Downgraded: Checked bags on international American Airlines flights
British Airways was the first to do this, but American Airlines wasn’t far behind: Many AA economy-class ticket-holders will no longer have an allowance of two checked bags on international flights. For those who buy tickets to Belgium, England, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Italy, Spain, or Switzerland on or after September 14, 2009, the first bag remains free (or, perhaps more accurately, included in the cost of the ticket). However, the second bag, which used to be included free, will now cost $50, up to 50 lbs. A list of exceptions applies, including full-fare tickets, elite AAdvantage and oneworld members, military personnel and dependents, and, interestingly, those traveling on codeshare-issued tickets.

Upgraded: Biofuel at airports
It’s not quite biofuel in the jets, but it’s a great start: Eight airlines will start using biofuels to power their ground equipment at LAX.

Downgraded: All-you-can-fly fares
JetBlue, which rolled out a $599 all-you-can-fly ticket two weeks ago, ended sales early. “While supplies last” meant they didn’t last.

Downgraded: United Breaks Guitars, episode 2
The original “United Breaks Guitars” video was a delight, a catchy tune that lambasted the airline for treating a customer poorly. The sequel, while cute, lacks the magic. It does, however, feature tubas.

Upgraded, I guess: Squeezing a couple bucks out of Hotwire
Hotwire has settled a class action lawsuit that charged that the company didn’t properly notify consumers of the fees and taxes charged for hotel reservations. If you made a hotel reservation on Hotwire between January 10, 2001 and May 2, 2005, you are likely entitled to either cash refunds or Hotwire credits. The Hotwire credit is significantly more lucrative, if you’re a Hotwire user anyway. See here for details, if you didn’t get an e-mail from the plaintiff’s attorneys (if you’re wondering, they got customer e-mail addresses from Hotwire…)

Downgraded, as if it was possible: Ryanair
Just when you think the airline couldn’t go any lower, Ryanair charges a fee to collect your lost-and-found. Even if you’re a nine-year old girl who lost her purse. It’s comical really: Ryanair will take candy from a baby, literally.

I’m on an American Airlines MD-80, which happens to have Gogo wireless access. (I saved $9.95 by using code AAWiFi76194A1, valid thru August 23. You can use it too.)

Here’s my current location, for those keeping score:

The speed is impressive:

In any case, it’s time to put this sucker to the test and see if streaming video can work. More reports when I’m back on terra firma.

The machines, called “Your Assistance Delivered Anywhere,” or YADA — insert Seinfeld joke here — won’t be tied to a specific spot. Instead, AA staff will be able to rove around, checking bags, printing boarding passes, clearing upgrades (!), and providing flight and gate information. The program is designed to reduce wait-times. It sounds like they’ll need a skycap tailing them, to carry the bags off.

It’s a six-week test, so it will be interesting to see how the new procedure plays out in the real world.

Boston AA travelers: Please post your experiences with the YADA in the comments!

There are some benefits. The obvious one is that you can book one-way award tickets, should that need arise. And it would now be possible to mix and match between booking classes, e.g., first class one way, coach class returning.

Another benefit might be on hard-to-book routes: Let’s say you can find availability on the outbound, but not the return. You can then go ahead and book the outbound, to lock that in, and keep checking back to see if/when the return opens up. (If this strategy fails, of course, you’d have some fees to cancel that one-way ticket, or you might end up buying a cash fare for the return… but it’s another tool in your arsenal.)

The one-way ticket also means you can string together a series of tickets that criss-cross the country, or the globe — say, New York to Albuquerque on one ticket, Albuquerque to Portland on another, Portland to Tampa on another, and Tampa to New York again on a final ticket. Of course, each city pair is its own ticket, but you could create some pretty complex itineraries that weren’t possible earlier.

But…

After seeing a post by lucky that pointed to a message board discussion of the policy changes, I knew there was a downside coming. What WAS possible before, and what’s been dampened alongside this change, was the free stopover when flying American Airlines or its partners on an roundtrip ticket.

