Posted by Seth on January 30, 2012 under Trip Reports | 
I had a grand plan for transiting three different cities across Europe on consecutive days. Sure, I’d sleep a couple hours each night, but I was also going to spend most of the 20-ish hours on the ground at each stop exploring the town, eating their food and drinking their booze. It was a grand plan, alright, but the execution was a bit lacking.
My first stop of the hopping was Berlin, a city I’d heard great things about and one I was quite excited to visit. I even sortof knew what I wanted to see while I was there. Sortof. OK, other than the Brandenburg Gate and the Holocaust memorial, nothing at all. But I’d figure it out, right? After all, I always have.
The bus in from the airport was incredibly easy (except the ticket machines don’t make change for bills larger than 10 Euro) and 20 minutes or so later I was in front of the beautiful, towering, modern Hauptbahnhof. I knew my hotel was just a stop or two away from there so I headed inside. Sure, I spent the next 20 minutes or so wandering around lost in the enormous station, trying to find the appropriate S-Bahn train, but I didn’t mind at all. The station truly is beautiful.
And then, after dropping my bag in the hotel I was back out. I had only an hour before I was due to meet a friend for drinks and dinner and that really isn’t much time in a city as grand as Berlin. But I knew the two things I wanted to see and they were only about a 10 minute walk from the hotel; I was doing fine.
The Gate is pretty. They light it up lovely at night. And I even got a couple photos of it that I don’t particularly hate, which is somewhat impressive given that I had no tripod, the exposures were painfully slow and it was pretty darn cold outside so I was shivering a lot.
From Brandenburg Gate I headed around the corner to see the Holocaust memorial. It is beautiful. It is amazing. It is rather intimidating to walk into when it is dark outside. The photo here is a VERY long exposure, making it appear reasonably light outside. Truth is that the sky was the same darkness as the Brandenburg Gate photos above. Still, thanks to the miracles of modern technology I got the pretty cool picture below.
And then my hour as a tourist was up. I had to race to the U-Bahn to meet up with my friend. I found the station, figured out which track and caught the next train going my way. I was rather confused 2 stops later when they made the "Last Stop" announcement (though at least they repeated it in English). Apparently there were track works in progress and I was supposed to find a replacement bus to the next major station. At this point I became acutely aware of just how hard it must be for the tourists in New York City who are forced to navigate the constantly changing construction projects we have, all without the benefit of any communication in their native language. Even with the little bits of English on the signs it was a challenge. I made it, eventually, but it wasn’t easy.
I also had grand plans for the morning, to see more of town before my noon-ish flight onward to Munich and then Ljubljana. Alas, when I awoke I discovered that there had been a schedule change at some point previously and I was now faced with a 5 minute connection in Munich rather than the originally booked 30 minutes. The airport is easy, but not that easy. A panicked phone call to the folks at Continental (this was an award ticket) got me booked on the next earlier Berlin-Munich flight which meant I’d make my connection. It also meant scrapping my plans for a morning in Berlin.
And so, the entirety of my tourist time in town was an hour (plus an awesome dinner with an old friend). I definitely saw a lot in that hour and had a blast, but it also would be a disservice to Berlin to say that I saw the city. Guess I’ll just have to go back.
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Posted by Seth on January 24, 2012 under points |
Here’s the thing about marketing – it only works when you’re actually able to effectively convince someone that they need to buy what you’re selling. And one of the first steps in that process should be to actually understand what you’re selling and how much it costs. Apparently the folks sending emails at OnePass missed that memo this week, at least if the email I just received is any indication.
It is amazing, really, that 255,712 miles might only just be enough points to make it to select cities in Asia. They don’t even mention which cabin of service, but that is actually enough for two business class tickets to anywhere in Asia. I guess if you "select" all cities served by Star Alliance of them that still counts as "select cities" in their world?? Oh, and it is also more than enough for a trip to Australia or New Zealand, unless I’m flying up front at the rule-buster levels; no need to actually buy more.
It is crap like this that gives marketing a bad name.
Posted by Seth on January 20, 2012 under Hotel, Review, Trip Reports |
I love the arrivals service offered as part of the BusinessFirst service from United Airlines at most of their legacy Continental routes. I’m a firm believer in the power of a shower and a beer to help reset the body clock towards something approximating normal and the arrivals facilities generally make that work out quite nicely. Our request for the service apparently made it to the agent in Stockholm – she acknowledged such in the jetway – but not all the way to the hotel. That delayed our access by about 15 minutes but it was resolved quickly enough.
