Posted by Seth on January 30, 2012 under Flying, News | 
Thai Airways has announced the end of their non-stop service between Thailand and the United States. The flights will be reduced from the current daily service to 5x weekly on February 1 and will shift to one-stop service via Seoul starting in May. At that time the route will also shift from the gas-guzzling Airbus A345, the only plane flying today with the range to make the non-stop trip (Update: I forgot the 772LR can make it, but TG doesn’t have any), to a Boeing 777-200ER, which has lower fuel burn rates but also a much more limited range. This new flight schedule will only operate 4x weekly. Additionally, the change means no more premium economy product on the route as the carrier’s Boeing aircraft are not configured with that seating. The connection will also increase the travel time between Los Angeles and Bangkok by approximately 2 hours each direction.
This move doesn’t come as too much of a surprise given the trend in jet fuel prices, but it is still somewhat disappointing to see the option disappear. Then again, when I flew it last July I wasn’t particularly impressed with either the hard or soft products on board. And that was in business class. So maybe it is for the best that it is going away.
If you’ve got a ticket booked on TG 794/795 now would be a pretty good time to call the carrier and get that straightened out.
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Posted by Seth on January 23, 2012 under frequent flyer, News, points |
Hawaiian Airlines and JetBlue will announce today a partnership for both travel and their frequent flyer programs. The deal comes on the heels of the recent announcement of new service by Hawaiian Airlines with the upcoming launch of non-stop service between New York’s JFK and Honolulu. While the Hawaiian service doesn’t start up until June, the deal will start sooner, with the carriers routing passengers via Los Angeles for one stop service on interline itineraries.
JetBlue has been steadily growing their roster of interline partners but one one of those – American Airlines – has any form of points reciprocity set up. This deal will include at least some reciprocity on the frequent flyer side. Full details are yet to come, but it is nice to see benefits in both the flight and loyalty programs coming to fruition.
More details to come as they are made available…
Posted by Seth on January 18, 2012 under Flying, frequent flyer, News |
I’ll be the first to admit that I was definitely betting against Philadelphia scoring service from Virgin America in their announcement yesterday. There were a couple other destinations on their "short list" which seemed more likely to me. Alas, I was wrong, and the carrier will be launching five daily frequencies starting in April.
As part of the launch release Virgin America pulled no punches, describing their competition in less than flattering terms. Said company CEO David Cush:
Travelers deserve more options than just the typical legacy airline cattle car, and we hope our unique brand of low fares and inventive service will be a breath of fresh air for Philadelphians.
I didn’t expect Philadelphia to be the new market based mostly on the fact that transcons are expensive and it generally takes a lot of capacity to compete in those markets; once daily service, especially between larger cities, is often frowned upon by customers. Virgin America is coming in big, however, adding three flights to Los Angeles which will increase the daily frequencies from 7 to 10, a reasonably significant capacity upgrade. Similarly, the frequencies on the San Francisco route will increase from 8 to 10 with the two new Virgin flights.
But are there enough passengers – profitable ones at that – to make the service work? Virgin seems to think so, suggesting that roughly half of the passengers on each of those routes takes a connecting flight rather than a nonstop option. So maybe there are enough people looking for nonstop options; the question is whether they’re profitable. Time will tell.
With all the hating that goes on against US Airways, this route might seem like a perfect assault. But attacking them at Philadelphia with only a couple non-stop destinations seems unlikely to be the way to go. Even Southwest, which attacked many more routes, is pulling back in their assault there, suggesting that US Airways is reasonably stable and willing to fight their competitors.
One thing it might do, however, is convince US Airways to compete on pricing for the routes. A one-way fare is currently $850 on US from Phillly to LA; the new numbers with Virgin in the market look to be a bit lower:
Interestingly, while US hasn’t been matching Delta fares on the route (or United Airlines on flights to San Francisco) they appear to be taking the Virgin entry into the market a bit more seriously. They aren’t completely matching the fare, but they are much closer, at least for San Francisco. Apparently they’re banking on their frequent flyers or the more frequent schedules demanding a $20ish premium for the route.
For Los Angeles, however, the price disparity remains, at least as of this morning.
