american airlines

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American Airlines About to Drop a Big List of New Routes and Network Changes

by Gary Leff

american plush airplane
Aug 07 2019

I’ve previously predicted Chicago – Krakow and Philadelphia – Casablanca so I’ll still with those. (They weren’t final by any means when I heard about them.) Since there’ll be several routes announced there should be something from the Qantas JV, it’ll include Europe changes, and also bundle small ball North America stuff. I expect that changes will probably be less heavy in South America – even though airline President Robert Isom just made a trip there – pending the LATAM joint venture.

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American Says Customers Have Become Less Likely To Recommend the Airline

by Gary Leff

Jul 28 2019

American Airlines produced a report for employees on the carrier’s progress towards its 2019 goals. One item that stood out – apart from the airline’s operational problems this year – is that customer “likelihood to recommend” scores have fallen.

The airline attributes this to its reliability challenges, although it’s equally notable that American compares themselves to just before they began retrofitting domestic aircraft to a new less comfortable standard.

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Why American’s Operational Problems are About More than a Mechanics Slowdown

by Gary Leff

american airlines hangar
Jul 26 2019

I’ve certainly written the most about the mechanics slowdown component of this issue. It’s what employees and the company have been most vocal about. But even without that the operation would still be suffering. And the reason to get a joint contract done isn’t just to end the animosity (an odd place to be for a company claiming its culture is its competitive advantage), it will also reduce the friction in getting legitimate maintenance work accomplished — on ex-US Airways aircraft by legacy American Airlines employees and vice versa.

Even so, the airline will have to invest in clearing deferred maintenance items. It will have to stock the parts needed to keep the fleet flying. In the meantime they’re still planning to re-start their domestic narrowbody densification program next year, so they’ll be taking additional aircraft out of service. It may be awhile for the airline’s operation to recover even after they get a deal done with mechanics and there’s little indication at this point that a deal is close.

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No, the Trophy for World’s Largest Airline Didn’t Just Pass from American to Delta

by Gary Leff

american airlines plane
Jul 25 2019

This morning Edward Russell noted at the Points Guy that Delta earned more revenue than American in the last quarter, and United has more seat capacity than both. The title of his post, “American Airlines Loses World’s Largest Airline Title to Delta and United.”

Lucky at One Mile at a Time picks this up, while noting American has a larger fleet and more employees. He suggests American’s personnel count “is just to say that they aren’t very efficient.”

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Congratulations: American Airlines Finally Made Money Flying Passengers in the Second Quarter

by Gary Leff

american airlines plane
Jul 25 2019

I wrote last fall about how American Airlines was losing money flying passengers and also covered earlier in the year how all of their profit was accounted for by the AAdvantage frequent flyer program. American Airlines makes money selling frequent flyer miles to banks.

This was notable because it underscored just how badly the passenger operation was performing financially.

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