After our flight in to Stockholm from Newark we were all a bit out of it (I actually managed to forget my laptop on the plane, though I was quickly reunited with it) so having a nap also played into our plans. The arrivals service is Stockholm is a day room provided at the Radisson Blu hotel in the airport so we had the opportunity to get that nap, along with the shower; the beer had to wait until lunch.
The rooms we got were configured with two beds, two very small beds. They’re singles, rather common in Scandinavia, but it was entertaining to hear some of the stories from our group about trying to make that work for multiple people in the room.
Beyond the beds (which I was actually quite comfortable sleeping on), the rooms were reasonably well appointed, if not a bit small. Sliding the chair out from the desk, for example, resulted in hitting the bed situated adjacent to it. That said, it was not the smallest room I had during the week, not by a long shot.
The bathroom was reasonably nice, too, with all the expected/usual amenities provided.
One rather strange bit about the hotel is that the rooms (on at least one side of the hall) overlooked the terminal rather than the outside world (though you could see outside through the terminal windows). That was definitely a bit different for me. I think that contributed to the hotel not using black-out curtains in the windows (the photo above is as dark as the curtains got). I was tired enough that sleep came anyways, but I can imagine that being an issue during the summer when darkness is harder to come by in the region.
In short, it was a very typical and very serviceable business hotel at the airport. It did have the advantage of being literally in the airport making it incredibly convenient, and also allowing for a premium to be charged on the pricing for rooms that I saw in a quick search. Still, faced with an early morning departure I’d either be sleeping there or in the nearby jumbo jet.
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Posted by Seth on January 20, 2012 under Dining, Flying, Review, Trip Reports |
Any trip that starts with a dozen folks hanging out in the lounge, enjoying a few drinks before the flight, has strong potential. That I had already been in the lounge 2+ hours when the others started to arrive didn’t hurt the situation either. And the fact that my upgrade into the BusinessFirst cabin on the 757-200 had cleared at the time of booking made things even better. So it was slightly lubricated that I made my way down to the duty free shop and then to the gate for a flight from Newark to Stockholm.
Boarding was a bit of a mess, even though we arrived at the gate towards the end of the process. We were awaiting the last of the duty free deliveries which took us precariously close to departure time and my mobile boarding pass failed, causing me to hunt down a printed one while the gate agent dealt with some other issues which involved the police. Still, I had sufficient time to stow my bags in the overhead and settle in to 1E with a glass of champagne prior to departure.
I also was able to find the International Concierge working the flight, despite his best efforts to remain invisible in the cabin. Somewhat critical to the success of our first day in Stockholm, I requested access to the arrivals facility that the BusinessFirst service provides. In Stockholm this is a day room at the Radisson Blu hotel in the airport. There were four of us in the forward cabin so four rooms were requested. And he actually followed through on the request; the agent meeting the flight knew that we needed the rooms and was ready for us (sortof).
I chatted with my seatmate a bit during our short taxi out to Runway 22R and the ~7.5 hour flight to Sweden began.
It turns out that there are only two bottles of Heidsieck Monopole catered in the forward cabin on a 752. Those went pretty quickly, starting with the warmed nuts service and lasting part of the way through the appetizer service. The nuts were not particularly memorable but the apps were. Both the cold seafood soup and the beef empanada were quite nice. There was a salad, too.
I took a risk when ordering dinner: I chose the miSteak. It is a complete crap-shoot taking that route. Sometimes the meat is horribly overcooked and miserable. For this flight, however, it was cooked to a reasonable medium doneness (still way overcooked for my tastes, but at least edible) and actually tasted pretty good. The accompanying sides (creamed spinach, asparagus and a potato patty of some sort) were not particularly memorable, either for being good or bad.
And then there is the hour-long foodgasm that is dessert on the BF flights. First was the cheese plate, served with a reasonable glass of Port. Not particularly great cheeses, but the flavors were where they should be for the types served. Next up was the ice cream sundaes. I only had one (caramel and chocolate, thank you very much), but there were extras making their way back to the galley which may have been waylaid by a couple of the other guys. And then there were the pastries. They’ve got nothing on Austrian, to be sure, but they were pretty tasty.
And then it was time to try for some much needed sleep. I actually managed to get 3-4 hours which is pretty good for an eastbound redeye; it helps that this is one of the longer flights being run out of Newark to Europe. Plus, I managed to sleep through the relatively poor breakfast offering which was a good plan based on the reports I got from the others.
