Posted by Seth on April 15, 2012 under News | 
It seems that hardly a week goes by without another special offer from Porter Air. I don’t always post them but there are two out right now that are actually pretty decent and are dollar-off coupons rather than percentage off so the fact that they apply only to the base fare isn’t quite as limiting. The two coupons available right now are each for $100 off, depending on the dates of travel and routes.
First up is a $100 off any return trip coupon. It requires purchase by 16 April 2012 and travel by 31 May. The coupon code is 041412.
The other deal is more limited in terms of the route available – it covers only flights between Toronto‘s City Airport and Montreal. But it is also much broader in the dates it covers, requiring booking by 27 April and travel by 4 September.
Both are also valid for $50 off a one-way trip.
Paying full price to fly on Porter Air is almost never necessary, it seems, and these deals are just another example of that. And if you haven’t flown on Porter Air it is definitely worth giving them a try. I’m a big fan of the service and the fact that they fly out of the City airport downtown.
Posted by Seth on December 26, 2011 under Flying, News |
It seems that Porter Air has been running some version of this sale for nearly a year now – some percentage off if you book in the next few days for travel in the upcoming quarter. The dates and percentages change but this is the first time I’ve seen the discount rise to 50% off and the first time I’ve seen it stretch out 4 months for travel. Hard to complain at all about either of those things.
Book at FlyPorter.com and use promo code BOX50 to get half off for travel between now and April 30, 2012. Book by January 6, 2012.
Oh, and if you’ve never had the opportunity to experience Porter, give ‘em a try. I’m a big fan, especially when heading to/from Toronto. Flying in or out of Toronto City Airport just off the heart of downtown is a great experience.
Posted by Seth on November 26, 2011 under frequent flyer, News, points |
Virgin America wants things to be different. Very different. David Cush, the carrier’s CEO recently was interviewed by Scott Mayerowitz from AP and there are a few interesting bits in the Q&A that offer up a rather unique view of how he sees the company fitting in the market and how his old company, American Airlines, is doing these days. Here are a few of the bit I found most entertaining.
Q: How much more are people willing to pay for [food & entertainment on demand] services?
A: The model is getting them to pay the same amount with a much lower production cost.
For a guy who thinks he’s looking at the bigger picture and the long-term view of the airline it is not at all clear how he plans to maintain this approach. Every airline starts out with lower costs initially. The problem is that maintaining that cost structure is incredibly difficult as labor seniority (and the correlated costs) only go up over time. Yes, the new fleet means decent fuel efficiency but that will erode (or require major capital expense) over time as well. Doesn’t seem to be a particularly useful approach to long-term survival.
Q: How can you attract business travelers when your miles can’t be redeemed for Hawaii, Europe or other places you don’t serve?
A: The mile problem will be solved early next year. We have basic agreements with Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia that will be fully reciprocal. We also have agreements with Cathay Pacific, Singapore and Emirates that will develop into frequent flier relationships.
This is quite interesting and certainly will be a welcome change. Even if the reciprocity rates aren’t particularly great – and I’d bet they will not be – having more earning and redemption partners is a great thing for customers. Of the independent US-based carriers Alaska Airlines has done the best at this (and they’ve also been around the longest to figure it out) while JetBlue has a minimal partnership with American Airlines. Growing those relationships is about more than just having an interline agreement for ticketing and baggage; it is nice to see Cush recognize that value.
Q: In Dallas, you’re telling fliers to "dump your older airline for a younger, hotter one." American responded by slashing fares to San Francisco and Los Angeles. Can you survive this fare war?
A: We’ll survive. At current fares, it will not be a profitable route but it wouldn’t be such a loss-making one where we would consider any type of reduction. You have to be in Dallas-Fort Worth if you’re going to be a business airline.
This is a particularly interesting view on the value of certain markets (elsewhere in the interview there is also discussion of pulling out of the Toronto market). Apparently there are some markets so important that losing money over a long period of time while serving them is OK. He doesn’t note just how much they’re losing or for how long they’re willing to keep losing that money, but it is quite a claim. Definitely makes me wonder about the long-term plan once again.
