News notes from around the interweb:
- Amsterdam’s mayor wants to open a prostitution hotel
- Uber appears to be devaluing the elite benefits of its Uber Rewards program starting August 4. For instance instead of Platinums and Diamonds getting ‘price protection’ on their favorite route (I’ve saved a ton on airport pickups) the favorite route will earn bonus points instead.
This makes me not at all unhappy about losing my Diamond status come August, since while Uber extended elite status they only did so for those with earlier expiration at the start of the pandemic.
- No doubt Boeing is apoplectic that the FAA is opening a 45 day public comment period, which the agency will then have to respond to, as part of its process to re-certify the Boeing 737 MAX.
- Shanghai-based China Eastern, part-owned by Delta, says they’ll be back to 94% of last year’s capacity by the end of the month, how many of you were skeptical of this?
- Wendy’s has launched a new revenue-based loyalty program $45 spend gets a breakfasts baconator sandwich.
- This is also what American Airlines now serves on their longest domestic flights, other than New York JFK – Los Angeles and San Francisco and on their longer Hawaii flights. (It used to be the ‘buy on board’ cheese plate in coach.)
Onboard @AmericanAir today, I was served a cheese plate in first class from DCA to ORD. It appears that the cheese plate is still served on flights that are an exemption market, and during a lite bites time period. Interesting. pic.twitter.com/RXzCY5a5il
— Jamie Larounis (@TheForwardCabin) July 21, 2020
What’s an exemption market??
@John exception markets are those shorter than the normal length the airline requires but where a meal is still provided, usually for competitive reasons (other airlines do it too) or because of the importance of the market for business travelers.
You should do a blog post as to why Uber can’t offer a proper loyalty program and is taking a knife to it now. Runs counter to all your principles. That’s your wheelhouse baby
@Stvr – they don’t have anyone there that understands it, they’ve laid off the folks who were driving it, remember applications for their cobrand card are even paused and they’ve more or less de facto given up turning uber credits into a standalone currency than they’d planned
but it’s sure bizarre nonetheless.
Excited to see what a crack squad of experts comprised of Joe and Jane SixPack can uncover RE: the 737 MAX. How many inspections is the FAA going to have to complete to assure the public that there aren’t any chemtrail sprayers on board? :-\
Gary, thanks for the explanation of the “exception” market. The original writer threw in “exemption” market which was apparently not the correct term.