Necessity is the mother of invention, and the coronavirus pandemic has created plenty of necessity. Thai Airways is in the midst of restructuring and they’re looking for revenue anywhere they can find it.
Among the course options, for 2800 Baht ($89) you can learn to be a flight attendant. Their safety course lets you head down the emergency slide and put a real fire out on a plane. You can even take cooking classes to make inflight Thai meals.
British Airways cabin crew who tested negative for Covid-19 on arrival were nonetheless rounded up from the SkyCity Marriott near the Hong Kong airport and taken to a forced 14 day quarantine in a government facility when one member of the crew tested positive. The airline’s pilots were allowed to return to London.
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.
American has been speaking to the customers that are traveling the most now during the pandemic – and it’s not the ‘executive liaison’ callers doing the dialing, it’s the airline’s senior management.
American Airlines President Robert Isom told pilots last week that Chief Revenue Officer Vasu Raja and Chief Customer Officer Alison Taylor thought it would be “neat to find out who it is that’s traveling and still earning elite status throughout the pandemic.” So they “pulled a lit of the top 50 customers and assigned 10 [each]” to various senior executives, including Isom himself who reports that this was the “first time [he] cold called customers in a long time.”
There are two new important testing developments in travel today, both United Airlines announcement. United is partnering to provide Covid testing for its San Francisco – Hawaii flights. They’re providing testing at the airport, and they’ve worked with Hawaii to accept an Abbott rapid test rather than just a PCR test.
The airline expects to expand this to other airports and destinations.
American Airlines no longer sends membership kits to frequent flyers when they earn AAdvantage elite status. This means that elites are no longer sent a membership card, luggage tags, or employee recognition certificates. Instead the airline tells newly minted elite members that AAdvantage is “a fully digital experience.”
However they will still allow elite members to call and request certificates to give to employees for ‘above and beyond’ service.
It’s been two years since they announced this was coming, and all they’ve done so far is change the program name and announced points will no longer expire, but Virgin is trying their hand at a coalition loyalty program across the group’s brands. There’s also a double points promotion for Virgin flights.
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.
Covid-sniffing dogs were already tested in the UAE with 90% accuracy, now they’re being trialed in Helsinki. Two European airports will use a self-serve ‘Israeli gargle test’ which provides results in 15 minutes. Both are efforts to ensure travelers are all virus free, and give both passengers and governments confidence to travel the way we (mostly) used to.
An even better solution extends far beyond airports. Cheap, at home strip tests (think of something similar to a pregnancy test) that identify whether or not you’re Covid-positive. The primary obstacle to cheap daily at home testing isn’t technology, it’s the FDA. Set this up to read results through an app, and the app could become your passport not just to travel but also bring back indoor activities.
American Airlines is primarily a domestic airline. They’re smaller internationally than Delta and United. Their focus has been building domestic connections between the middle of the country and also the Sun Belt.
Like all the other major airlines they have a number of planes parked, especially widebody planes that fly internationally. Talking to pilots last week about how they’ll grow their route network again and deploy these widebodies, American’s Senior Vice President and Chief Revenue Officer Vasu Raja offered four principles.
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 »