It is also worth noting that elites in the US Airways Dividend Miles program can confirm that $850 fare into the first class cabin at the time of ticketing. Virgin is selling their first class cabin – admittedly MUCH nicer than that of the US Airways A321s – for about $1,000, a premium for elites, though still $200 less than the non-elite upgrade fare from US. Both are significantly higher than Delta’s first class fare on the route.
What does it all mean? I have no idea. But there are enough interesting bits at play here that it is worth watching. Oh, and prices on some of the inaugural flights are still pretty reasonable, so I might be headed to Philly for some fun in early April.
Tags: Delta, elite status, Flying, frequent flier, frequent flyer, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Southwest Airline, United, United Airlines, upgrade, US Air, Virgin America
Posted by Seth on December 6, 2011 under News |
American Airlines has made reduction of costs the cornerstone of its bankruptcy reorganization plans. From the very beginning they’ve made it clear that they expect to cut costs pretty much across the board. This includes returning some aircraft to lessors and getting out of some real estate deals and also, hopefully, renegotiating labor contracts. That last part likely just got a lot harder.
A nine-member panel was appointed to represent unsecured creditors of the company and three of those seats are held by representatives of the company’s unionized workforce. The pilots, flight attendants and ground workers each received a seat on the panel, along with Boeing and other creditors. Having that strong a union voice in the courts as recommendations are heard is going to make it much more difficult for the company to pull a fast one on the employees, but that also seems to be their only plan for getting out of the bankruptcy so that could hinder those efforts.
In other bankruptcy news, some analysts are suggesting that American should scale back operations at Chicago, Los Angeles and New York City and focus on their fortress hubs in Miami and Dallas-Ft. Worth. Fortress hubs are great, I suppose, for the business. But when that’s all you have you’re horribly susceptible to competitors showing up and fighting. And that sort of fight isn’t what an already struggling company needs to be faced with.
Always interesting to see what’s next…
Posted by Seth on November 22, 2011 under frequent flyer, News, points |
April 2012 is going to be a busy month for Star Alliance. That’s when Copa and Avianca-Taca are expected to become full members of the global alliance, culminating a process that has been ongoing for many months now. The official invitation to join was extended just earlier this month and it seems that the integration process will be completed incredibly quickly by global alliance standards. Normally the integration takes 12-18 months (or even longer if you’re Air India) but these carriers plan to do it much faster.
For Copa the process shouldn’t be too hard. They already use the same OnePass loyalty program as Continental and that will merge into the new MileagePlus program from United. There will still need to be bilateral agreements drawn up with the other alliance members and some adjustments on the inventory and computer systems side of things but they are pretty far ahead in the game.
For Avianca-Taca there is definitely some more work involved. Although the carrier has frequent flyer relationships with Star Alliance members United and Lufthansa there are still more steps required to get fully integrated. Still, Copa CEO Pedro Heilbronn confirmed that join date for both programs so it looks pretty good, at least for now.
One interesting bit about Copa joining the program is that, as of today, there are no long-haul flights into the Panama City hub from overseas. There are connection options from Dulles, O’Hare, Los Angeles, Houston and Newark, giving great integration to the United Airlines network, but not much beyond that. It will be interesting to see if joining into Star Alliance can bring some more long-haul traffic into that hub.
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Tags: Avianca, Chicago, Continental, Copa, frequent flyer, houston, Los Angeles, Lufthansa, Newark, Panama, points, Star Alliance, Taca, United, Washington DC
Posted by Seth on November 7, 2011 under Hotel, Internet, Trip Reports |
Yesterday morning I found myself in need of a hotel in or near Burbank, California. No big deal, right? I did my typical search across a few different sites (ended up booking via hotels.com because I was redeeming my Welcome Rewards points) and found a room at the Ramada by the airport that was the right price and got decent enough reviews (though mine won’t be so glowing, I expect). Once I had that as a basis for my price comparisons I did what I normally do next – check the page of the hotel operator to see if they’ve got a better deal or a best rate guarantee I can take advantage of. And that’s where they lost me.
