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Spend more time in hotels than you do in your own home? Maybe you don’t even have a permanent address? A journalist for a major American financial magazine is looking to interview ultra-hard-core road warriors who know the ins and outs of business travel.

If interested, click the “contact” link at the top right of the blog, and I’ll forward your note.

tags: travel | business travel

If you’ve got reservations on US Airways for flights on or after September 20, you’d better check your itineraries after September 4. As reported in Travel Weekly (registration required), the airline is merging the fare class structure and codes between America West and the old US Airways. Flight numbers are changing as well for all reservations made before September 1. The changes will go into effect between September 1 and 4.

What this means:

Travel agents will need to accept the schedule change and cancel the old segments to ensure their clients have a smooth experience with Web and kiosk check-in, automated first class upgrades and seat assignments, the airline said.

Anytime I see “cancel segments,” I get nervous. And with reason: I’ve had itineraries get completely messed up after a schedule change required an agent to cancel and rebook segments. On US Airways, no less!

Hopefully tickets purchased directly from the airline will automatically update, but you’d be wise to check your itineraries after September 4. Look for missing segments, seat assignments, frequent flyer account numbers, and upgrade requests.

An FAQ, aimed at travel agents, but illustrative of the scope of the changes, is here.

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tags: travel | US Airways

Coalition of conservative groups rewards porn-free hotels
Anyone who’s ever worked behind the scenes at a hotel will tell you that the pay-per-view pornography is a profit center. Now a coalition of conservative groups in the U.S. is targeting hotel porn, charging that it violates a range of local obscenity laws, and trying to get the FBI involved. They’re also publishing a list of porn-free hotels. I’d rather see an investigation of obscenely-priced minibar items. Or how about fighting for quieter doors?

JetBlue rewards one flyer a free t-shirt (in exchange for his civil liberties)
It’s not just British passengers who are afraid that brown-skinned passengers are all terrorists. Raed Jarrar, an Iraqi architect and blogger living in the United States, was treated to absolutely moronic security treatment at JFK airport a few weeks ago. Wearing a shirt with Arabic and English lettering, his shirt apparently bothered people enough to warrant an intervention by JetBlue and unnamed security officers. They insisted he change his shirt. After much wrangling, and after JetBlue bought him a NYC souvenir t-shirt, he succumbed and got onboard. Ughh. See here for an interview and here for a photo of him in the shirt, as well as his firsthand account of the events at JFK.

TSA rewards passenger’s fear of his mother with a cavity search
Advice: It’s better to be embarrassed and admit you’ve got a penis pump in your suitcase, even in front of your mom, than to say it’s a bomb.

Delta rewards well-dressed flyers
Dress spiffy on Delta, and you might get a prize. Really.

Europe rewards all flyers…with a fingerprinting
Coming soon to all European airports: all travelers will be required to submit to iris-scans or fingerprinting.

Banks reward loyal clients by refusing them access to cash overseas
Calling your bank before leaving the country, notifying them you’ll be traveling abroad, is always a good idea, so they don’t place a lock on your accounts. But apparently, that may not be enough. Some banks are blocking all ATM transactions in certain countries. See here for the story, and check with your bank.

Sherman’s Travel rewards U.S. postal service by going offline
The travel-deals website is going old-media, with a new magazine targeting readers interested in “luxury value.” Sounds a bit like this blog’s motto, no?

Reward thieves by using public wi-fi
Not much of a surprise, but public wi-fi, including that offered by hotels, is not very secure. Use a VPN or other security service whenever possible.

Second-mover advantage? ASiQ possibly rewarded by Connexion’s demise
Inflight internet over the oceans may soon be shut down, but ASI Entertainment claims to be stepping in with their inflight internet product. If it works, it would only be a quarter of the speed of Boeing’s soon-defunct Connexion. But if papa needs an internet fix…

(image: theimacguy)
tags: travel | JetBlue | airport security | hotel porn | ATM | hotels | airlines

Tired of the TSA Man keeping you dehydrated? Angry that you can’t savor the flavor of that triple shot venti decaf latte no-foam with pink sugar that you grabbed on your way to the airport? Or just looking to make the security checkpoint fun again?

Dr. Vino points the way to the Beer Belly — more subtle than a hat with straws heading up to a pair of cans, but just as prohibited.

If a rubber flask worn under your garments is too risky for you, cheer up: Duty free liquor is legal again, though under strict new rules.

tags: travel | beer belly | drinks on a plane

Just when you thought that some stability and sensibility were coming to the carry-on luggage game, the British Airports Authority (BAA) throws a wrench into things:

Britain’s main airport operator yesterday banned all cosmetics from passengers’ hand luggage unless the items were bought at shops in the departure lounge. Under the new restrictions, imposed by BAA, travellers are forbidden to take talcum powder, lipstick, eyeliner and mascara through security control. These items had been exempted from the ban, while other cosmetics such as lip gloss had been banned from the start of the terrorist alert. The move was designed to end confusion, said a spokesman for BAA which owns Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Southampton, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen airports.

