When Southwest Airlines extended elite status back in April, and made it easier this year to earn both status and a Companion Pass, they extended the validity of travel vouchers.
There’s been discussion for months about being able to convert travel funds into Rapid Rewards points and that functionality is finally available. The rate is reasonable but I won’t be taking them up on the offer. Here’s why.
Six men were charged with “stealing millions of airline frequent flier miles” in the Northern District of Texas. While the Department of Justice doesn’t say this, the court in which charges are being brought includes Dallas and almost certainly means they’re prosecuting a theft of American AAdvantage miles.
The lead defendant was arrested in Poland in May and extradited, arriving in FBI custody on Friday after weekend travel from Warsaw to Dallas. I’ve been involved in several criminal trials involving miles and points as an expert witness. This is the first one I’m aware of that involved an international arrest and extradition.
Right now there’s a stronger likelihood of a second round of airline subsidies from the federal government than at any time in the past several months. It appears that $17 billion more for airlines is included in the next scaled-down federal stimulus bill, and legislative leaders in the House and Senate plan to bundle it with must-pass funding measures to keep the government running and avoid a shut down. Now legislators have a Friday deadline.
Airlines have deployed the argument that the vaccine means they need subsidies because they’ll have to scale up operations to be prepared for cargo shipments, and even though they’d be paid to ship cargo somehow they are unable to prepare for that on their own. This is, to put it bluntly, a lie. Here are 10 reasons why.
At the end of last week American Airlines President Robert Isom held a town hall meeting with pilots, a recording of which has been reviewed by View From The Wing. Isom outlined the airline’s aircraft fleet plans for 2021.
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.
The Boeing 737 MAX is ungrounded. Part of moving on, though, isn’t just getting regulators to sign off on the plane. It’s making things right with the families of people who lost their lives. Boeing paid out a substantial settlement, but Lion Air 610 families say their lawyer – made famous by the movie Erin Brockovich – stole the money to support himself and his reality star wife.
In countries where Covid-19 has been contained, quarantines are taken seriously. Taiwan was one of the earliest successes in keeping the virus at bay. Surveillance video is used to catch those who break quarantine. And there are consequences.
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.
Airlines have gone to some real lengths in recent years to make their safety videos memorable and sometimes funny. Often they’re just trying too hard. Some carriers like American Airlines have stayed away from this entirely with their new safety video, released by mistake.
Despite all of the effort and money that’s gone into safety videos, it’s apparently never occurred to anyone with enough influence to use Men Without Hats The Safety Dance – until now. How is this possible?
In 2013 Airbus warned of fume events from failure to clean environmental systems following leaks, and suggesting “A clean APU means clean cabin air.”
There are scores of Airbus narrowbody fume incidents across diverse carriers — including some fume occurrences leading to flight diversions and hospitalized passengers and crew — across JetBlue, Austrian, British Airways, American Airlines, Spirit, Lufthansa, easyJet, Aer Lingus, Jetstar, Germanwings, Turkish, Air France, Delta and others. And regulators may not be doing enough about it.
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 »
