Tag Archives for american airlines.
I’m looking at changing an American Airlines business class ticket. This is not a cheap ticket. It’s well over $3,000 one way. American’s website says it’s possible to do what I want.
American Airlines flight attendants have a status conference with the National Mediation Board this upcoming Wednesday over whether the federal government will allow them to strike.
And flight attendant social media is lighting up over an incident on board a flight from Dallas to Denver this week where the airline’s Senior Vice President of Inflight and Premium Guest Services, Brady Byrnes, was traveling with his family and reportedly wrote up the crew for failing to deliver proper service.
Several customers are suing American Airlines after their AAdvantage accounts were shut down. They used invitations to apply for Citibank credit cards that circumvented rules limiting how often one could get a new card bonus. People lost millions of miles.
There’s a lawsuit. American has responded. And they advance a pretty draconian theory.
While the Airbus A321XLR is still in the future – the aircraft hasn’t been certified yet, so Airbus can’t deliver any – American is beginning the process of switching its existing fleet of A321T planes into the standard, less luxurious configuration.
The onlooker flagged down a flight attendant, asking to at least be able to change seats. She “looked over at them, said it didn’t look like they were doing anything to her” and told him that he couldn’ be moved – that if it bothered him she should “just ignore them, it’s a short flight.”
That’s when he began filming. He showed the video to another flight attendant, who was shocked – not at the behavior of the passengers in congress – that he recorded them.
American Airlines upgrades on Qantas are now live. It’s managed by PlusGrade, the company that sells ‘bidding for upgrade’ programs to airlines. And it’s a “cash or miles” upgrade option. Basically you have the ability to upgrade on Qantas, as a Qantas member might, but pay using AAdvantage miles. And this is the oneworld upgrade program.
During the American Airlines Investor Day on Monday afternoon, an analyst asked whether American would be open to re-starting its partnership with JetBlue. When the government sued to break up the deal, the judge in the case argued that it’s carving up who flies where that was an anti-trust violation. The judge’s decision was clear that a partnership along the lines of how American and Alaska Airlines work together in their ‘West Coast Alliance’ would have been legal.
American Airlines held its Investor Day on Monday afternoon. There was a surprising amount about the AAdvantage program in the discussion, in addition to what you’d expect about airline strategy.
We can expect to see some changes in how miles are awarded (more miles), new redemption options, and better redemptions for members with status. And there’s an explicit commitment not just to defend the value of their miles, but to ensure their currency provides greater value per mile than competitor airlines and even banks do.
A week ago I wrote that American Airlines would announce a big order for new planes on March 4th. Now they have done just that, placing an order for 260 planes: 85 Airbus A321neo, 85 Boeing 737 MAX 10, and 90 Embraer E175 aircraft.
Jeff Bezos for years has preached a simple mantra: that the biggest mistake companies can make is focusing on what their competitors do, rather than what their customers want – and working backwards from satisfying the customer to figuring out the product.
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 »
