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.
There may be a very good reason that the UnitedSM Explorer Card has its best-ever public signup offer.
The airline’s financials suggest stagnation in MileagePlus’ growth. I believe they’ve largely been flat outside of revenue from Chase for Ultimate Rewards points transfers.
With China Southern leaving the SkyTeam alliance next year American Airlines — which owns a $200 million stake in the Chinese carrier — will be expanding its codesharing relationship next year. Along with that will come reciprocal mileage-earning and redemption and reciprocal lounge access.
Ultimately this will be a huge net add for AAdvantage members looking to travel to Asia, unless dominoes fall further and eventually push Cathay Pacific out of oneworld. That would not be a worthwhile tradeoff.
When a man declared himself a terrorist in his dating life, his Jet Airways flight aborted takeoff in Kolkoata, India on Monday.
The man was onboard Jet Airways flight 472 to Mumbai. He snapchatted a photo of himself “with a handkerchief covering half his face” along with the comment “Terrorist on board, I destroy women’s hearts”.
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.
Earlier I asked whether Royal Air Maroc is about to join oneworld. We now know that oneworld will be announcing a new member on December 5. Royal Air Maroc is my bet.
In addition Alaska Airlines says they are considering joining oneworld as a ‘connect’ member.
At the beginning of last week I wrote about American’s service training for new flight attendants. Basically they don’t get any although the airline says they’ll start offering a (very) modest amount next year.
Several flight attendants have weighed in on this discussion. They share their stories.
oneworld is about to celebrate its 20th anniversary. They have their governing board meeting next week in New York.
Government-owned Royal Air Maroc, based in Casablanca, would fill a huge gap for oneworld in Africa. The airline has been inching closer to oneworld members Qatar and Iberia, and an agreement to use Avios as their mileage currency. They start service to a new American Airlines hub in April.
Ironically there’s a lot of sitting around in travel. Plenty of flight attendants bring magazines or books with them, often now reading on a tablet. One British Airways flight attendant got fired for reading her book upside down (it was a dead giveaway she was drunk).
I have to say though this is the absolute best use of a book on an aircraft. Ever.
Star Alliance carrier ANA is introducing Airbus A380 service between Tokyo and Honolulu. They didn’t really want A380s, but it’s how they got Airbus’ support as a creditor to take over bankrupt Skymark. This new Hawaii service will launch May 24.
We’ve now learned more about the inflight product as well including details of unique business class, coach (“joined to create a lie flat bed”) and first class.
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 »