The revised mileage chart shows only one-way fares, and reference to stopovers has disappeared. In the FAQ’s for the new One Way Flex Awards, there is this: “Awards between North America and Europe, India, Asia, and Central / South America allow a stopover at the North American gateway. However, other one-way awards do not allow stopovers.” That’s a function of the change from roundtrips to one-ways, but it’s lame.

The old rules (found via a quick search that yielded the original stopover rule text on a thread at Flyertalk) permitted stopovers at either the US or the international gateway. (International stopovers on oneworld alliance tickets, which are calculated on the basis of miles flown, are still possible, since you can string up to 16 flight segments together for one mileage fare.)

Savvy travelers have long made good use of free stopovers to make their miles go further. This has especially been true internationally, where one could add a few days’ jetlag recovery in one city before catching a flight to the intended final destination. Those stopovers will still be possible under the new policy, but they’ll cost you an additional flight segment’s miles. That’s a downgrade.

A shame, really. American Airlines’ one-way awards would otherwise have been praised as a nice upgrade. Too bad they giveth, and they taketh away.

American Airlines’ CEO Gerard Arpey dared to dream. He slipped a comment into their recent earnings call which seemed rather off the wall, until Delta CEO Richard Anderson effectively repeated the idea. The proposal? Instead of paying commissions to agencies and websites that sell their fares, airlines would charge those agencies a fee for the right to display and sell their fares.

AA’s Arpey:

“I can see a day, and maybe I’m dreaming here, where those folks who are the intermediary between us and our customer have to pay for access to our product rather than us paying them to distribute our product.”

DL’s Anderson:

“Over time, the industry will evolve,” Anderson told analysts on Tuesday during a conference call to report first-quarter financial results. “People will pay us for our content.”

There’s an odd disjuncture here in the understanding of what it is airlines are selling, and who their customers are. Travelers see airlines as selling transportation services, and that passengers are the customers. But these airlines apparently seem to think they’re selling “content” — their schedule data — and that the agents who sell tickets on the airline’s behalf are the customers. No wonder the airline industry is such a mess.

On the one hand, airline execs are right to be looking for ways to reduce their costs. And when an agency or website besides their own sells a ticket, they’re giving up a cut, largely to the global distribution systems like Amadeus, Galileo, and Sabre that distribute their information to agencies large and small. (Granted, the agent themselves may or may not get a cut, depending on the contract they’re on, with most small agents getting $0.00. That’s why independent travel agents typically charge a “service fee.” The big guys like Orbitz and Expedia get a piece of each sale.)

But charging their sales team — the agencies — for the privilege of even offering fares sounds like a multi-level marketing scam or a 19th century company town. Paging the Pullman Company!

What airlines are missing here is that the bulk of higher-priced tickets aren’t sold via the airlines’ own websites. They’re sold through big agencies, often through corporate travel sites. And even if the US market has moved away from independent shops, the rest of the world is still heavily dependent on agencies. Cutting out other means of distributing their fares could be cutting off their nose to spite their face.

If this really were to happen, it wouldn’t be great for consumers, despite the ostensible cost savings. The problem is transparency. If some airlines would be available for sale through one system but others wouldn’t, it would make meta-search all the more important to find lower fares. (That is, if the airlines allow aggregators to search their sites…)

But honestly, none of this is likely to happen. There’s the fact that the high-revenue sales come through the higher-cost distribution channels, and for all the complaining, the money is too good to just sacrifice.

Plus, even if this happened, and even if we assumed that sales would just revert to the airline’s call centers and website, implementing this would require a ramp-up of airlines’ customer service infrastructure (call centers, web support, etc.), just to do the work that agencies are doing now. Will the commission savings outweigh increased personnel and customer service costs?

Either way, at the very least, American and Delta have ticked off a host of agents. The comments on the TravelWeekly article already number in the hundreds. (419 to be precise, and comments appear to have been closed.) Threats of boycotting AA abound, and there’s ever more bad blood between agents and the legacy airlines who proposed this.

Great move, guys.

(image)

The 50K bonus is just for paid first or business class (discounted Z fares count!), while 25K is for the upper-end coach fares.

You’ll find American’s offer here and United’s here. Registration is required for both, so be sure to follow the registration links on those pages if you want to qualify for the offer. Remember, also, that you have to be flying to or from the UK. Transiting the UK to another destination won’t count.