Perhaps more appropriately I should say that Ramada lost Burbank. Typing Burbank, California into their search engine returned the following map results:
Apparently we’re moving Burbank 300 miles northwest this weekend. Go figure.
Not the first random hotel booking site that I’ve found cannot get geography and I got around it (searched for Los Angeles and scrolled up the map to Burbank) but pretty impressive that they can fail so badly.
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Posted by Seth on August 21, 2011 under Flying, News |
United Airlines CEO Jeff Smisek has stated a few times that the company had some deficiencies in their in-flight product, bits that would be addressed as part of the merger process between United and Continental. The first of many bits detailed on that topic was the announcement that Economy Plus would be expanded to the Continental fleet starting in 2012. Other than that, however, not many specifics have been discussed. That changed today with the release of some upcoming changes that can be expected from the company to the tune of a $550MM investment.
Economy Plus Seating
While the Economy Plus efforts on the Continental fleet were initially expected to not be seen until 2012 the new release suggests that the conversion will be starting sooner. The company expects to see the E+seats on 38 Continental aircraft before the end of the year. Based on some information received from other sources it is quite possible that these first Economy Plus aircraft will be 757-300s or 737-800s. Those aircraft have been operating with temporary seats and without any in-flight entertainment systems for a while now due to issues with the Koito seats.
By the end of Q1 2012 the company expects to have 100 Continental aircraft equipped with Economy Plus seats. That number will include 29 Bombardier Q400 commuter turbo-prop aircraft which will be equipped with both a first class and economy plus section.
Flat-bed Seats
Already the leader in total flat-bed seating capacity to and from North America, United has committed to expanding their installation starting in Q3 2011. There are 26 Boeing 767s – 12 of the -400 variant form Continental and 14 of the -300 variant from United – which will be equipped with the new seats. The 12 -400s were previously announced while the 14 -300s have only been speculative recently. These aircraft are also going to be receiving winglets to improve their range and performance. This does mean the likely reduction of wide-body service in the form of 767s on domestic routes as the -300s being converted are the aircraft that service that function.
In addition to the 767s being converted the company has committed to installing flat beds in 12 more 777s by the end of the year. The United aircraft being converted will continue to be in a three-cabin configuration.
In-Flight Entertainment
The announcement also highlights updates to the IFE systems on the Boeing 747 aircraft. Rather than installing dedicated systems in the seats of the economy cabin United will instead offer a streaming media option for users with their own wireless devices. While the release suggests the decision is still out to bid the only current offering that is installed is that of gogo and the product they currently have in operation on American Airlines 767s running their premium transcon routes. There is no indication that they will be adding power outlets to the economy cabin on the 747s so hopefully your wireless media receiving device has a good battery.
The IFE systems will also be updated as part of the full-fleet renewal of the p.s. aircraft operating between New York City‘s JFK airport and Los Angeles and San Francisco. Those aircraft will receive the lie-flat Continental BusinessFirst seats as well as a full AVOD system and will maintain wifi service.
Not included in the announcement but referenced above, the company also expects to begin the deployment of the DirecTV systems on the few 737s that were delivered without it as well as the 757-300s that have not yet been converted later this year.
Channel 9
While this could arguably be included in the regular IFE section of the report but it is worth highlighting separately as it is a pretty cool feature and one that it unique to United. The company has committed to expanding the Channel 9 systems on all legacy Continental aircraft. Woohoo!
There are a number of other improvements being made as well, including upgrades to the overhead bins and a retrofit of the interiors of the United Airbus narrow-body aircraft. They also reaffirmed the commitment to add wifi to the legacy Continental aircraft that have DirecTV systems, pending the launch of the additional satellite by LiveTV to bring that service into operation.
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Posted by Seth on August 2, 2011 under Dining, Flying, Review, Trip Reports |
Los Angeles to Bangkok – non-stop on Thai Airways – seemed like a good idea at the time.Yes, the flight is blocked at just over 17 hours, making it one of the longest commercial flights in operation. But I’ve flown other very long flights previously, several times in coach, and I’ve survived all of them and even enjoyed some of them. Yes, I knew going in that the seats in use on the Airbus A340-500 are not the most comfortable. Still, business class for that long a journey should be pleasant enough, right? And, yes, it meant a 14 hour travel day just to get to the point where I could start the trip. But that was worth it for the joys of making the super long flight, putting the cool line on my flight history map, right?