Q: Do you think that American is on the right path?
A: It’s hard to tell. There’s a culture there that is perhaps a bit risk-averse. In the past, it was always an airline that was willing to accept risk. The industry’s consolidated around it and all of a sudden American finds itself in third place. I don’t know if they have the answer. I do know their top guys. They’re smart, capable but at some point you need to stick your neck out a little bit if you’re going to get out of a rut.
Well, cutting chunks of the route map is one version of sticking ones neck out, I suppose. For a guy so keen to run a very limited airline with a very limited route network, it seems that telling others who are running a much more complicated setup that they’re not trying hard enough is an entertaining stretch. That’s not to say I think the AA plan is particularly great, but they also cannot really effect wholesale change just by flipping a switch. There’s a lot of momentum to be dealt with there.
Q: Mile for mile, airplanes burn more fuel than cars, trucks or trains. Do you think this poses a problem for the industry?
A: If we don’t find a way to clean up air travel, we’ll become a pariah. We’ll be what the coal companies used to be.
How about, "Planes are ever improving in efficiency and they allow for connectivity in the world and great advances that cannot be had any other way," as a response rather than shying away from the problem with your tail between your legs?
Q: In ten years, do you see Virgin America being a full-blown national airline?
A: That’s not our goal. The biggest discipline we need to have is not outgrowing the model. That means maybe 100, 150 aircraft, probably no more. The goal would be to be consistently profitable, the highest quality airline where we can hopefully make a few hours of people’s day a little bit nicer.
This is perhaps the most interesting of all the responses. It makes sense from one point of view, but that is a very simplistic approach. No airline is going to be all things to all people; the numbers simply don’t work out. At the same time, however, artificially limiting yourself to only serving major cities or only serving limited frequencies is a sure fire way to make sure that you’re not going to meet customer needs. And when serving those markets becomes a matter of entering into markets that area already rather competitive the revenue pressures are going to be even harder. I respect the theory but I don’t think it maps to the real world very well.
It seems to me that most of the answers Cush offers up are rather small-ball or short-sighted views of the market and how to operate successfully in it. Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m certainly not feeling all warm and fuzzy about the company’s future reading his views.
Read the whole story here if you want more.
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Posted by Seth on November 23, 2011 under News |
JetBlue and WestJet were the winners of the auctions for landing slots at New York City‘s LaGuardia airport and Washington, DC‘s National airport according to reports. JetBlue had made it clear that they intended to bid on the slots and their win there is not particularly surprising. WestJet is a slightly bigger surprise (and only won at LaGuardia); the carrier appears ready to attack the "golden triangle" commuter traffic from Ottawa, Toronto and Montreal to New York.
On the JetBlue side there isn’t any particular indication yet of what the routes will be used for (or even an official confirmation that they won). With an equal number in both DC and LaGuardia it would be possible to take on the US Airways and Delta Shuttle operations, though that also seems unlikely; the market doesn’t need a third player in that space. There are enough other routes that could be operated from the two airports which makes Shuttle service seem unlikely. And with $72MM invested in acquiring the slots it seems to make sense that they’re going to want to maximize revenue, not just attack other established markets.
Most surprisingly to some observers is that Southwest apparently declined to bit at both airports. Southwest was the main instigator of troubles with the previous efforts to distribute the slots so their absence from the auction is somewhat surprising. That said, with their purchase of AirTran the need to acquire slots through the auction process was rather diminished.
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Posted by Seth on March 8, 2011 under Flying, frequent flyer, points |
In part one of this report I recounted a great award booking – even though it was all in economy and on small planes – to the Canadian Maritime provinces. Part two will cover my exploitation of the bmi Diamond Club program and their quite flexible routing and award zone rules.
