Featured Articles

JetBlue Shifts Focus: Boosts Flights to San Juan While Cutting Back in Europe

May 08 2024

In March I wrote that JetBlue would cut some transatlantic flying and this announcement would come in April. It looks like the timing was off by about a week, but that they are pulling back on winter trips across the Pond. That’s a sinkhole for money and JetBlue can’t afford losses right now.

Fighting for San Juan, and offering premium service to winter long distance domestic destinations from New York makes good sense.

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Bilt Rewards Expands: Hilton Honors Added as Latest Transfer Partner – What It Means for You

May 08 2024

Bilt Rewards has added Hilton Honors as a transfer partner. Just like with their addition of Marriott as a transfer partner in the fall, it doesn’t add much to the program. It’s not that Hilton Honors points aren’t valuable, it’s that everything at Hilton is inflated by a factor of three or four – on both the earning and the redemption side – and that balances out fine except when transferring points 1:1. (Bilt requires a 2,000 point minimum transfer for base members, and 1,000 points for elites.) First transfers from Bilt to Hilton through June 8th receive 1,000 bonus Hilton points. That’s worth about $4, and doesn’t make up for 1:1 simply not being a worthwhile transfer ratio to Hilton. Crockfords, Las Vegas Bilt points now transfer to all of the major U.S.-based hotel…

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Congress Adds Language To Require Automatic Refunds When Flights Are Delayed Or Cancelled

May 07 2024

I personally don’t see a problem with leaving it up to the customer to request a refund. That’s how every other product in the world works – if you want a refund, you ask for one. I’m not sure why we should be treating airline passengers differently, especially given the complexity, and writing this into law. But people get frustrated with airlines, and politicians don’t like siding with them in an election year.

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