New Routes With Great Award Space, Free Room Nights With Account Signup, and a Whole Lotta Cash (Bits ‘n Pieces for January 15, 2014)

News and notes from around the interweb:

  • New Airbnb customers get a free night worth up to $300 and how to do very bad things with it.

  • American is finally releasing business class award and upgrade space on its Dallas – Hong Kong flight. Lots of it. Too much. Either it’s a mistake and won’t last long, or the route is already on the chopping block with new management. Or both.

  • Etihad is adding a second New York JFK – Abu Dhabi flight. Award availability is amazing (as are most Etihad flights). They’re going to be using a Jet Airways aircraft, rather than one of their own (still suites in first class) and eventually this Etihad flight will be operated by Jet Airways. I find Etihad an excellent use of American Airlines miles for travel to the Middle East, India, and the surrounding region.

  • Dunkin’ Donuts is testing a new revenue-based frequent flyer buyer program.

  • Now that American and US Airways have combined, they are a gigantic company and they have a ton of cash — $10 billion. If the Department of Justice hadn’t just gone all medieval on the idea of big airline mergers, I might expect them to go shopping with some of that cash (for Alaska Airlines or JetBlue perhaps). Instead, some analysts expect paydown of debit and dividends.


About Gary Leff

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 »

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Comments

  1. I doubt that AMR-LCC will start acquiring another airline until they’re done with their “own” merger. Probably either a buyback or a dividend. More importantly, it probably leaves DL to buy up Alaska while AMR-LCC is still busy.

  2. Do you think we will magically see JFK/ORD-HKG award space on CX drying up all of a sudden for AA redemptions?

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