Tag Archives for delta.
Based on a new agreement between the US and Japan, the US Department of Transportation gets to allocate 12 day time slot pairs for service between the US and Tokyo’s close-in Haneda airport starting with the 2020 summer travel season.
The DOT has issued its preliminary ruling, and here’s what they’ve granted.
Recently Delta started adding surcharges to Virgin Atlantic awards in premium economy. Delta has acknowledged this was a mistake. They’ve fixed it — stopped charging miscellaneous surcharges on Virgin Atlantic premium economy awards departing the U.S. — and they’re refunding SkyMiles members that already paid it.
Hilton and Lyft have launched a new partnership. Just link your Hilton and Lyft accounts and earn 3 points per dollar on Lyft rides and 2 points per dollar on Lyft shared rides. This appears to stack with earning Delta miles and JetBlue points for Lyft rides, with credit card rewards earning, and with free ride credits earned paying with a World Elite Mastercard. Together that makes riding Lyft lucrative.
The National Education Association, the teachers’ union, is threatening a boycott of Delta. Their President has sent a letter to Delta President Glen Hauenstein, and they’ve tweeted “We won’t be flying Delta.”
Here’s the NEA’s letter to Delta.
Delta is telling employees that if they unionize, union dues are going to cost them $700 per year. And they could buy video games with that money.
Why not make the same argument this way instead?
Delta’s pilots and dispatchers are unionized. However Delta clearly benefits from having fewer unions.
The IAM is working to organize Delta’s flight attendants and fleet service workers. Delta has a counter-campaign.
Several frequent flyer programs around the world let you put your status on pause, or extend your status, when you experience major life events. It’s not nearly as common in the U.S., perhaps because we’re not as focused here on accommodating new births or medical issues as people are in Europe or Australia.
It makes all the sense in the world for a travel loyalty program, though. A customer who was incredibly valuable before having a child is likely to be incredibly valuable once the get back on the road.
Asked about the Boeing 737 MAX during Berkshire Hathaway’s shareholders meeting, Warren Buffett said that he “will never hesitate even for a second to fly on a 737 MAX” once it returns to service.
You may have an opportunity to fly the MAX again sometime this summer. Will you let it take you where you’re going?
Ever since removing their award charts from public view, Delta has seemed to go out of their way to find more and more ways to stick it to their SkyMiles members like imposing basic economy restrictions on the least expensive awards and eliminating high value upgrade awards.
Now they have a new trick to charge you more miles — and since they don’t tell you how their pricing works you might never even know it and wind up spending more miles than you have to for the same itinerary! Delta now charges more than 50% the roundtrip cost of an award for many international redemptions.
At some level if a US airline cannot compete against an Italian one, a ‘government-controlled’ one no less, they probably shouldn’t be in business. And shouldn’t they worry about how about half of their passengers feel when they’re flattering the President as election season heats up?
What they’re so worried about – and running to the President for protection from – is an airline in Italy with 15 planes that’s just suspended winter service from Los Angeles and San Francisco – and that cancelled Chicago service before it even began.
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 »