It all started with plans to visit Bangkok in July for a friend’s wedding. With Thai Air still operating their incredibly long LAX-BKK flight I figured it would be nice to get a change to fly that route. Plus I have never been on the Airbus A340-500 so that’s an added bonus. It turns out that Thai has had a TON of award inventory available for westbound travel but nothing available coming back east. Turns out that isn’t much of a problem for me as I’ve turned a long weekend in Thailand into a RTW ticket adventure.
By sheer coincidence a friend of mine is going to be in Capetown, South Africa the week after the wedding. And I have the points available so why not? Even better is that the award cost from Thailand to South Africa is pretty cheap with Diamond Club. Oh, and I am flying via Mumbai, flying in on Thai and out on South African Airways. South African operates the A340-200 on the route which is also new to me.
And then I needed to get home from South Africa. This is where the Diamond Club rules become VERY favorable if you’re willing (or wanting!) a bit of an adventure. Most carriers only permit North Atlantic crossings for that award. Diamond Club permits South Atlantic crossings, too. So I’m taking one. Award seats form Johannesburg to Buenos Aires and Sao Paolo are pretty readily available.
Seats from there back north are a bit harder but I found some availability with Air Canada from Santiago to Toronto. Getting from Toronto to New York City is pretty easy with a ton of frequencies and a couple airports to choose from. To get from Buenos Aires to Santiago there is really only Star Alliance routing. It just so happens to leave 40 minutes before the flight from Johannesburg arrives. So I have a 23 hour 20 minute connection in Argentina. That’ll be fun.
So I’ve made it back to New York City and I’m home. That’s the end, right? Not for me. Diamond Club considers Puerto Rico part of their South America/Caribbean zone. And award flights from South Africa to South America are less expensive than those to North America. Based on straight geography that sortof makes sense – it should be fewer total miles flown – but getting to Puerto Rico can only be done via North America with the existing partners and routes. So I have a stopover in New York (one stopover is free on the bmi award) and then, two months later, a flight in first class from Newark to San Juan. It was actually many fewer miles to take the extra flight. Plus, I’ve been looking for a good excuse to get back to Puerto Rico, possibly in daylight this time. Given that the flight down there is better than free, I see no reason to skip that bit.
Put it all together and I’ve got this 31,586 mile masterpiece:
And all the flights save two short ones are in business class. All but one of the lines are new and a few of the aircraft are, too. All for under 200,000 Diamond Club points. I could’ve done it as cash & points for even fewer but I’m trying to use up my stash and this is a great way to do it.
The booking process was bit more frustrating than I generally enjoy, partly because my Skype connection was flaking out but mostly because the agents at the Diamond Club call center don’t have the best grasp of geography nor of the rules of their program. They initially tried to charge me 5 separate awards rather than the three I booked and all at higher rates than I should have paid. Fortunately I was able to eventually get a supervisor to understand and put it in correctly, but that was two extra hours of annoyance on the phone that I didn’t really need. Still, at the end of the day, completely worth it for this trip. Retail value on the ticket is somewhere north of $10,000; getting it on points for the routes and dates I wanted is just phenomenal.
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Tags: Africa, Air Canada, Airbus, Argentina, award, Bangkok, bmi, Canada, frequent flyer, New York City, points, Puerto Rico, RTW2011, San Juan, South Africa, Star Alliance, Thai Air, Thailand, Toronto
Posted by Seth on March 7, 2011 under frequent flyer, points |
Some folks love the challenge of earning frequent flyer points. To me, that’s just business. I do it and I accrue and I move on to the next flight. But when the time comes for redeeming those points, that’s where the fun begins. Part of it is because the airlines really do make it difficult to book awards. Part of it is because there are quirks and tricks and nuances in every program and understanding the rules of your specific program makes a huge difference. And part of it is that I generally feel triumphant when I can beat the airlines at their own game.
I won HUGE last week.
First up, our annual anniversary trip. Now in its 5th iteration, my wife and I have gone somewhere out of town for our anniversary each year. Ecuador, Philadelphia/Washington, DC Norway and Scotland were the previous four. This year’s goal was the Canadian maritime provinces. Turns out they’re a bit too spread out for us to hit as much as we wanted in the long weekend so we scaled back to just Nova Scotia. Not too disappointed about that at all.
