More airline employees with sticky fingers

by Tom Johansmeyer on

Did you lose a bag at Philadelphia International Airport? Well, there may be a reason. An American Airlines baggage crew chief was arrested and charged with stealing clothes from the luggage he handled. The game appears to have been: (1) steal the clothes, (2) return them to a department store and (3) don’t get caught.

That last one’s the hard part.

A passenger on Flight 892 from Dallas to Philly noticed four articles of clothing missing – with a total value of $550. It was easy to reach that amount; the tags were still on the items. Later, the clothing, which was purchased at a Nordstrom in Dallas, was taken to a local Nordstrom.

If it seems to easy … well, handcuffs are there to tell you that it is.

This is just the latest instance busted up by police. A TSA official was fired from his job in Philly for lifting passenger belongings, and a theft ring in St. Louis was discovered – after around 900 items were alleged to have been stolen.

American Airlines bringing in-flight Internet to more domestic flights

by Scott Carmichael on

There is no denying it – in-flight Internet is here to stay. The popularity of being able to get some work (or fun) done during your flight helped make in-flight WiFi one of the winners of the 2008 Engadget awards.

This morning, American Airlines announced their commitment to the service by revealing plan to bring the Gogo in-flight Internet service to 300 of its domestic planes.

American Airlines has been testing the service, and has installed it on 15 planes, Passenger feedback has been so positive that 150 of their MD-80’s will be outfitted with the equipment this year, and another 150 planes next year.

Getting online costs just $9.95 for flights 3 hours or less, and $12.95 for longer flights. Recently, Gogo introduced a new price plan for users with a handheld device or smartphone – they can now get online for just $7.95.

I took the Gogo service for a spin last year, and as far as I cam concerned, it can’t can’t come fast enough on every plane in the country.

It’s Ladies Night at American Airlines!

by Annie Scott on

Traveling is hard. Don’t you think you should get a special discount just for being a woman? American Airlines does!

In recognition of Women’s History Month … March (also, according to Wikipedia, American Red Cross Month and Fire Prevention Month), American Airlines is offering a special deal just for the ladies.

If you visit AA.com/women, you can:

“Print out a flyer and present it to any Admirals Club lounge representative on or before May 15 to save up to $50 off a new annual membership or $25 off a membership renewal. American, a founding member of the oneworld Alliance, has more than 40 Admirals Club locations worldwide.”

Awesome. The website also includes destination deals and articles on worldwide women. Check it out!

U.S. Airlines can’t come up with any new ways to charge their customers

by Scott Carmichael on

Some sad news from Reuters this afternoon (for the airlines at least).

U.S. based airlines may have finally run out of new fees for their passengers.

Indeed, after years of moving things that used to be free into a fee based category, there simply isn’t anything left they can charge us for.

Some airlines, have increased their revenue by over $2 Billion a year, just off things like meals, drinks and baggage charges.

These are all things that used to be included for free with your ticket, but now add as much as 25% to the price of your trip.

Of course, when an airline claims it has run out of ways to screw us, I suspect they are just getting warmed up for the really nasty charges they are preparing. There are plenty of ways they can still make a few bucks off us, until the point where your ticket is nothing more than a piece of paper that entitles you to getting to your destination “sooner or later”.

I’ve written about some of the insane ways airlines come up with “exciting” new products, and quite frankly, I don’t think their creativity will end until the last accountant has left the building.

(Via: RickSeaney.com)

American Airlines passengers: Get double elite miles

by Grant Martin on

Now that the economy is low and demand is tapering off, airlines are doing whatever they can to encourage passengers to return to flying the friendly skies. Sure, oil has come down from it’s all time high of $5000/barrel, but without passengers to fill airplanes, some equipment has to be shelved, and that’s never good for profit.

What to do? Incentivize. A deluge of fare sales including dirt cheap tickets to Barcelona, Tokyo and Moscow have all hit the charts this past week, and the few of us with the travel bug have been booking tickets like madmen.

Other promotions include American Airlines recent Double Elite Qualifying Miles (EQM) bonanza. You might remember that Elite miles/points, the nifty little jobbers that get you points towards Elite status are fairly hard to come by, and those that maintain status often have to do Mileage Runs to keep up their quota. But with this promotion, passengers can earn double elite points through June 15, effectively reducing the number of miles to earn Gold, Platinum and Executive Platinum to 12.5, 25 and 50K respectively. Heck, I might even take a gander at that.

You can sign up for the DEQM promotion here using the code DBEQM. Check out American’s elite info here.