‘Basic Business Class’ Fares Are Bad Business For Both Customers And Airlines

by Gary Leff

Jun 19 2021

Emirates started selling ‘basic business class’ fares last year. Qatar Airways came out with this, restricting access to lounges and to advance seat selection on the cheapest business class tickets. And the latest entrant into this game is Finnair, and their restrictions are absolutely brutal.

What’s really interesting here is whether airlines can make Basic Business Class work as a way to generate more revenue. While Basic Economy has caught on and had mixed results, it’s going to be a lot harder to do with Business Class and that strategy will probably cost an airline more than it’ll generate in incremental revenue. Your cable television bill helps explain why.

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How One New Priority Pass Lounge Shows The Failure Of Asia In The Pandemic’s Re-Opening Phase

by Gary Leff

Jun 19 2021

Cathay Pacific carried an average of just 774 passengers per day in May. Only around 2000 passengers per day used the Hong Kong airport. That’s only 1% of pre-pandemic volume. As a result, Cathay Pacific has just one lounge open – The Wing First Class lounge.

The Wing first class lounge joins Priority Pass effective Monday, June 21.

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American Airlines Is Cancelling Scores Of Flights Due To Lack Of Pilots

by Gary Leff

cockpit with pilot
Jun 19 2021

American Airlines has cancelled over 100 flights already today. The most common reason is ‘flight crew unavailable’. Many other flights show cancelled due to ‘operational decision’ which appears to be giving that flight’s pilots to another aircraft (in other words, also ‘flight crew unavailable’). In contrast, as of this writing United has cancelled eight flights today and Delta has cancelled two.

The issue appears to be concentrated on the Boeing 737 fleet. American’s schedule seems too big for the crew they have available, especially since they’re only midway through the process of bringing inactive pilots back online.

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The Difference Between Scheduling Flights For Customers And Scheduling For Operations

by Gary Leff

Jun 19 2021

American Airlines is launching service between Austin and Washington Dulles in August. This flight is absolutely ideal for me. I live in Austin and in the Before Times my most frequent destination was Washington DC – a minimum of once a month, and often twice.

But the flight times are terrible – scheduled to allow a single plan to operate the route, rather than being scheduled for the business travelers who would actually take the flight.

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The President of AAdvantage Wants To Replace Award Charts With A Real Estate Website

by Gary Leff

Jun 18 2021

The President of the American AAdvantage program says they’re intending to get rid of award charts. He offered that they’re working on a replacement like “a real estate website that shows you how many people have bought a property in a given area and for what price range, as well as a ticker for how many people are looking at a specific property right now.”

The more I think about this model, and this analogy that he offers, the worse it sounds for customers.

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