Search Results for "ASIA".
Doha is a really convenient stopover, as the home airport for Qatar Airways, a top world carrier and member of oneworld. Their first class lounge in Doha is amazing, and even features pieces from the Museum of Islamic Art’s collection.
I found just two days in Doha to be perfect, but if I had it to do over again I’d do four nights… two dedicated to a museum visit and two for The Ritz-Carlton Sharq Village & Spa.
I flew the American Airlines domestic inaugural flight for their brand new Boeing 787-9 aircraft on Thursday. From Dallas to Los Angeles I tried out their newest business class product. For the return I flew in their brand new premium economy cabin. That’s the product I’ll share with this post.
I week ago I wrote about truly amazing business class award availability on Delta’s new Minneapolis – Tokyo Haneda flight with 6 or more saver award seats per flight.
This was what availability looked like for 6 passengers in business class during the flight’s first full month of service (Minneapolis – Tokyo Haneda starts October 29). Most dates actually showed 9 business seats.
This summer I wrote about outstanding first class award availability on Etihad and walked through the routes between the US and Abu Dhabi that had award space for at least 2 passengers.
Etihad is one of the top airlines in the world for passenger experience. They offer a great connecting point in Abu Dhabi for travel to India and the surrounding region. I’ve used them to travel there as well as to the Maldives and also back from Sri Lanka.
On September 23 a passenger in his late 30s had an epileptic seizure on Air China flight CA1478 from Kashgar — the westernmost city in China near the border with Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan — to Urumqi in Northwest China.
The passenger lost consciousness and was foaming at the mouth.
Alitalia has an awesomely good award chart for many destinations as I’ve covered in the past. Here are some of their business class partner redemption rates:
t’s rarely the case that airlines will provide meals that will be better than what you can get on the ground. The prepacking in the flight kitchen, constrained spaces onboard, and altitude present real challenges. And food is hardly the primary driver of my choice of premium cabin airline (heh, award space usually is!).
But some airlines do a fantastic job despite the challenging conditions.
Now that Marriott’s acquisition has closed, and they’re already letting you link accounts, match elite status, and move points between programs, there are fantastic arbitrage opportunities created.
However long the period lasts where the Marriott program and Starwood program retain their separate identities while letting members move their points and status back and forth between the two — whether only a little over a year, or for two years — this period may wind up as one of the real golden ages of hotel loyalty programs.
Japan’s Skymark Airlines was scheduled to take the A380, but it went bankrupt. ANA won Airbus’ support as a creditor to take control of Skymark — all they wanted was Skymark’s slots at Tokyo Haneda — by agreeing to accept the Skymark A380s. ANA says they’ll operate the planes to Honolulu.
No US airline has taken an A380. Many airlines regret theirs. It’s a big plane, expensive to operate, although cost-effective if you can fill it. The idea was to fly routes at slot-congested airports, like Tokyo Narita and London Heathrow, where an A380 could replace two smaller planes. But an airline that does that loses frequently, and becomes less convenient for time-sensitive business travelers. And adding seats to a market drives down the price the carrier can sell those seats for.
Nearly three years ago the story went viral about a man who would buy and refund an airline ticket each day using that ticket to gain lounge access and eat free for a year.
Two years ago a man did this 36 times with Lufthansa’s lounges and they sent him a bill for 2000 euros. Airlines often have requirements in their contracts of carriage saying that you actually have to intend to fly when buying a ticket and this sort of behavior is highly suggestive that the man never intended to actually fly.
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 »