The food was fine, as was the seat and the sleep. What truly made the flight for me, however, was the crew. It is usually easy to tell at the beginning of a flight if the crew is enjoying themselves or not, and that generally translates into a better in flight experience. This crew was having a great time from the get go and it really did play out through the rest of the flight. It really is great to fly with a crew that enjoys their job.
Overall the trip was a very good one. Most of that is attributable to the crew, combined with having a bunch of friends on board, but I’m not so sure the reasoning matters as much as the fact that it was a nice flight. Even with the very recent surprisingly nice flight on Lufthansa, I have to say that the legacy Continental product that United is offering these days tops it, both in food and seat. It is one of the better business products across the pond.
Tags: Continental, Dining, EuroHopping, Flying, in flight, Lounge, Lufthansa, Newark, Photos, review, Stockholm, Sweden, Trip Report, United, United Airlines, upgrade
Posted by Seth on January 18, 2012 under frequent flyer, News, points |
The frequent flyer partnership between United Airlines‘ Continental subsidiary and Virgin Atlantic is being terminated as of February 13, 2012. This date is the last for mileage earning or redemption ticket issuance on the partner, with award redemptions valid for one year from that date, assuming they are issued. This isn’t a particularly surprising move, though it is a bit of a downgrade in terms of the MileagePlus program.
The Continental/Virgin relationship made a lot of sense when it was originally launched. Continental had a minimal amount of traffic into London at all and none into Heathrow due to the Bermuda II restrictions. It allowed Continental to market flights into Heathrow under their own code and to sell onward connections using Heathrow as a transit point. Since the establishment of the Open Skies agreement between the US and the EU, however, Continental has had access to Heathrow and has steadily increased flights there. Add in the merger with United and there are only a few cities now where Virgin had nonstop service ex-LHR that the combined United doesn’t and those are less significant today.
The end of the partnership is rather unfortunate on the redemption side of the frequent flyer program in particular as Virgin has often had decent award availability, especially in their Upper Class business class product and especially close to the travel date. I’ve taken advantage of that a couple times and, though I’m not a huge fan of the product, it is still an option being lost which is unfortunate.
Also unfortunate is the timing of the announcement. The company provided barely 4 weeks’ notice of the change, one that they have likely known about for some time. It is a shame that the changes to partners and earning rates are trickling out so slowly as part of the merger process.
Posted by Seth on December 17, 2011 under News |
The answer to that question just got a lot easier for most flights on American Airlines. Like more airlines American offers flight status information via their website. But, until today, only Continental Airlines has been able to offer up where the inbound aircraft for a flight was rather than just the current departure schedule. This is most useful when a flight is listed as delayed and it isn’t clear if they are likely to move the departure time around a lot or not; it is very hard to conjure up a spare airplane, particularly at outstations, when the inbound is delayed.
The inbound flight tracking option goes away once the flight departs so you cannot track an aircraft back multiple stops to see where the problems might have started (OK,not really useful but something I’ve been known to do when I’m bored). But that’s the only minor issue I can see with the offering.
Still, overall this is a great upgrade in terms of transparency to the customer. United Airlines has already committed to expanding the feature to all flights in their system post-merger as they integrate onto a single operations platform. Delta may be able to tell you where your bags are but not where the airplane is.
Posted by Seth on December 13, 2011 under frequent flyer, News, points |
Ethiopian Airlines became the third African carrier to join the Star Alliance network this week, growing the alliance to 28 carriers. Of those 28, 16 provide service to Africa, covering 110 airports in 48 countries. The move also integrates Ethiopian into the fare and award products, though some integration on fare products won’t occur until January 2012.
The move also integrates the carrier into frequent flier earning across the alliance. Thus far I’ve seen earing details for Asiana, Continental, United Airlines, Turkish, TAP Air Portugal, Air Canada, Lufthansa‘s Miles & More and Agean Airlines. Those earning rates have been incorporated into the calculators on the Travel Tools site. Generally speaking most of the carriers are providing 100% earning rates for all economy fares and a bonus for business class fares. Full details about the rates can be found on the Travel Tools Update here.
Tags: Africa, Agean, Air Canada, Asiana, Continental, Ethiopian Airlines, frequent flier, frequent flyer, Lufthansa, points, Star Alliance, TAP Air Portugal, tools, Turkish Air, United, United Airlines
Posted by Seth on December 9, 2011 under Flying, frequent flyer, Trip Reports |
Sure, it is a good problem to have. Two passengers traveling together and only one upgrade clears. It has the potential to be an awkward situation, so what do you do (keeping in mind that you’re in an airport so shooting the hostage probably isn’t a viable solution)?
