I am loath to post many mileage deals that appear to be mistakes on this blog because airlines do read blogs and respond quickly – I may not have the readership of The Points Guy, but it is no...
Is the Elimination of Stopovers on United MileagePlus Awards Inevitable?
Delta Air Lines has announced that free stopovers will not be part of the 2015 Skymiles program and it seems likely that the combined American and US Airways AAdvantage program will also not offer complimentary stopovers. That would leave...
United Airlines Announces Service to Venice, Additional Service to Dublin and Paris
United Airlines announced three new Summer 2015 routes today, including new service from Newark to Venice and Chicago to Dublin as well as a second daily flight from Washington to Paris. Newark to Venice The 767-400 scheduled on this...
More Devaluations for United MileagePlus in 2015
Christmas gifts have arrived early from United Airlines and like last year, we’ve all received lumps of coal. As United continues to dismantle what was once the world’s best airline loyalty program, several more changes have been announced, all...
United Airlines Mimics Delta, Raises 2016 Elite Requirements
The consultants United Airlines hires to provide strategic advice on loyalty innovation and how to increase profit must have a pretty easy job…watch Delta, then copy. Once again, United has mimicked Delta in increasing elite status thresholds for 2016...
United Reports Strong Q3 Profit
United Airlines reported a healthy third-quarter profit today of $1.1 billion, a record and also a 99% increase from last year. Here’s some of the specifics: United’s consolidated passenger revenue per available seat mile (PRASM) increased 3.9 percent in...
New United Airlines Premier Status Tracking Website
United Airlines has introduced a nifty new website for tracking MileagePlus status: nothing revolutionary, but knowing how much you have to spend to attain or maintain elite status is now very transparent. Here’s the website and watch this one...
United Airlines, Hertz Partnership Adds Elite Benefits to MileagePlus
United Airlines and Hertz have announced a new partnership in which MileagePlus elite members will receive elite status in Hertz’s Gold Plus Rewards program and more miles for Hertz rentals. Discounts and Bonus Miles with Hertz Hertz is already...
LOT Polish Airlines Award Space Bookable on united.com
LOT Polish Airlines is back after a long hiatus on united.com. The Polish flag carrier operates a fleet of 787s to North American gateways including Chicago, New York JFK, and Toronto and award space in both business and economy...
Streaming Inflight Movies and TV on United Airlines
United Airlines has made economy class travel much more bearable by introducing streaming IFE to many of its aircraft. I had a chance to try it last week on a flight from Chicago to Frankfurt and was very pleasantly...
New United Airlines Globe Surfing Commercial
United Airlines has released another commercial narrated by Matt Damon, this time highlighting United’s extensive worldwide route network from the view of a lie-flat seat…or something like that. It is by no means UA’s best commercial: it features a...
My Delayed Journey to Chicago
Fire in an FAA Facility shut down Chicago’s O’Hare and Midway airports for several hours this morning and it just so happened that I was flying from Los Angeles to Chicago this morning to speak at this weekend’s FTU...
United Arrivals Lounge London Heathrow
United Airlines offers an arrival lounge to intercontinental business and first class passengers in its new home in Terminal 2 at London Heathrow. Open from 5am – 2pm each day, Air Canada and South African Airways also allow their...
Frankfurt to San Francisco in United Airlines First Class
United Airlines CFO John Rainey made an unforced error when he told Bloomberg News that there was virtually no difference between United Airlines First Class (Global First) and Business Class (BusinessFirst). While true that the differences between first and...
9-Seat Airliner Coming to California
I have family that lives in Visalia, California and while my uncle was still alive, I made frequent trips up there – often once per month. A 3hr drive on I-5 is not a horrible thing, but the drive...
United Cuts JFK-IAD Service, Effective October 25, 2014
Even I am not too old to remember when New York Kennedy was once a United focus city, with service to Tokyo, London, Hong Kong, Boston, Chicago, Washington, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. JFK was also once the home...
Kidnapping Forces United Flight from Washington to Beijing to Divert
I love the movie Argo, which tells the story of how Canada and CIA operative Tony Mendez smuggled out a cadre of six U.S. diplomats from Tehran during the Iran Hostage Crisis. In the gripping conclusion (full of artistic...
United Airlines’ CFO Disses His Company’s Global First Class Product
John Rainey, United Airlines’ infamous CFO who claimed that elites are over-entitled, has put his foot in his mouth again…this time by trashing his company’s three-cabin international first class product, dubbed “Global First”. But it was not just a...
Giving up Lufthansa First Class for Love
Today was the day that my wife was to fly Lufthansa First Class for the first time. I was looking forward to it so much! First Tokyo Haneda to Frankfurt, then Munich to Toronto in First Class tomorrow with...
U.S. Secretary of State Rescued by United Airlines
It is not just us hoi polloi that run into mechanical delays that foul up our schedules and cause us to shift travel plans…it even happens to the Secretary of State of the USA. Sec. John Kerry has been...
