A first class American Airlines passenger was kicked off of a flight after requesting a predeparture beverage. He refused to leave after being told to do so a flight attendant and a pilot, so police were called.
He wants to know what he’s done. It doesn’t matter, he’s been told to leave and in the moment there’s nothing he can do about it. The request does not have to be reasonable. He’s going to have to comply.
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.
Why are they even training for a middle of the night interrogation inside a hotel with guests sleeping?
Pilots have a lot more sway at airlines than flight attendants. It’s harder to become a pilot, in part because government regulations make doing so time-consuming and costly. That makes it hard to replace pilots. Pilots also have a lot more say over an airline’s operation, so can slow it down dramatically.
Those are important reasons why pilots are paid more. They receive better benefits. And their life on the road often features better hotels, better ground transportation, and higher meal allowances. Is that… fair?
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.
New U.S. Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) got frustrated with United Airlines and tweeted out his boarding pass, complete with reservation number and MileagePlus number.
Vance had blasted United Airlines for something that airline passengers are frustrated with all the time – the failure to update customers in a timely manner. In this case the plane hadn’t yet boarded at the scheduled boarding time, but was still showing as though it would.
A passenger off of a transatlantic flight to New York has shared what happened when they were accidentally directed straight out of JFK airport – instead of being directed to immigration.
They were sent a note by the airline that they had to return to New York JFK airport the next day and given a specific time to do so in order to present themselves to the U.S. government.
Aircraft manufacturer Airbus tweeted on Wednesday evening that American Airlines lost their luggage. Someone had flown into Washington, D.C. where Airbus has its headquarters, and the airline failed to deliver their bags – or to send the bags out to the customer when they said to expect them. American Airlines is the largest operator of Airbus aircraft.
American Airlines has eliminated its ‘saver’ and ‘anytime’ awards. Now when you’re using American’s miles to fly American Airlines, the only option is web special awards, which have been renamed Flight Awards. Nothing else changes at this time, though a number of things flow from this decision.
Most awards were already web specials. There’s a new award chart, but it doesn’t provide very much information. Overall I consider the change negative, but mostly just recognizing past devaluations rather than representing a new devaluation.
American Airlines has eliminated Saver and Anytime awards, and replaced those award charts with a new ‘starting from’ pricing chart for American Airlines flights. There are no changes to partner awards or upgrade awards. And since most American awards were already dynamically-priced web specials, in practice little changes at all.
Here are the full details.
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 »
