star Alliance member EVA Air — the airline that flies Hello Kitty jets — has introduced a ‘peppy robot’ named Pepper to each of Taiwan’s two airports.
Passengers can go up to pepper, scan their boarding passes, and get information about their flight and weather at their destinations. But this isn’t just a kiosk meant to displace ground staff.
The man who caused 252 United Airlines passengers to get stuck in Auckland for a day after his racist, homophobic rant on United’s New Year’s Day flight UA870 from Sydney to San Francisco led to a diversion will not face charges.
Here’s the man talking into his phone upon landing in Auckland, “Tell my dad to get his law firm ready because United Airlines just diverted the […] plane because I complained to some fat […] who got in my […] face.”
The Holiday Inn Midtown on West 57th has rates as low as $70 during the third week in January. Rates are otherwise under $100 into February.
It’s not just the Holiday Inn Midtown where prices are low, here’s The Hudson on the same night for $102 and the Park Lane for $159. And that’s not even looking very hard or for opaque rates.
Between the middle and end of the month Norwegian has flights from Oakland to London as low as £95.30 British pounds on their UK website. That’s $117 US dollars for the one way.
Austrian is a Star Alliance airline, they have a good business class in fact arguably they have the very best food in business class.
You can use miles with United, Aeroplan, ANA, LifeMiles, and many other programs to book awards to and through Vienna to most places you’d want to go in Europe and even Asia.
For travel through March 31 (with slightly higher prices in April) Star Alliance member and United partner Air Canada has fares from Denver to Paris and Brussels from $321 roundtrip.
28 day advance purchase is required, along with a 7 day minimum stay, and these fares come with a $300 change fee.
For a long time American AAdvantage has offered status ‘challenges’ that do not require you to already have status with another airline and that you pay for. These allow you to earn elite status more quickly with travel over a compressed period of time.
Now that American has introduced a revenue requirement for earning elite status in 2017, they’ve apparently revamped their elite status challenges.
British Airways is offering triple points on your first 8 flights taken by March 31. There are no fare restrictions. This is valid for new itineraries booked and flown starting January 5.
You’ll earn triple points on all British Airways flights and on British Airways codeshares for transatlantic travel on American Airlines, Finnair and Iberia (BA’s revenue-sharing joint venture partners).
Since he didn’t pay for a ticket, he earns no miles in United’s revenue-based program despite the 322 mile journey from Charlotte.
Perhaps he just wanted a preview of what United’s Basic Economy is going to be like.
When Delta started testing ‘Basic Economy’ fares in 2012 the idea was to compete with the ultra low cost carriers — they already had to match price, so they wanted to be able to offer a product that was closer to the limited service Spirit provided, in hopes that customers would buy up to more expensive fares for more services like pre-assigned seats.
Basic Economy fares are no longer just about competing with the ultra low cost carriers like Spirit, Allegiant, and Frontier though. At its recent investor day event we learned that Delta’s Basic Economy fares have spread to 38% of its markets — and growing.
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 »