Designed to end confusion, or to subsidize cosmetics sales at those seven airports? Actually, the tighter restrictions are most likely the result of increased delays at checkpoints: When all carry-ons were illegal, security went faster. Now that security officers sort through carry-on luggage more closely, the delays have gone up, and make-up is apparently a prime culprit.

But only those airports owned by BAA are imposing these rules. Other UK airports had completely different restrictions:

Cardiff, for example, allowed passengers to take talcum powder, lipstick and eyeliner through security as long as they were X-rayed before being allowed into the departure lounge. Birmingham airport’s website said it was still allowing passengers to take lipstick on board. However, it explicitly banned gel-filled bras.

In theory, airport security should be no different in Birmingham than in Glasgow. Changing the rules as they go along makes mockery of an already dubious policy (see this page on Ryanair’s site mocking UK airport security — barely safe for work, no pun intended).

But the fact that the BAA-owned airports are the only ones imposing these tighter rules gives credence to economist Joseph Stiglitz’s argument in today’s Financial Times (subscription required) that poorly-planned privatization of airport ownership is the root of the problems.:

Flights were cancelled and delayed largely because BAA lacked sufficient trained staff for security checks. […] There is an incompatibility of incentives, and because airports are a monopoly there is no competition to force it to change. […] Without appropriate incentives, a private operator bears the cost of additional personnel and equipment, but gets none of the benefit. The inexorable drive for profit maximisation leads to excessive economisation; BAA’s profits rise at the expense of airline profits and consumer welfare; and society is worse off. The seeming disdain BAA shows for customers and users is what one might expect from a monopolist.

Zing! Among Stiglitz’s suggestions: make the airlines stakeholders in the airports. If they’d own a piece of the pie, then they’d pressure the airport operators to run a more efficient operation that doesn’t tick off the passengers.

Don’t hold your breath for that solution. In the meantime, if you’re traveling in the UK, you’ll need to check with your airline and the airport your traveling to/from to see the latest restrictions. Almost makes you long for the TSA, doesn’t it?…

tags: travel | BAA | aiports | security

I guess this proves that German police and airport security don’t cross-check their flight manifests against a list of outstanding arrest warrants. And that wearing a mask is a good idea when committing crimes:

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German woman who was held up and robbed in her Berlin apartment earlier this month was astonished to see the thief waiting to board her flight from Antalya in Turkey to the German capital, police said Tuesday. The 37-year-old woman telephoned her husband who alerted the authorities, police spokesman Joerg Kunzendorf said.

When the flight arrived at Berlin’s Schoenefeld airport late Sunday, police arrested the 25-year-old man, who was wanted in connection with several other robberies.

(image: HolyHolySnappers)
tags: travel | karma

In the NY Times, Michelle Higgins runs through some of the pros and cons of hotels’ self-check-in kiosks.

On the one hand, the kiosks can be a relief from long lines at the check-in desk. Why wait for others to ask a million questions if all you want is your room key? And besides, the airlines have paved the way, making such kiosks commonplace.

On the other hand, if you’re picky about room location, the kiosk isn’t a great choice. Want to make sure you’re far from the ice machine, or perhaps you’re interested in upgrading to a suite (with or without the $100 handshake…), then the kiosk won’t be much help. Kiosks are bound by the rules. You’re more likely to get some flexibility from a desk agent than from a machine.

Doing it yourself can also depersonalize the experience of checking in, an issue only at luxury hotels. Hotels that push the self-serve option too hard risk downgrading their image. Are airlines really the customer-service example to be following here?

What the kiosks ARE good for is check-out — assuming that you weren’t able to use the TV check-out. I’m 0 for 10 on the TV checkout working on my last hotel stays, so the kiosk is a good alternate.

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Eos, Maxjet, Silverjet, MiMa… and now Elysair.

A new French carrier is planning to launch premium transatlantic flights by the end of the year using an ex-Condor Boeing 757-200.

Paris-based Elysair says that France’s civil aviation administration DGAC is “in the process” of delivering its French air carrier operating licence and air carrier certificate, the airline having fulfilled the necessary economic criteria.

At least you won’t have to connect in London…

tags: travel | Elysair

John Mark Karr, the recently-extradited suspect in the JonBenet Ramsey killing, flew back to the United States from Thailand yesterday. In business class.

I don’t know who paid for the ticket on Thai Airways — the Boulder police? The Department of Homeland Security? The U.S. embassy in Thailand? But there may have been method to the madness of putting a suspected killer into the premium cabin:

Some experts called the royal flight treatment a brilliant strategy intended to get the suspect relaxed enough to talk more.
“There is always a reason when the unusual happens,” said Denver attorney Larry Pozner, past president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

Well, it sounds like he didn’t say anything of note.