[While you're at it, make sure you're signed up for the double elite-qualifying mile bonus offers that American, United, Continental, and (as of yesterday) Delta are pitching. Registration is required.]

Why the sudden burst of big-ticket offers?

Oversupply, oversupply, oversupply. Obviously, the airlines are trying desperately to fill seats, and in the case of the UK offers, fill those seats at higher price points. UK routes are particularly common among business travelers, and the mauling of the premium-cabin market has to be taking a bite out of the airlines’ projected revenue streams.

Plus, they know Americans are hooked on frequent flyer bonuses, so they’re trying to keep you from moving your business to the loving embrace of Virgin Atlantic or British Airways, both of which are offering great deals to the British isles these days.

By offering bonuses like these, the airlines are effectively throwing in a free (restricted) domestic ticket when you buy a UK-bound seat at full price. But realize that it’s not necessarily a bargain.

(image)

1) 40K United Mileage Plus miles
Chase is rolling out another fat bonus with their Mileage Plus Visa: 40,000 total bonus miles, but you don’t get them in one shot. 20,000 up front, and more as you spend, and after one year:

20,000 bonus miles after first purchase
10,000 bonus miles after your first anniversary
10,000 bonus miles after approval and making $10,000 in qualifying transactions in the first six months

The first year fee of $60 is waived. One other caveat: The fine print says you can’t get the bonuses if you’ve had a Mileage Plus card before. (Hat tip to AskMrCreditCard!)

2) 25K American AAdvantage miles
A simpler, less-confusing offer. 25,000 AA miles from Citibank, with their MasterCard or Amex (yes, Citibank issues Amex cards now). Spend $750 on the card, get the bonus.

Again, the first year’s fee ($85) is waived.

—

If you’re going to collect these miles, don’t hoard ‘em, spend ‘em. And consider canceling the card after you’ve collected the bonus.

Downgraded: American Airlines considers going fully a la carte
American Airlines is considering ditching the “combo meal” approach to plane tickets and going fully a-la-carte with all its fares. This potentially means something along the lines of Air Canada’s model, not just adding on fees for baggage. Amusing, to me: Air Canada’s executives “look down their noses a bit at the actions of their U.S. counterparts, saying a la carte pricing should be about transparency and customer choice, not simply revenue.” The promise of price transparency is not a victory for consumers unless everyone does it the same way: Making apples-to-apples comparisons will be harder if some airlines publish fares one way and other airlines don’t.

Downgraded: Sun Country files for Chapter 11
Sun Country, the Minnesota-based discount airline, has filed for bankruptcy protection… again. But hey, they’re still operating! Beats the “We’re sorry, all flights are canceled” message on the homepage of so many failed airlines. The airline faced a cash crunch after the company’s owner was indicted on federal fraud charges.

Upgraded: Odds of actually bringing liquids through security
TSA and international counterparts are “within a year” of relaxing restrictions on carrying liquids through security checkpoints. “TSA has been testing X-ray machines that can detect liquid materials used in bomb-making and the technology is close to be ready for widespread use. The X-ray machines themselves are already widely deployed in the U.S., but the software necessary for the liquids detection and evaluation is still being tested.” Again, these are already in action in Japan. What’s the holdup?

(image)

Downgraded: New York aviation landmarks
There are a handful of routes where pilots use land markers to guide their approach for landing. New York’s LaGuardia is one of them, and they’re about to lose a key marker: Shea Stadium, the home of the Mets, is being demolished. The use of these physical markers, seen from the sky, is kind of quaint. I recall flying into LaGuardia (on a different approach path) and listening to Channel 9 on United (which lets you listen in on the cockpit conversations with the tower). The tower’s instructions were something like “Turn left at the Statue of Liberty and fly up the river.” Awesome.

Downgraded: Flights to Pakistan
A note to any passengers flying to Pakistan: British Airways has indefinitely canceled its flights to Islamabad, in the wake of the Marriott hotel bombing. BA’s FAQ page for passengers with flights to Pakistan is here. Joe Brancatelli suggests that travelers to the region avoid US and UK airlines and hotels, and consider companies that cater to Japanese travelers instead.