For me the answer is an easy one. I’ve always tried to give the seat away. Heck, I even give it away some times when I don’t know the other person. The hard part of giving the seat away, however, can be convincing the other person to take it.
One of my fellow BoardingArea.com bloggers was in a pretty awful car crash a few weeks ago and the rest of us are pitching in to help keep the content flowing on his blog while he recuperates. My guest post on MilesQuest is up today and tells the story of the very first time my wife actually agreed to take the one upgrade we had to share. Give it a read and let me know what you think.
Posted by Seth on December 9, 2011 under Flying, frequent flyer, points |
Honestly, these changes have been a long time coming. Turkish Air changed their fare classes a while ago, adding in their "Comfort Class" premium economy product and pulling out their first class cabin. Many of their partners were quick to update the earning charts; Continental and United Airlines weren’t. That has finally been resolved as of today.
The new earning rates are mostly downgrades on the Continental side of things. Y and B fares no longer earn 150% EQMs and G fares – one of the most discounted economy class tickets – now earn nothing at all. There are a few other changes, with F, W and Z fares also no longer earning but I believe those fares are also no longer published so less of an issue.
The Comfort Class fares will only earn at 100% (US Airways and Air Canada both have an earning premium assigned to those fares) which is unfortunate. That said, the change does at least add all three of the Comfort Class fares to the list; previously one was absent.
On the United side of the coin the earning rules are similar, with one additional downgrade. Elite members will no longer earn the 500 mile minimum credit on flights operated by Turkish. Not a huge deal, as most TK-operated flights are longer than that, but still a minor downgrade.
Also of note is that with both programs the V fare class will be deprecated as an earning bucket come January 1, 2012. This is another discount economy fare bucket and losing it will be unfortunate.
Finally, there has been an addition to the earnings tables. Flights marketed by Turkish but operated by AnadoluJet (a regional/express carrier) will be eligible for earning in both programs. The cheapest economy fares (L, Q, T, V) do not earn while non-discount fares (Y, B, M, K, H, S, E) earn at the 100% rate, again with no 500 mile minimums.
All of these earning rate changes have been loaded into the mileage earning calculators on the Wandering Aramean Travel Tools site.
Posted by Seth on December 4, 2011 under Mileage Run, Trip Reports |
There are few things more fun than a behind the scenes view of how companies operate. For a travel junkie like me that means behind the scenes at airport operations, getting to "ride along" for the day while watching how the many people I never get to interact with work together to make sure that my flights run. In other words, getting to play airline for a day.
Thanks to the folks at United Airlines I had that opportunity this weekend. It was AWESOME!
The event was in Tampa, which isn’t so far away that it was a bad thing to have to make the trip. In fact, making the trip also put me over 150K EQMs for the year so that means more upgrade certificates, too. And that was part of the justification I had for making the trip. Even still, when faced with a VDB opportunity I declined to make sure I’d get the tour and I’m incredibly happy I did. Getting to the airport for a 7:45am departure after a night of drinking can be a challenge. In my case it meant no sleep and being still drunk when I got to the boarding area. Whoopsie. No matter; I was running on adrenaline by the time the tours started and there was no holding me back.
The tour involved about 15-20 customers and guests as well as a comparable number of employees from United. It was great to see them come in on the weekend and shmooze with the customers. And, if the few bits I overheard are to be believed, many of them were getting to experience some of the behind the scenes stuff for the first time as well, so it was fun for them, too.
The initial part of the day was meetings with these managers and talking through a number of the different services they represent. One of the guys who helps run the contact centers was available to talk about some of the difficulties being experienced as part of the merger (roughly the same number of calls but handling times are WAY up due to inter-carrier complexities, for example). There were questions about the computer systems merging, the loyalty program (I had more answers than many of the UA employees there on that category) and many other thins. After meeting everyone and talking about the Tampa station and some of the potential future changes it could see (yes, there is a space that could work quite nicely as a United Club once corporate real estate gets through the relocation aspect of the merger) it was time to head out airside for the tours. And by airside, I mean out on to the apron.
We visited a number of different departments on the tour. The maintenance guys have two different roles, working on ad hoc tasks during the day as planes come and go. On the overnight shift they are responsible for running basic scheduled maintenance operations for the planes that RON at the station. Even when there are no flights operating the folks working there are busy.