Not really.
Boarding for the flight was conducted via one of the bus gates at LAX’s TBIT terminal. This is the first time I’ve ever had a departure from the terminal and I was rather surprised just how awful the experience was. Not nearly enough seats for the number of passengers boarding, overlapping announcements that confused pretty much everyone and nothing resembling proper amenities once you got out to the bus area. Pretty pathetic for a major international gateway. Still, I got on the bus and made the long ride out to the far stands where our aircraft was waiting, hoping things would be better once on board. After all, as I joked to a woman I was crammed against on the bus, "We’re flying business class; this is the closest we have to be to anyone for the next 18 hours."
Pre-flight included a glass of bubbly which was nice for keeping me awake and getting ready for the dinner service. And the dinner was pretty good food, though not the best I’ve had in the air by any stretch. There were a couple interesting quirks to the dinner service that made me wonder just how deep the budget cuts in catering were. The warm nuts, for example, were quite the pathetic presentation. Yes, I took this photo before eating any from the bowl.
The starter was a scallop, with a mango chutney of some sort. Not bad, but certainly a small portion and not particularly amazing either. Of course, I often find scallops to be that way when served out so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.
For the main course I chose a fish. Sure, I’ve seen Airplane about a few dozen times but it still seemed like the least offensive of the options available. Plus, I was asked to make my choices for all three meals before departure (not a fan of that at all) and it seemed like a decent way to approach the menu. It was not offensive but also not particularly amazing.
Cheese course, drinks, dessert, drinks and before I knew it 2am PDT had arrived and it was definitely time to stretch out the seat and see what I was in for as far as sleeping was concerned.
The seat was, as anticipated, mediocre. I knew going in that it would not be a fully flat bed. Still, it was supposed to be flat enough at an angle that I’d be able to get some sleep. Especially combined with the fact that I’d been up for so long once I finally got on board, sleeping should be easy. And it actually was, even though the seat didn’t even seem to be flat at an angle when fully extended. I slept pretty well for 7 or 8 hours after the dinner service. The problem was that there were still about 7 hours left in the flight and the seat was pretty bad for just sitting in. There is nothing quite so disappointing in flight as waking up after a long, restful sleep and realizing that there is still the equivalent of London to New York City or more left to fly.
And so, with about 7 hours to go in the trip I wandered back to the galley to find out when the next meal was. Only 90 minutes away. This is actually my largest gripe about the service on the flight: the timing and ordering of the meals was wacky. When I’m taking a long flight and adjusting to a new time zone I try to switch my body over as early in the trip as possible, making it so that I’m as close to the local time as I can be when I land. The schedule of meals on this flight worked quite a bit against that.
Sure, a dinner just after take-off makes sense. And having it as a three-meal flight is great. But the second meal, served approximately 11-12 hours into the flight and at approximately midnight local time in Bangkok was breakfast. It was a good breakfast, but having it at that time rather than having another lunch/dinner course a couple hours earlier makes no sense to me. I had the shrimp congee option:
The third meal, served only about 4 hours later and only an hour prior to the 6:30am local time arrival of the flight was another lunch course. Again, decent food (though the shrimps were not as good on this one as in the congee) but it was the wrong meal at that time of the flight.
The A345 does offer one of my favorite bits of airplane silliness: a window in the lav. I’m not quite sure why, but I crack up every time I see it.
Ultimately the flight got me there in relative comfort and without too much trouble along the way. But the timing of the meals meant that when I landed I had been up since midnight local time. This made it rather difficult to get through the day fully coherent (or as much as I ever am). Fortunately I had some good friends around on the ground who helped drive that and kept me entertained as we toured Bangkok. But it was one of those friends, over dinner, who shared the following observation of this incredibly long flight:
I’ve taken it several times in each of the three classes of service available. I’ve had incredibly mediocre flights in business, rather pleasant flights in premium economy and surprisingly enjoyable flights down the back. It isn’t that the economy service is better than business; it just does a better job of exceeding expectations.