With non-stop flights from New York to both Moncton and Halifax it was actually surprisingly easy to find award seats into the region. Our outbound requires a connection in Toronto but we’re waitlisted for the non-stop flight (shown in red on the map) and I’m betting that it clears. Either way, we get where we want to be on the day we want to get there and at roughly the times we want to fly. No complaints there. Coming back we picked Sydney as the departing airport. No, not that Sydney. There’s another one up in Nova Scotia. Being a tiny town with a tiny airport the prices on revenue tickets can be pretty ridiculous. So even though we’re only going a few hundred miles the cash version of these flights was pretty ridiculous. But award inventory wasn’t a problem at all. Connecting in Halifax and then back into Newark at good times and with no real issues.
As an added bonus, there are flights from Sydney to France (in the form of Saint Pierre & Miquelon, shown in purple on the map) that we just might have to try. If the flight schedules work that is definitely on my radar.
Did I mention that these were a pretty good deal in terms of valuation for the points redeemed? I like that the Continental booking engine gives you the offer to pay cash instead of redeeming miles for the trip. But I couldn’t help but laugh when this was the option it presented me:
Purchase this Reservation in Economy for $4,452.46 without redeeming miles
Instead I cashed in 50,000 points and about $100 in taxes for the two seats. I’d say that’s a damn good deal.
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Tags: Air Canada, award, Continental, Ecuador, France, frequent flyer, Norway, Nova Scotia, Philadelphia, points, Scotland, Sydney, Toronto, Washington DC
Posted by Seth on March 5, 2011 under Flying, News |
I’m a big fan of Porter Air. Even though flights are on a Q400 there is more space, better snacks and generally more fun than on most other carriers. Plus they fly out of Toronto‘s City Airport, on an island just off of downtown. That’s pretty cool and VERY convenient for visiting downtown.
For the next 4 days they’re also offering 30% off ALL flights. That’s AWESOME!
Simply book by March 9 for travel between March 6 and September 6, 2011. That’s a pretty wide open sale and one that I hope I can take advantage of. Now to come up with a good reason to visit Toronto or beyond…
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Posted by Seth on October 22, 2010 under frequent flyer, News |
For the past couple years American Airlines has been the dark horse amongst the major carriers in the United States. They’ve been trailing the others in profitability (though they did report a profit in Q3 ‘10) and they’ve been struggling to keep their route network competitive with the other programs that are growing alliances. Things are starting to look up a bit, however, with the ATI deal for OneWorld partners British Airways and Iberia, the interline agreement with JetBlue and most recently the announcement earlier this week on an interline agreement with Canadian carrier WestJet.
The new agreement opens up the opportunity for American’s passengers to connect to flights on WestJet’s network throughout Canada. A total of 25 new cities will be available via connections in six Canadian gateways served by American or American Eagle: Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, Vancouver, Halifax and Ottawa. The two carriers expect a phase two of the agreement to eventually include connections at WestJet’s US gateways.
The current iteration of the interline agreement covers through ticketing and checked baggage but does not include things like frequent flyer program reciprocity. American and JetBlue have reportedly come to an agreement on the FF front so it is likely that similar negotiations will follow on the WestJet side.
The move is also a big win for WestJet. They have announced intentions to arrange a similar interline agreement with Southwest over two years ago. That agreement proved fruitless, however, and the deal was never actually implemented. The very quick start-up time on this deal – bookings on aa.com will be available starting on November 9, 2010 – should help avoid that this time around.
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Posted by Seth on September 7, 2010 under All You Can Jet, AYCJ, Trip Reports |
The first day of All You Can Jet 2010 is here and I’m flying. Not really any way things could have gone much better. Well, maybe a little bit, but not enough that I’m complaining. I woke up this morning in Guyana so that meant a bit of a later start on the AYCJ adventure for me. I actually didn’t make it back to JFK until around 1:40pm but I was through immigration and customs and inside T5, boarding pass in hand and hanging out with some old and new AYCJ friends about 45 minutes later.
