Tag Archives for american airlines.
Thursday morning I laid out the realistic pessimistic view that we aren’t going to see ‘normal’ again for quite some time, and that what we even think of as normal may shift.
One indication of this is that American Airlines has extended change fee waivers for passengers traveling through May 31.
Minutiae may seem trivial at this time but thinking back on them, I realize how much I’ve appreciated the effort. Mostly though I’ve appreciated the people. The ladies in the Austin club (they’ev all been ladies) have been amazing, taking care of me during the worst of American’s operational challenges.
I haven’t been in during recent days to offer support, and I feel badly about that too. After 9/11 I brought treats to my local United Airlines City Ticket Office to support the employees that I’d gotten to know and had been so helpful to me over the years.
With Americans being told not to travel abroad, and non-residents who have been in Europe over the past 14 days not permitted to travel to the U.S., American Airlines has reduced its transatlantic and transpacific flying to three routes total.
However supply chains matter as much – probably more – than ever before, as anyone who has tried to get toilet paper in the last week can probably attest.
In London just in advance of travel restrictions going into effect, American Airlines President Robert Isom traveled across the Pond to speak to employees there. American employees nearly 1000 people in the U.K.
He spoke at the British Airways headquarters at Waterside, and said that while they aren’t going to spend “even a dollar” that they do not have to, they owe it to customers not to degrade the inflight experience and that the company is “prepared to weather any type of storms that come up and says there’s “enough cash on hand to weather downturns in the business.” And that was before they picked up another billion dollars just today. Still they want to ensure that if the government is handing out money, they’re well-positioned to get some.
American Airlines interlines a lot of passengers from Philippine Airlines at Los Angeles. They’re picking up a lot of passengers each day from Manila and sending many of them onward to Manila. Now American and Philippine Airlines have filed for permission to codeshare.
American Airlines still expires miles in your account if you don’t have activity for 18 months. They have not paused this even though travel has slowed down for so many. There are simple ways to make sure your miles don’t expire.
Due to low passenger volumes and suspended flights, American is closing 11 lounges so far. I expect that number to grow.
There are various state laws that are affecting service in Admirals Clubs. Perhaps the most extreme place you can social distance inside of an airport is in American’s Flagship First Dining. But they’ve had to close it at New York JFK because ‘restaurants’ are required to be closed. Some won’t let you take food with you, others won’t let you eat the food they give you there. And in some places alcohol cannot be served.
American Airlines is telling flight attendants they have “great options” to choose from to voluntarily reduce the airline’s workforce: retirement and no pay but two years of benefits, or leave with no pay but benefits. Pilots are being offered about two-thirds of pay.
Unless there’s some sort of commitment not to furlough employees as part of taking the government bailout package airline CEOs and their lobbyists have been pushing for, I’d expect to see furloughs coming next.
American Airlines has cut its international schedule by 75% and its domestic schedule by 30%. Load factors are dropping. People aren’t buying tickets. The one thing American Airlines has too much of is seating capacity. And the one thing American Airlines has too little of to make it through this crisis is money. That’s why they’re running to the government for assistance.
And yet they’re continuing their ‘Oasis retrofit’ program where they replace the interiors of domestic aircraft to add seats to planes, making them less comfortable for passengers.
American Airlines, slow off the dime in its moves to protect its business compared to United and Delta, already began major capacity cuts in response to the administration’s ban on non-U.S. residents entering the country if they’ve been to Schengen Area countries of Europe within the past 14 days.
With the government extending that restriction to the U.K. and Ireland, and with demanding drying up more and more each day, they’ve now taken things a step further. They are reduce international capacity by 75% year-over-year. Ostensibly this will apply March 16 to May 6, but many of these cuts will almost certainly last longer.
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 »
