A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
Fijian authorities have launched a formal investigation into an alleged theft and serious sexual assault involving three Virgin Australia crew members who were on layover in Nadi. The incident reportedly took place on Tuesday evening after the crew visited a nightclub in the Martintar area.
On United Airlines flight 2479 from Houston to San Francisco on New Year’s morning, just after arrival, a woman decided that her seat was “in the middle of the right aisle” of the Boeing 777 aircraft.
The passenger is in a wheelchair and preboarding. She is being taken onboard by a contractor. The agent scans her boarding pass, he begins to push her onto the jetbridge, and then the agent calls them back. The woman apparently called the agent a “jackass” after he scanned her boarding pass. This was the tipping point that led him to remove her from the flight.
American Airlines reduced the number of flight attendants working its widebody and premium domestic flights during the pandemic. Flight attendants weren’t serving extensive meals then, and there weren’t as many passengers on board.
When the pandemic ended, the airline didn’t restore staffing levels.
There’s a rant attracting a lot of attention online about passengers standing up “like their lives depended on it” at the end of a 40 minute flight. They’re incredulous that someone would do this on such a short flight (or at all).
American Airlines stopped catering the espresso machines on board their Boeing 777, Boeing 787, and Airbus A321T aircraft during the pandemic. The “frothing wands, cups, saucers, brewing pods” were taken off of planes, according to the airline.
This returned to some aircraft in spring 2022. However, Boeing 777-200s didn’t get catered, and Boeing 777-300ERs only got espresso in first class. That’s changed!
The animal was too large to fit underneath the seat in front of its owner. It was too large to fit on the floor. So the dog’s owner just had it sit beside them, notwithstanding the seat was assigned to someone else. And the dog bumped the passenger out of the seat.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
Today is the most democratic (small d) day of the year in travel. That’s because it’s January 1, and in many programs everyone’s elite status counters get reset to zero (except for those squirrely foreign programs that have membership years based on the date you joined, and American that has extended the elite earning year by two months).
I have exactly the same number of elite qualifying miles and nights as everyone else today.
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 »
