United Airlines MileagePlus is now charging a premium for non-stop partner award tickets booked within a month of travel. Right now, of course, when people book air travel it tends to be at the last minute cause of all the uncertainty in the world. And United hasn’t even told members they made this change.
Delta, like many other airlines, wants the best customers of competitor airlines. And to make it easier to switch, they offer temporary elite status (a status match) and an expedited path to keep that status (a status challenge).
Right now they want the best customers of competitor airlines a lot more than usual and are doing something creative about it.
British anti-lockdown protestors were flying BA from Berlin to London Heathrow and “celebrated their ‘victory’ over airport staff” by sharing photos on social media where they’re flying without masks.
Etihad isn’t just dropping chefs from first class, flight attendants with restaurant experience and who are more expensive for the airline.
They’re also eliminating their Flying Nannies program in partnership with Norland College. And, with Etihad’s Airbus A380s grounded, the ‘butlers’ who serve the A380 Residence (and act as flight attendants on flights without passengers traveling in the Residence) are having their duties re-assigned.
The cheapest tickets on United are a worse value than similar fares on Delta and Southwest (especially) but even American too. Right now most passengers aren’t well-informed and disproportionately book through sites like Expedia – and as a result don’t know that they’re getting less value, because these sites don’t tell them. Online booking sites don’t serve the people who are ostensibly their customers.
Etihad will eliminate first class chefs and business class food and beverage managers. It’s expected that the former may be laid off “by the end of October” while the latter face elimination “by the end of this year.”
Etihad’s first class chefs are flight attendants with restaurant cooking experience. Food and beverage managers are specially trained.
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Right now there are some great opportunities to use your miles for the whole family on Qatar Airways QSuites from San Francisco to travel to the Mideast, Africa, or region around India as well as to travel on the new Qantas Chicago – Brisbane flight. Space is generally available throughout 2021, and by the second half of the year we could be past the current unpleasantness.
A fired flight attendant who worked for defunct ExpressJet Airlines is asking the Supreme Court to review a 6th Circuit decision that didn’t allow her to sue for requiring her to serve alcohol to passengers even though she’s Muslim.
The case presents interesting questions of whether federal labor law (which requires arbitration) trumps federal civil rights law (which allows a suit) and whether an airline having to re-open a collective bargaining agreement to provide an accommodation constitutes an undue burden.
While the Wright Amendment’s restrictions on flying to specific states with aircraft that have more than 56 seats was lifted, I had forgotten that not all restrictions were eliminated. Southwest would have to give up some of its Love Field gate space if it wanted to serve DFW airport. That’s a restriction that remains in place until 2025.
It is effectively illegal for Southwest Airlines to come in and compete against American Airlines at DFW.
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 »