Upgraded: Elite lines at American Airlines… and Southwest
American Airlines is rolling out the red carpets for their elite frequent flyers. Literally. Starting September 30, at select airports, you’ll find check-in lines, security lines, and boarding lines. (Before anyone gets upset: The TSA doesn’t control the security lines, the airports and airlines do. See here for a defense of the process.) I’m not frequently on board AA planes, so I’m not an elite with them. But I’m shocked that this isn’t already out there for AA flyers. Other airlines have been doing this for years. Years! More shocking, though also, not entirely: Southwest is rolling out elite lines, too.

Upgraded: Continental, caving, brings back the 500-mile minimum
An anonymous commenter brought it up early, and it’s since confirmed: Continental is reversing itself and granting passengers a minimum of 500 frequent flyer miles on flights under that distance.

Downgraded: “Fakeproof” passports
I love stories like this: British authorities touted the safety and security of their “e-passport,” effectively a passport with an embedded radio-frequency chip. Hacker-proof, they claimed. It was cracked, cloned, and altered within minutes. Minutes. Not even hours, much less days, or weeks. Minutes. The computer researcher proved his point by changing the data to make the passport appear to be Osama bin Laden’s, complete with passport photo. Just awesome. (Recall that, as posted a couple years ago, the easiest way to destroy the chip inside your passport, if you’re wary of RFID scanners stealing your personal information, is with a hammer.)

Downgraded: American Airlines upgrades
A downgraded upgrade? Indeed. American recently rolled out copayment fees for many of its upgrade awards. See the changes on the award chart here. More evidence of the devaluation of miles, if you needed a reminder.

Upgraded: European booking war hilarity
Britain’s Thomson Holidays, part of the TUI Group, came under heat for offering vacation rentals in Greece or Turkey for £14 a week. At £2 a night, that’s some cheap sleeps. Why was this problematic? Competitors complained that Thomson was changing customer expectations, causing travelers to hold out and wait for the rock-bottom room rate, instead of booking early. Sounds like crybaby talk to me.

Upgraded: Alliance dalliance
It’s not really a surprise, given the urge to merge that’s rampant in aviation today, but American Airlines, British Airways, and Iberia are looking to link up. They’re already alliance partners within Oneworld, and this isn’t a merger (yet), but the three airlines are trying to get antitrust immunity, so they can collude and set fares together. There’s really no benefit to consumers in this, especially if you fly between London and the United States. AA and BA dominate those routes, and the companies want to expand their price-setting power.

Upgraded: Google Maps’ sense of humor
Remember how Google Maps gave directions from the U.S. to Europe which included the instruction to swim across the Atlantic? Those jokesters recently did it again, suggesting you kayak across the Pacific Ocean. (They took it down, alas.)

Upgraded: Your chance to speak your mind on aircraft interiors
Friend of the blog Addison Schonland is doing some market research on aircraft interiors, and what you want to see inside those aluminum tubes. Take his poll, which will hopefully filter through to airline designers and execs attending the Aircraft Interiors Expo show next month.

Upgraded: Stormy weather
Priceline is once again rolling out a cute promotion, which promises to pay the cost of your vacation package if your trip is rained out, through November 16, 2008. The “Sunshine Guarantee” kicks in if a half inch of measured rainfall is present on HALF of the days of your trip. That’s a lot of rain, so don’t count on any payout. Kerala monsoon holiday, anyone?

TechCrunch also reports, citing “the CEO of a competing travel site” as a source, that American is “considering doing the same with Orbitz. If it does so, other airlines such as Continental and Northwest may follow suit.”

For starters, this stinks for consumers, because it’s making comparison shopping harder. Already we’re stuck comparing apples to oranges, thanks to the variation between the airlines’ myriad fees. But in the long run, I’m betting that pulling out of comparison sites will stink for the airline, too, and we’ll see this decision reversed.

