For many years Chase operated a pop up lounge around at the holidays for United Explorer cardmembers at the Mall at Short Hills, New Jersey. They wanted to be where there customers are.
Coming soon is a network of Chase airport lounges co-branded with Collinson’s The Club, the same company that brings you Priority Pass. But before we see the opening of the first Chase airport lounge, the bank has opened a lounge in the Metaverse..
A man on a Delta Air Lines Salt Lake City – Portland flight on Friday removed the plastic covering from the emergency exit handle on his aircraft and tried to pull it. He wasn’t going to actually succeed in opening the exit door of the pressurized cabin, but his unruly behavior got him arrested.
It turns out his goal wasn’t trying to open the exit door at all. The whole thing was a ruse to attract attention.
Singapore Airlines is offering business class saver awards on its non-stop flights between the U.S. and Singapore out of New York JFK, Newark, and San Francisco for at least two passengers through much of the year.
You’ll find the space form now through end of schedule, so you can pick whatever time works best for you and the vagaries of immigration-restricting authorities to visit Southeast Asia.
Apparently your elite status will not protect you. A customer, currently sitting in jail, wasn’t even status matched or given status from a credit card. He’s spent $15,000 with Hertz during the pandemic.
While this isn’t a foolproof strategy, I’ve implored readers over and over renting from Hertz not to change vehicles or extend rentals. The problem certainly doesn’t happen every time but when it does it’s bad enough that each rental with Hertz seems like a risk to me.
Like airlines, Marriott will now sell you points while making a booking, not just on a dedicated page. That way they have more opportunities to sell points. And they’ve increased the limit on the number of points you can buy. They’re also running a new points purchase bonus of up to 50% more points.
No matter what your position on continued masking on planes throughout the Omicron wave – that it no longer makes sense to extend the federal transportation mask mandate which currently runs through March 18, 2022.
Betting markets now give 3-1 odds that the mask mandate will be gone before the election. Prediction markets are frequently more reliable than expert commentary because well-informed observers put real money behind their arguments (it’s their revealed expectations, rather than cheap talk).
Any airline with the resources can buy a large flat seat and pay for good catering. Creating a true lifestyle brand experience creates a moat against competition – the opposite of the commodity mindset that most airlines have adopted. Rather than being unprofitable, first class therefore carries the potential to be the most profitable since it’s the most de-commoditized. And in a world where so few do it, it’s easy to get a head start.
Bill Franke is a name that should make airline passengers shudder and yet it’s hardly known. He ran America West and hired Doug Parker to be his cost-cutting CFO.
Franke is responsible for turning Spirit Airlines into an ultra low cost carrier. He divested there and bought Frontier Airlines, turning it into a Spirit clone. And now he’s merging the two. And another one of his airlines is looking to offer transatlantic service.
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.
Hyatt is making annual hotel category changes – making some hotels to more expensive points redemptions, while making other hotels less expensive, based on the room rates those hotels are projected to achieve. These changes will go into effect at 146 hotels on March 22, 2022 at 8:00 a.m. Central time.
What’s significant here is that even though slightly more hotels will go down in category (76) versus going up in category (70), this should still be seen as a devaluation – and in some cases a big one. For the first time ever Hyatt will charge category 8 prices for hotels that have been in their own portfolio for years, not merely partner hotels or hotels that are part of newly acquired brands.
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 »
