Great American Airlines First Class Award Space West Coast – Europe Without Fuel Surcharges

by Gary Leff

flight chart
Jun 03 2019

West Coast – Europe award travel is tough, getting premium cabin to Europe on American Airlines (and thus not paying surcharges) is tougher still. This is definitely worth taking ‘AAdvantage’ of. And if you have a stash of Etihad Guest miles, ring up about your preferred itinerary to see if they can book for 50,000 miles each way in business (vs. 57,500 from American) or 62,500 in first.

However if there was any doubt that American’s married segment award availability logic was in play for premium cabin awards now (and with ensuing negative consequences for making changes to awards) this should illustrate the extension beyond coach — and is a part of dynamic availability if not pricing.

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US Government Tentatively Approves Anti-Trust Immunity for American Airlines and Qantas

by Gary Leff

sydney opera house at sunset
Jun 03 2019

Three and a half years ago American Airlines and Qantas announced an expanded joint venture. American was launching Sydney and Auckland service, Qantas Sydney – San Francisco. And they indicated there would be more new routes in the offing as a result of the partnership.

They proposed to extend their partnership to coordinate schedules and pricing and share revenue on Pacific flights (but not Hawaii routes). The Obama administration said no. The Trump administration has now said yes.

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The Destruction of 6 Dallas Love Field Gates Could Be Headed to the Supreme Court

by Gary Leff

airline
Jun 03 2019

Southwest Airlines started out as an underdog fighting government cronyism meant to keep it from flying. Now it’s the beneficiary of government cronyism meant to keep others from flying. The Supreme Court isn’t going to undo that, though Congress should. However the court could fix an important precedent that allowed Love Field gates to be taken from their owner without payment.

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Another Southwest Flight Attendant Cares for Baby Inflight, this Great Service is Getting Ridiculous

by Gary Leff

man and baby
Jun 02 2019

The Dowell family found three seats together in the last row of their Boeing 737-800, and were struggling to juggle their bags and accoutrements for their baby. That’s when Wesley, one of the flight attendants on board, offered to hold 9-month old Alayna while they got themselves situated.

She was “screaming her head off for quite a while” while inflight so Wesley came back and offered to take her — walking her up and down the aisle, shushing her, and calming her. He did this for 15 minutes, “rubbing her back, walking up and down the aisle like it was just a day in the park” before returning her to her parents where she fell asleep.

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Is Detroit Challenging Atlanta as the Most Corrupt Airport in the Country?

by Gary Leff

planes docked
Jun 02 2019

The airport’s former manager is in the midst of a federal criminal trial. James Warner is accused of “fabricating invoices, overcharging the airport for work performed by contractors and receiving more than $5 million worth of kickbacks during a four-year period” — which is even more than Detroit’s former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick took in payoffs.

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United’s Air Canada Award Availability Problem Fixed

by Gary Leff

lounge desk
Jun 02 2019

Last month I received several questions from readers about why United wasn’t showing award space on Air Canada that appeared to be available to every other Star Alliance partner?

If you called United and spoke to an agent they’d generally be able to ‘see’ the inventory (in other words, X and I buckets for economy and business appeared to have space) but they couldn’t book it. What’s more that’s at a time when Air Canada availability looked excellent when searching on other partner websites, like Singapore Airlines Krisflyer, even for tough-to-get flights like Vancouver – Sydney.

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