Flight operations is still split between the Continental and United subsidiaries but progress is being made, with some systems already aligned on the Unimatic platform for dispatch. Still, there are differences in things like fuel planning reporting, where United is a computerized system and the Continental folks are still filling out paperwork by hand and filling the various copies. Pretty interesting differences.
Back inside and up in the terminal we all got to take turns working the various aspects of the gate agent jobs while a flight was boarding. I got out of there before they were forced to handle an oversold F cabin for a flight to Newark but I did get to play with the computer system to make sure that the flight was fully boarded, make the announcements for the few passengers who were late getting to the plane and hand out BPs to the non-revs as they cleared onto the flight. Apparently my announcement style is "a bit curt" (I blame my Newark training) but otherwise I’m apparently pretty good at talking on a PA. Not that it is any surprise; I will talk about anything. We also got to take the final paperwork out to the plane, chat with the crew and close up the door (well, the real employees did that part) and send the plan on its way.
Back outside it was time to get a flight loaded up and ready to push back. In addition to being allowed up the conveyor belt and into the hold of the plane (apparently I have a penchant for finding myself in such areas) we also got to see how the folks working the ramp prioritize loading of the bags, handle the tracking and otherwise make sure that the bags get where they are going. I got to play with the scanner to "load" the bags and even found one that was supposedly missing to help the agents at the ticket counter verify that it was actually checked through as expected.
Finally it was time for the flight to depart. A few last-minute bags came sliding down the chute and were loaded into the plane and then things were sealed up and we walked the plane out for departure. Standing out under the wing as the plane pushed back was awesome. There were definitely a few confused customers on the plan wondering why the guy "working" out there was also waving at them and taking photos. Because I can.
Oh, and I got to drive the jet bridge. Those things handle like a pig and make for a very bumpy ride. Still, I managed to get the wheels back in the red box where they belong after driving around for a minute or so. I think I’ll put that in the "skills" section of my resume next time I apply for a job.
One other very cool thing they showed off was a special baggage cart. As one of a few stations located adjacent to a large military installation the airline is often used to help repatriate remains. The support this function they actually have a dedicated carrier which is specially equipped for the task. Just another little thing they do to make things better for all customers.
And then, sadly, it was time to get back on the plane and head home. I was in and out of Tampa in about 6 hours. Six glorious, wonderfully fun hours of playing with all the toys and getting to experience what operations are like for the airline. On a slow day. With no weather or mechanical issues. Sure, it was the intro-level version of the experience but that didn’t make it any less fun. And the icing on the cake was that my upgrade cleared just as they were about to close the door. A big comfy seat to sleep in on the way home, dreaming happy thoughts of aerophile fun.
Posted by Seth on November 29, 2011 under frequent flyer, News, points |
So American Airlines‘ parent company AMR has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. They’re saying "business as usual" (no real surprise there) but what does the filing really mean? There have been plenty of major airline bankruptcy filings in the past couple decades and much can be learned from them. But this one is rather different than the others and there are some interesting things that might come out of it.
Miles & Tickets
Nothing is really going to change in the operations for the near future. The points aren’t going anywhere anytime soon and neither are the flight operations. At least not on most routes. There will be some additional schedule changes in the coming months but nothing that wasn’t already likely to happen. In short, there really is nothing to worry about as a customer, at least not yet.
As for the miles specifically, I did get a chuckle out of this bit in the email from AA today:
The AAdvantage miles that you’ve earned are yours and will stay yours, subject to usual policies…
The irony here is that the "usual policies" explicitly states, "Accrued mileage credit and award tickets do not constitute property of the member." Glad they cleared up that little confusion.
Big sales and promos
The past few Chapter 11 bankruptcies that have happened in the industry were accompanied by major sales and promotions to keep customers flying in the face of uncertainty. There are many suggesting that will happen again here. I’m not so convinced. Unlike most of those recent bankruptcies this one is not a debtor-in-possession filing. That means that there isn’t a major bank along for the ride pulling the purse strings. Yes, there are still major creditors anxious and working to make sure that they will get their cash, but there is no significant investment of new money right now from a party looking to insure that new investment. Plus the $4Bn+ in liquid assets offers a decent run rate for the company. In short, no need for a fire sale so one seems unlikely.