The news reports are describing the onboard service in excruciating detail, making it into an infomercial of sorts for the Thai airline’s nonstop flight to L.A. Consider the Associated Press description:

Before takeoff, Karr took a glass of champagne from a flight attendant and clinked glasses with Spray, who sipped orange juice. Karr first dined on pate, salad, fried king prawn, steamed rice, broccoli and chocolate cake. He also had a beer — crushing the empty can with his hands — and then had a glass of French chardonnay. […] He later dined on roast duck with soy sauce and yellow noodles, and for his third meal had pizza, chocolates and a bottle of Evian.

Obviously, the level of detail is meant to enrage the reader, but it’s making me hungry…

(image: AP)
tags: travel | John Mark Karr | JonBenet Ramsey | Thai Airways

Farecast, the site that intends to predict the directions of airfares for your specific travel dates, has expanded their beta site to include many more airports.

The horizon for predictions is limited to 3 months. If you’re looking at travel dates more than 3 months ahead, you won’t get any analysis, just fares.

It’s also still a bit buggy. I had a few searches come up with no flight results, or no prediction, even though they were in the range of “legal” dates.

Predicting airfares’ direction is tricky business, since fare wars are waged by humans, not machines. Plus, fuel prices depend on a number of geopolitical factors, which I suspect aren’t part of the Farecast algorithm.

I’m wary of predictions, but the fare trend is the key. (FareCompare offes a trendline, too.) If your fare is below that trendline, just buy. Don’t worry about the prediction. If it’s below the average, it’s a good fare.

Related:
- Farecast beta goes public, just in time for a reader review
- So how accurate is Farecast?
- The traveler’s crystal ball
- Market timing: More advice on when to buy cheap plane tickets
- The black art of repricing tickets

tags: travel | Farecast

With air travelers increasingly checking bags, skycaps at airports have been doing better business. But Bags to Go and BAGS, Inc. (an acronym for Baggage Airline Guest Services) take the skycap business to the next level, by letting passengers check bags and get their boarding pass offsite — at locations such as hotels, convention centers, or cruise ship terminals.

It’s a great idea, and it’s bound to get a boost in coming months. Depending on the location, you can check your bag as early as 24 hours in advance, or as late as 2 hours before the flight. They take your bag to the airport, where it’s screened, etc. Since they also issue you a boarding pass at the remote site, you just get in line for security when you get to the airport.

San Francisco’s Moscone Convention Center, Chicago’s McCormick Place, and Orlando’s Orange County Convention Center already have agreements with BAGS, while Bags to Go is limited to Las Vegas — the convention center, and the Venetian. Bags to Go charges $20 per person (not per piece) for the service, while BAGS rates vary by location.

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tags: travel | baggage | skycaps | BAGS, Inc. | Bags To Go

Last week, I briefly referenced Irish discount carrier Ryanair’s threat to sue the British government if security procedures were not normalized at UK airports within a week. Now, Ryanair is coming under fire for “profiting from fear.”

Ryanair chief Michael O’Leary, who has made frequent TV appearances attacking the Government’s security clampdown at airports, allegedly told an official at the Transport Department: “Every time I appear on TV I get a spike in sales.”
But Mr O’Leary, who has clashed with Transport Secretary Douglas Alexander, denounced the claim as ‘preposterous’ and denied having made the remark.
And he stepped up his war of words with the Government by claiming there was no proof that any plot to blow up airliners had ever existed.

A few points:

- That latter claim of O’Leary’s — that there was *never* a threat — is certainly kicking things up a notch with a conspiratorial flavor. I personally still believe a plot of some kind existed, but if it’s the plot that was publicly reported, it would have been ineffective, as noted earlier.

- If Ryanair is making money off of fear, it’s pretty impressive. Considering that the incentives to travel are so low right now, if someone is actually making a buck in this climate, then wow. (The airline is running ads featuring Winston Churchill making the V for Victory sign.)

- Ryanair and O’Leary need to be careful not to overstate their case: The company doesn’t have a lot of credibility when it comes to safety. (or service, for that matter)

- They lose more credibility when they’re grandstanding on television, instead of simply filing dockets in court. Don’t threaten to sue. Just sue.

Despite the holes being poked in O’Leary’s motivations, I think it’s healthy to see some corporate resistance to governments in matters of security incompetence and fearmongering. Clearly they’re running a risk of backlash from the government. But what would the consequences be? Oh, the drama…

UPDATE: UK files official charges against 10 suspects in the London plot. Looks like the UK government is trying to prove O’Leary wrong…

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tags: travel | Ryanair