Report: Malaysia Airlines Waives $4200 in Checked Baggage Fees for Ex-Prime Minister Facing Corruption Charges

by Gary Leff

chart
Jun 21 2018

Malaysia’s recently ousted Prime Minister Najib Razak cannot leave the country while he faces corruption charges. He took his family on holiday to Langkawi and apparently took quite a lot of baggage on the trip.

He’s a Platinum member of the Malaysia Airlines Enrich status. One imagines whether he meets the criteria or not that he’d have this status. And his Platinum appears to come with a very special perk. His reservation shows that he checked 535kg of luggage and had the 17,000 Malaysia Ringgit excess baggage fee waived.

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After Dropping Chicago – Beijing, American Airlines Considers Ending All Chicago – Asia Flying

by Gary Leff

china memorial
Jun 21 2018

American Airlines announced last month that they’re ending their Chicago – Beijing flight in October.

American’s Vice President – Planning Vasu Raja told employees in Chicago last week at a question and answer session that Chicago flights to Asia are mostly connecting traffic, that they rely on connections from cities with low fares and often their own non-stop flights to the same destinations, and that higher fuel costs make it even harder to sustain flights than before.

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American Says They Need More Premium Seats – So They’re Getting Rid of Premium Seats

by Gary Leff

american plane
Jun 21 2018

American Airlines is predicting that British Airways will fly to more mid-sized US cities than they do today, and that American is going to increase the size of the planes they fly to London Heathrow.

However despite complaining that there aren’t enough premium seats flying Chicago – London, American currently plans to reduce the number of premium seats flying Chicago – London (and to reduce the number of premium seats on two major aircraft types they fly).

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Department of Homeland Security Blasts American, United for Not Wanting to Transport Kids Separated from Families

by Gary Leff

trump the game
Jun 20 2018

Earlier today I wrote about flight attendants expressing concern over transporting kids who were being separated from their families as they’re split up under immigration laws. Both American Airlines and United have expressed solidarity with their crew, which isn’t surprising.

The Department of Homeland Security has come out swinging against both airlines.

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AAdvantage President Shares Her Take on Award Availability, Premium Economy Upgrades and Inflight Credit Card Pitches

by Gary Leff

airplane seats
Jun 20 2018

AAdvantage President Bridget Blaise-Shamai appeared on the latest American Airlines employee podcast Tell Me Why which is also uploaded on several public podcast hosting sites.

She commented on Platinum Pro and ConciergeKey elite status changes, efforts to improve award availability, the future of upgrades into and awards for premium economy, and inflight credit card pitches.

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Unaccompanied Minor Flying Seems to Be Up From the US to Mexico

by Gary Leff

special services card
Jun 20 2018

There’s been a lot of chatter and possibly ill-informed speculation amongst Ameircan Airlines flight attendants about the number of unaccompanied minors being up on their US-Mexico flights.

There’s been some disagreement over whether this is the result of the federal government deporting children on American Airlines flights, or parents proactively sending their children out of the country out of fear they might be captured and held in separation from their families.

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American Says Regional Flights Returning to Normal, Still Cancelling Large Number of Flights

by Gary Leff

american promo
Jun 20 2018

Supposedly American is unable to program waivers based on flight number or regional carrier. They could have issued a waiver for Charlotte but that would have meant that some customers unaffected by American’s major outage could have benefited with fee waivers.

They chose to inconvenience well over 100,000 customers on cancelled flights, not counting myriad more on massively delayed flights, instead of allowing fee-free changes for passengers flying through the most affected airport — chancing that someone somewhere not flying PSA might benefit from the waiver a cost American money. Shameful.

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