Author: Gary Leff

How American is Handling LAX Catering Since Their Contractor Was Found With Listeria

Advice, Travel

A week ago American Airlines suspended most of their catering at LAX after trace amounts of listeria was found at Gate Gourmet, which catered most of their flights (along with Delta, and several international airlines). That’s a smart precaution to take, but it created big operational problems. For a few days it’s meant double catering some flights into Los Angeles so there’d be food and beverages for flights out of LA. It’s meant providing food for passengers to bring onboard. American Airlines Gate-side Food Carts, 1990s – early 2000s And it’s simply meant onboard catering that doesn’t meet customer expectation. American has been providing travel certificates as apologies. Virgin Atlantic, another Gate Gourmet customer, has been handing out vouchers to each in the terminal. Via the Forward Cabin is appears that LAX has their catering…

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100,000 Signup Bonus for Amex Platinum Available to Some Through CardMatch Tool

Advice, Travel

American Express is strategic in trying to identify people who aren’t already cardmembers of other Amex products when they are acquiring new customers with the biggest offers, but that may not be their only criteria.

One of the great ways they have to target bigger signup offers is the CreditCards.com CardMatch tool.

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Drunk Iranian Woman Hacks Sleeping Husband’s Phone, Causes Bali Flight to Divert to India

Advice, Travel

Two Iranian passengers flying Qatar Airways flight QR962 from Doha to Bali got into an altercation that caused the flight to divert to Chennai, India on Sunday.

The married couple were traveling with their child. The husband fell asleep, and the wife — apparently drunk — used her husband’s finger to unlock his cell phone. She began combing through it and uncovered evidence that suggested he was cheating on her.

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FINAL DAY Best-Ever 70,000 Mile Signup Bonus for Delta Amex

Advice, Travel

In the long term I think airlines are going to have to increase the value of miles to attract customers, not just bump bonuses.

In the meantime though American Express is offering signup bonuses up to 70,000 SkyMiles which I believe is only the second time I’ve seen a public Delta offer go that high. These offers end tomorrow so if you want to jump on them, act now.

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Carter Page Bragged About Delta Elite Status Before the House Intelligence Committee

Advice, Travel

Anyone worth influencing, that you’re trying to influence, you fly at least business class.

However former Trump foreign policy advisor Carter Page noted to the House Intelligence Committee that he managed to endure the flight over to Russia in economy thanks to his SkyMiles elite status

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British Airways Moving to Revenue-Based Redemptions Next Year

Advice, Travel

British Airways Executive Club is a challenging program already: Fuel surcharges; extremely expensive premium cabin long haul awards; fuel surcharges; few elite benefits that aren’t provided to all oneworld elites of the same tier; fuel surcharges; modest mileage-earning since they eliminated 1 mile per mile flown.

And now we can expect things to get worse.

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American Offering Up to 100,000 Bonus Miles for Buying Miles (Buy Miles Under 2 Cents a Mile)

Advice, Travel

It is not at all surprising to see the price of American AAdvantage miles falling with the value of those miles falling, but clearly they’re testing to see what bottom looks like and whether 1.72 (or lower) drives more purchases than 1.83 or 1.92.

And of course they need to switch things up if only to make “Buy 1 Suit Get 7 Free” look like a limited time offer!

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Qatar, Rebuffed By American Airlines, Just Bought 9.6% of Cathay Pacific

Advice, Travel

Qatar Airways is buying 9.6% of oneworld partner Cathay Pacific for $662 million making Qatar the third largest shareholder of the Hong Kong-based airline. Swire Group owns 45% of the carrier and Air China owns 30%.

In addition to stakes in British Airways, Iberia, and Cathay, Qatar Airways owns 10% of LATAM and 49% of Italian carrier Meridiana.

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Emirates Brand New First Class Launches December 1, Destinations Revealed

Advice, Travel

Emirates new first class on the Boeing 777 will shrink from 8 seats — two rows in a 1-2-1 configuration — down to 6 seats, 2 rows in a 1-1-1 configuration. The existing suite debuted in 2003.

The new Emirates product will be revealed November 12th at the Dubai Airshow but we now know that it will launch in service on December 1 from Dubai to:

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Air France KLM Flying Blue’s New Revenue-Based Earn and Burn: Convoluted and Less Valuable

Advice, Travel

Now Air France KLM Flying Blue has formally announced details of its new program which goes into effect April 1, 2018. And they’re both convoluted and I expect destructive of value — but we don’t yet know how destructive.

Reportedly Flying Blue has a goal with their changes of increasing revenue from the program by 15%. They’ve revealed that while they sometimes talk about 31 million members of the program, there are 15 million active members that can be communicated with and about 1.5 million elites, and that all members redeem about 400,000 award tickets per year.

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The Chicago O’Hare T3-T5 Shuttle is a Giant Cluster

Advice, Travel

Chicago O’Hare started offering a bus between terminal 3 and terminal 5. In theory this should save a lot of time for American Airlines passengers in terminal 3 transferring to international airlines departing terminal 5. (United passengers from terminal 1 could walk over to terminal 3 to take the bus if they wished.)

The bus was supposed to run from 8:30 a.m. until 8:00 p.m. at least that’s how it was announced. Except that it doesn’t.

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Free Breakfasts, Upgrades & Deals At Luxury Hotels (inc Hyatt, Hilton, SPG, Marriott & Four Seasons)

Advice, Travel

Did you know that you can get free breakfasts, room upgrades and $100 of in-hotel credit if you book through a specific website or luxury travel advisor? This is over and above your usual status benefits that you get when you book stays in these hotels.

There are several great ways to book stays at nicer hotels — better than booking with the hotel directly.

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