Breaking the union
Reading the quotes from the new CEO this morning it seems clear that this move is focused on breaking the unions. Management has decided that their cost structures are too high and they’re going to attack the one bit they have a way to force change on – labor. American does have some high labor costs, partly because they still have their pensions funded, but their total costs aren’t actually that far out of whack with their competitors from what I’ve seen on recent data. So even if they do manage to renegotiate the union contracts down they’re still in a pretty tough spot. There’s only so much you can cut on the cost side if you’re not actually generating revenue.
At the same time, a work slowdown or "work-to-rule" action by the unions could cause trouble. It will be interesting to see just how quickly the contract negotiations happen and how big the cuts are. That could significantly affect the passenger experience.
What about the planes?
American just placed an order for 460 new jets, a wholesale refresh of their narrow-body fleet and then some. And much of that purchase was predicated on leasing the aircraft. Leasing companies aren’t generally keen to do business with companies in bankruptcy, though at least the new aircraft will have a high enough residual value that the leaseholders will be somewhat covered. Still, this isn’t likely to make their interest rates any better.
As for the existing fleet, the company has made it clear that they reserve the right – as is granted to them under the law – to slow payments on the existing contracts as they look at renegotiating them. Reading the bankruptcy filing, however, it is not clear exactly how many of the aircraft are tied up in leases or what that liability is. These numbers are significant, but not horrible based on a reasonable revenue model:
As of September 30, 2011, maturities of long-term debt (including sinking fund requirements) for the next five years are: remainder of 2011 – $1.1 billion, 2012 – $1.7 billion, 2013 – $1.0 billion, 2014 – $1.5 billion, and 2015 – $778 million. Future minimum lease payments required under operating leases that have initial or remaining non-cancelable lease terms in excess of a year as of September 30, 2011, were: remainder of 2011 – $309 million, 2012 – $1.1 billion, 2013 – $1.0 billion, 2014 – $861 million, 2015 – $703 million, and 2016 and beyond – $6.3 billion.
There will definitely be savings that come from working some of those contracts and likely from grounding some planes, but it is hard to see that making a sufficient difference to bring the company back from the edge. There is also nearly $1Bn locked up in landing slots and routes that is mortgaged to lien-holders, something that seems unlikely to be sold off anytime soon.
Prelude to merger?
The Delta/Northwest merger was prefaced by both carriers’ bankruptcy re-orgs. The US Airways/America West was also borne out of the US bankruptcy shortly prior to that deal being announced. Is that something we could see out of this filing? There are a number of folks already suggesting that the only way for US Airways and American to survive long-term is to combine their resources.
That would be a disaster.
Yes, it worked for DL/NW. It worked in large part because they were more or less in lock-step on the way out of their bankruptcies and were moving in the same direction anyways. Plus their route networks were incredibly complimentary. The US Airways and America West route networks were complimentary, but that’s where the benefits stopped for them. The results of that merger are a labor relations nightmare. It is something of a miracle that the carrier is still managing to operate and even eke out profits from time to time given that burden.
A merged AA/US would have the existing US labor issues as well as the AA labor issues that have been slowly smoldering and which appear likely to boil over into a full-blown fiasco depending on just how bad the cuts are on the contract front. Nothing like slashing $7 billion in pensions liabilities to make your work force feel respected and happy about their future participation in the company. There is the chance that a merger between the two could be seen as American acquiring US Airways and thus the AA union – with its much larger workforce – could absorb the US union and force down the rules upon them. But even that wouldn’t necessarily solve the labor relations issues.
Some other have suggested that Alaska Airlines might be a ripe partner. Or possibly JetBlue. Sure, it is possible, but seems unlikely as neither of those – both of which are profitable for the most part – gets much value of picking up the mess rather than cherry-picking bits as desired in the future.
What’s really going to happen?
If you’ve read this far and think I actually know what I’m talking about then I guess I’ve got you fooled. I actually believe the stuff I’ve written here but I have no idea if it’ll actually play out that way or not. I do know that I’m not worried about the operations or the miles, at least not yet. The company is likely to pull through well enough and has the cash to run long enough that I’ve got no immediate concerns. And any long-term actions will almost certainly protect the AAdvantage program anyways, so even that isn’t much concern.
It certainly does seem like those pilots who retired recently en masse and cashed in on their retirement plan might’ve made a smart move. Oh, and the fact that the CEO retires and joins up with former Continental Airlines CEO Larry Kellner in a private equity company is certainly an entertaining development.
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Tags: Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, bankruptcy, Continental, Delta, frequent flyer, JetBlue, merger, NorthWest, points, United
