Monthly Archives for April 2019.
Chris McGinnis conducted an interesting interview with United Airlines President Scott Kirby.
There’s a lot here for United flyers, especially those based on the West Coast. For me, though, three things especially stood out.
When you check your bags with an airline you expect that it will arrive at its destination. While the TSA has carte blanche to open your bags, the airline isn’t supposed to. When it happens it’s a huge breach of trust.
However acrimonious labor negotiations at American Airlines seem to now be affecting passengers, as a customer reports finding a union flyer in a checked bag after picking it up last Thursday at baggage claim.
I view Delta cards as strong, of course for their initial bonus and for the benefits they convey to passengers (especially those without elite status) flying the airline semi-regularly. I do not view them as a strong tool for spending, independent of weakness in the SkyMiles program itself.
That’s because even if you want to earn SkyMiles through credit card spend, American Express offers cards that earn Membership Rewards points faster than Delta miles, and Membership Rewards points will continue to transfer to Delta as well as having the option of being moved to other programs as-needed.
Testifying before a Nigerian Senate committee last week the country’s Minister of Agriculture called out wealthy Nigerians whom he says are ordering pizza from London.
The daily British Airways Boeing 747 from London Heathrow to Lagos, Nigeria departs London at 11:20 a.m. and arrives at 5:55 p.m. — just in time for dinner.
American’s first Airbus A321neo is about to enter commercial service on Tuesday, April 2. They have 100 of the ‘new engine option’ planes on order (22 of these deliveries have been deferred). It’s being outfitted in a new ‘dense’ configuration along the lines of the American Airlines 737 MAX, which has the airline’s new standard domestic interior.
In a communication to employees the airline is highlighting five features of the new aircraft.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
A Bangkok Airways pilot filmed passengers streamed off a jet bridge late one night in Phuket, Thailand. He was sitting in the cockpit of his aircraft and noticed that they were walking on the jet bridge but there was no plane anywhere in sight they could be getting off of….
I gave a talk recently where I promised that 90% of the people in the audience would walk away with a minimum of $500 in value right away, that some people would get as much as $20,000 in value, and that they’d be able to use the information over and over too.
That’s actually pretty easy to do.
I’m not a fan of travel insurance for most trips. I think it’s overpriced, and often fails to deliver what consumers think they’re buying. The hassle in getting a claim covered can outweigh the value of the claim. To my mind it’s something to consider for a ‘trip of a lifetime’ where a loss really would be catastrophic (a trip that could never be replaced) but not for run of the mill travel.
That’s a different matter from making sure your health coverage extends to wherever you’re traveling and to medical evacuation coverage.
Mark Ross-Smith, who until recently was head of the Malaysia Airlines frequent flyer program, is chock full of insights. He lays out a number of things that most frequent flyer programs aren’t doing, costing them real money, because they’ve gotten lazy — focused on little besides the revenue stream they’re earning from co-brand credit card deals.
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 »
