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.
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.
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.
United Airlines flight attendants don’t have to social distance from each other in the galley. On long haul flights they’re in close contact with customers as they serve beverages and even meals. But the airline is telling them that as a Covid precaution they need to stop sharing beds up in the crew rest area of widebody aircraft.
A 75 year old woman with terminal lung disease was heading to Seattle on Alaska Airlines – but was kicked off of her flight at the Fairbanks, Alaska airport over face mask rules.
She wore an N95 mask and a face shield during boarding. But once she settled into her seat she replaced those with a respirator helmet.
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 piece opens with new American Airlines frequent flyer head Rick Elieson, who moves over from cargo, explaining how loyalty and cargo aren’t that different than you’d think and the joke almost writes itself about AAdvantage members being self-loading cargo.
Elieson does confirm that award charts aren’t going away, that he’s working to get more saver award inventory, and that he’s open to considering a family pooling benefit.
There’s been no known cases of Covid-19 transmission on US airlines. Sure US contact tracing isn’t very good. But even internationally and across the whole world there are only a few flights where spread is believed to have occurred despite around a billion people traveling so far this year.
Hotels too seem to be safe. There haven’t been documented cases of spread between rooms either in hotels or office buildings.
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 »