The comparison with Southwest will inevitably arise. Sure, Southwest doesn’t show up in comparison sites, but Southwest customers have been “trained” for years now to skip the search engines and go straight to the airline. American doesn’t have that kind of culture built up, and it’s unlikely to go all-in toward creating such a culture at this point. Just pulling out of Kayak won’t do the trick. And worse, it’s a real pain in the butt to waste time looking all over the internet for the lowest fare. I have always disliked that about Southwest, but hey, it’s working for them. Still, Southwest is the exception — not everyone can pull off selling tickets solely on their their own. Even JetBlue caved in and started publishing fares on other sites.

American Airlines has played these games before. They once yanked first-class fares from Expedia, but came back three weeks later.

This sort of thing goes both ways, too. Notably, online travel agencies don’t claim to cover ALL the options. Orbitz, for example, limits customers’ choices in its rental car search to those companies that pay to be included.

I’m betting that American’s pullout is a bargaining strategy. They hate to pay any referral fees to sites that drive them customers, but they don’t want to lose those customers entirely. Their real goal: to negotiate a smaller revenue split with Kayak and/or Orbitz.

If I’m right, then American’s fares will be back online for comparison shopping within a month or so. If I’m wrong, then we will likely see other airlines do the same, and the business model of Kayak and its competitors is at risk. It’s not just venture capitalists who lose out if those sites fail: The consumer loses. So I really hope my prediction is right.

Dutifully playing follow-the-leader, and jumping into the proverbial meat-grinder, airlines are competing to make a bad scene worse. They’re piling on: adding fees, reducing benefits, and devaluing frequent flyer miles even more. And that’s just today. Yeah, it was a bad day.

Round one: Luggage fees
Barely wasting any time after American Airlines imposed a $15 fee for the first checked bag, United has followed suit. The new fee goes into effect “if you are traveling on or after August 18, 2008 on an Economy ticket or Economy award ticket purchased on or after June 13, 2008.” Yes, there are exceptions for elite frequent flyers (notably for all Star Alliance elites, and not just United elites) and premium-cabin passengers. Full details here.

Oh, and US Airways matched the $15 fee today, too. Who’s next?

Round two: Free stuff isn’t free anymore fee
American introduced a $5 fee for booking a free ticket online. Purely spiteful, as Gary Leff argued when this first arose. Online distribution was intended to lower costs, but now it’s just a profit center.

But American’s $5 fee seems downright generous compared to US Airways’ announcement today. There’s a double-whammy of “award ticketing fees” and “award processing fees.” The ticketing fees consist of $30 surcharge for U.S/Canada tickets, and $40 for international itineraries. But then there’s the “processing fee”: $25 continental U.S./Alaska/Canada, $35 Latin America/Caribbean, $50 Hawaii/international.

Extortionary.

Round three: Free trips will cost more miles
American jacked up the number of miles necessary for many free tickets and upgrades, thereby making it harder to reach your award goals. No surprise, alas, given the oversupply of miles chasing a shortage of flights in an age of increasing airfares. But still annoying.

So far, no other followers… yet. Give it a day or two, and it won’t be a surprise if others devalue your miles the same way.

Round four: We will kick elites like dogs, and you’ll like it
US Airways will piss off thousands of its elite frequent flyers with its new “enhancement” to the Dividend Miles program: “US Airways is also eliminating its bonus miles program for Preferred status Dividend Miles members. Preferred members currently receive mileage bonuses based on their status level. The Preferred bonus program will be discontinued for tickets purchased on/after Aug. 6, 2008.” Ouch. So, elites who previously accumulated miles more quickly can now kiss that benefit goodbye. How many elites will be kissing US Airways goodbye? (Hat tip to Benet Wilson for pointing this nugget out to me first!)

Rounds five through infinity: Everything else.
Beyond that, the fees just keep on coming. US Airways is adding fees for all soft drinks, including water. Excuse me, that’s “a new in-flight beverage purchase program.” Ooh, a program! Groan. They’re raising the price of booze, too, to a whopping $7. United is increasing various ticketing fees, across the board, too many to name. And US Airways is shutting clubs and arrival lounges. Satire just doesn’t cut it anymore.

Is there a silver lining in here anywhere? I can’t seem to find it.

Related:
- Copycat: US Airways mimics United, starts charging for second checked bag
- Death by a thousand cuts: US Airways edition