Oct 25 2018

American’s stock hit new lows yesterday in advance of today’s earnings call. That left the airline in a tough position, needing to explain how they’d cut costs which are rising at a faster rate than revenues.

I listen to the earnings call with a different perspective than most people covering them. I’m interested in news about the loyalty program, about the product, and about how changes to the business are likely to impact the way customers interact with the airline — as well as what we can expect from the overall direction in the industry.

As a result some of the six things that stuck out for me are likely to be different than key takeaways elsewhere, and are things you may otherwise miss.

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Oct 25 2018

This week we learned that American Airlines is gutting the ability to earn elite qualifying dollars from credit card spend for next year.

Barclays representatives are saying that they are unable to upgrade customers from Red to Silver at this time and that this is a requirement of American Airlines because of a loophole created by this change.

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Oct 24 2018

Basic economy is an attempt by the major airlines to raise revenue by offering a worse product.

The notion here is that the cheapest fares get called basic economy, and you have to spend more to avoid those restrictions. It’s a price increase that applies to customers that are willing to pay more to avoid the least comfortable travel an airline offers.

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