News and notes from around the interweb:
- Star Alliance launches connections service at London Heathrow they’ll monitor connections across Star carriers, and provide escorts for (presumably premium) passengers in jeopardy of missing flights.
The Star Alliance Connection Service launched at Chicago O’Hare in 2017, and has subsequently rolled out to airports including Frankfurt, Houston, Munich, Newark and Toronto.
An expedited baggage-only service is also available at Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington.
- Top 20 airports by departing frequencies Chicago is busier than Atlanta. The top 5 are all in the U.S.
Chicago O’Hare - Port Authority to subsidize MTA for LaGuardia AirTrain connection At the end of all this we’re still not going to have decent transit to and from LaGuardia so I’m not really sure of the point.
- Customers moving cash out of Chase for higher-interest alternatives
Copyright: jetcityimage / 123RF Stock Photo - While I continue to believe that the new Marriott program is better than the old Marriott program, and the promised benefits are better than Hilton’s or IHG’s for frequent guests, I also continue to believe they have a consistency issue and customer service is poorly equipped to handle anything that goes wrong.
When an elite member who earned points doesn't even bother to collect them, your program is doing something wrong @MBonvoyAssist. The transaction costs are just too darned high dealing with @MarriottBonvoy customer service. https://t.co/PccGcbtawt
— gary leff (@garyleff) May 31, 2019
- Why people are late to the airport some of us just value our time and are trying to maximize the productiveness of every minute.
- June 25 will be Anthony Bourdain day.
IMPORTANT! JUNE 25th #BOURDAINDAY Celebrating the Life, Legacy & Birthday of our Dear Friend Anthony! Wherever U are & whoever UR with, join @chefjoseandres I & share your tributes & memories using #BourdainDay & wish Anthony Peace & Happy Birthday! RT/Spread the word! CHEERS! 🙏🏼 pic.twitter.com/Sw28hDupfw
— Eric Ripert (@ericripert) May 30, 2019
It’s crazy that Charlotte has more departures than JFK, LHR, CDG, or FRA.
If you’re moving money into Chase Sapphire checking to collect the 60,000 UR points, you can put the majority into a JP Morgan money market paying > 2% while waiting 3-4 months for your points to post. I was planning to pull the money out once I got the points, but the Chase Sapphire debit card has no foreign ATM fees or currency conversion fees so now I’m torn. Darn it! I think they got me.
@ Gary — Marriott/SPG is a horrible program. Only Hyatt can be trusted to deliver expected benefits, at least so far. The rest are inconsistent at best, dishonest at worst.
IHG zapped all of my points due to insufficient activity. Didnt matter if it was 1 point or 1,000,000 because they were all gone.
The time I tried to stay at their property it was filled up, so I was doubly insulted. That plus one other reason, and now I avoid all of their properties.