At the end of the day I must agree. The flight in business class was fine but it certainly didn’t live up to any of the great expectations set by tales of great in-flight experiences from the Asian airlines. Not bad, really, but not up to the expectations. Should I need to get to Bangkok again from the east coast I’ll almost certainly favor the flights via Europe or the Middle East. Roughly the same travel time and arguably better timed in-flight services. Definitely better premium seats available.
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Posted by Seth on July 28, 2011 under All You Can Jet, AYCJ, News |
I was quite disappointed when JetBlue announced earlier this year that their wildly successful All You Can Jet program would not be returning this year. The company has apparently not left the "unlimited" flight coupon game completely, however. They announced today are offering BluePass, a three month unlimited flight ticket, with a few limitations.
Most significantly, the pass is targeted at residents of Boston or Long Beach. Each flight must be either to or from those airports, depending on which pass you purchase. Open jaw, circle trips and multi-destination trips are prohibited. This significantly limits the flexibility of the pass relative to the AYCJ passes of the past two years. That said, connecting itineraries are permitted so there are quite a number of interesting routes that can be flown with the unlimited pass.
There are "select" passes available to a limited number of destinations (13 ex-BOS, 9 ex-LGB) or a "full" pass that permits service to all airports in the route network from Boston. The price for the passes are $1299 for the LGB limited pass, $1499 for the BOS limited pass and $1999 for the BOS unlimited pass. Taxes for international destinations are extra.
The passes are valid for travel between August 22 and November 22, 2011. Limited destinations for LGB are: LAS, OAK, SFO, SMF, SLC, PDX, SEA, AUS and ORD. Limited destinations for BOS are: JFK, EWR, BWI, BUF, DCA, IAD, RIC, PIT, RDU, CLT, ORD, BDA, and JAX.
The limitations of only one trip per day and originating or terminating in Boston certainly make this deal a bit harder to call an immediate win given my base in New York City. Were I based in Boston the purchase would already be made. Still, it is quite tempting. I’ll mostly be spending the next few hours trying to figure out if the route map out of Boston is interesting enough and if connecting flights will be permissible such that I can get real value from the deal.
Hopefully they don’t sell out before I figure it out for myself.
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Posted by Seth on July 13, 2011 under Flying, News |
Gotta appreciate a sense of humor from an airline. Due to the closure of I-405 (a/k/a "The 405") in the Los Angeles area this weekend a massive carmageddon experience is being predicted. And JetBlue is having some fun with it. They’ve loaded a couple special flights into the system for this Saturday only between Long Beach and Burbank:
This is a pretty entertaining promo and were I in California this weekend I’d definitely be on it. Sadly, however, I do not think that I can swing the time for the transcons. But it is darn tempting, just to get the line on my map.
Yeah, I’ve got problems.
More details from JetBlue here: http://www2.jetblue.com/deals/overthe405/
Posted by Seth on June 15, 2011 under News |
Want access to the priority security lines at the airport without elite status or buying a first class ticket? Looks like it is time to start flying JetBlue. The carrier announced today the 15 airports at which their new "Even More Speed" program will be implemented, allowing customers access to the "priority" line that other carriers afford to elites or premium cabin customers. With JetBlue this perk will be an additional benefit of the Even More Legroom seats which are being rebranded as well as part of the move.
The initial airports for priority screening are:
Priority screening is also coming to Boston in the next 4-6 weeks as the reconfiguration of the checkpoint there is completed.
In addition to the priority screening access the company is changing the Even More Legroom moniker to Even More Space. The impetus for this change is the addition of early boarding for those customers, providing them the first chance to get at the overhead bins. The early boarding benefit isn’t particularly new but the branding is. Maybe they got a bulk discount on trademark registrations with "Even More" in the name.
Overall this is a nice addition to the offerings that JetBlue has. Combined with the previous indications that some sort of "elite" program (though they refuse to use that word) is coming and that some of these benefits are likely to carry over, it seems clear that JetBlue is working hard to woo the business traveler segment more than ever.
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Tags: Boston, Chicago, elite status, JetBlue, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, New York City, Newark, San Francisco, Seattle, TSA, Washington DC