I knew that I’d miss the kick-off party because of the arrival time from Guyana. Still, I held out hope that there would be a few freebies around to pick up even after the main party had dissipated. The first AYCJ item I spotted was actually outside security in the ticket counter area. One of the crewmembers had an AYCJ 2010 pin on her lanyard. I was somewhat racing past to get inside to meet people but I stopped short upon seeing the button. A bit of chatting later and we agreed to a trade: one of the extra bag tags I had (thanks, Morgan!) for her pin. A no-brainer in my mind. Deal done, I attached the pin and headed in to the terminal.
Inside I immediately went to my usual seat. In the food court there are two raised platforms. The higher one has a plethora of power outlets to go with the great views of folks coming and going in the terminal. The very first day the terminal opened I sat up there for hours soaking up the experience; I haven’t left since. Just my luck as I got up there – I spotted AYCJ legend 30DaysOnJetBlue hanging out with a few other folks. Introductions and handshakes quickly devolved into conversations of itineraries, tips and destination debates. The AYCJ community truly is one, even if very much an ad hoc one that ebbs and flows depending on who’s around at the time. The common bond – a love of travel – is a great way to meet and engage with completely random strangers.
Speaking of completely random strangers, returning from the service counter where I was trying to get my return boarding pass printed I saw an AYCJ luggage tag hanging off a red backpack attached to a tall guy walking through the food court. Community needs fresh blood to grow. Before I knew it Adam was explaining the itinerary he and his wife had mapped out. They live in Toronto and drove down to Buffalo to start their adventures. A week in California followed by Bogotá and then maybe Bermuda. I invited them to join us for more travel talk which they did eventually once they realized we knew where the power outlets were.
Read more of this article »
Tags: Airbus, AYCJ, AYCJ2010, Bermuda, Boston, Embraer, Flying, Guyana, JetBlue, Las Vegas, New York City, Photos, Toronto, Trip Report
Posted by Seth on June 24, 2010 under News |
The Toronto Port Authority has come up with a new allocation of landing slots at the City Centre airport. While the airport currently only sees service from Porter Air, Air Canada and Continental have expressed interest in operations at the facility and both will get their wish should the allocations hold.
Air Canada was allotted 30 slots at the airport and Continental received 16. Porter Air received 44. The two new entrants will need to negotiate with the Port Authority for gate and terminal space and other formal details prior to starting operations at the field. Additionally, Porter Air is likely to protest the assignments, having already noted in one response that historic usage should present them with 112 slots, more than the three now assignments combined. Considering that Porter Air uses the airport as a hub and serves several destinations, the 44 daily slots is quite unlikely to be sufficient for their needs.
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Posted by Seth on March 18, 2010 under News |
Virgin America announced today that they will be increasing transcon service from their west coast hubs in Los Angeles and San Francisco, adding service to Orlando and Toronto. The service will start this summer (August 19 for Orlando, as early as June for Toronto) and will coincide with the closure of the carrier’s operations at Orange County’s John Wayne Airport, effective May 26, 2010. On the change in service, CEO and President David Cush noted:
With strong financial performance, a new ownership structure and growth in fleet size, we’re pleased to be able to expand to world-class destinations like Orlando and Toronto this year. Both cities are major travel destinations from the West Coast, and we’re looking forward to introducing our service to travelers in these and other new markets in 2010 and beyond.
Despite the strong downward pressure on transcon fares, Virgin America believes there is value in these routes and will be operating once daily service each from Los Angeles and San Francisco to the new destinations. The introductory price on the Orlando service from Los Angeles is not a huge discount over the existing non-stop service that United Airlines, Delta and American Airlines all provide. The San Francisco market is a bit more significant due in large part to the route only being served by United currently. For passengers willing to make one stop there are fares below the introductory sale prices. And there are Virgin America fares for less than the initial sale prices on some days. Go figure.
Still, Virgin America thinks they can make money on these routes and they’re committed to them. We’ll see how it works out for them.
