More benefits reinstated

US Air has actually made a move that doesn’t suck for its frequent fliers.  They’ve reinstated bonus miles for elite passengers and also put back 500-mile minimums on short flights for their elites.  Much like United they will be going back and issuing these credits retroactively to their loyal members so as to make it appear as if the benefit never was cancelled. 

I’m glad to see that the airlines are occasionally acting rationally, even if it does take losing a ton of business in the process, as US Air seems to have done.  It will be very interesting to see if this is enough for many of the defectors to return to the program. 

Southwest bids on LaGuardia

Southwest seems to be the only domestic carrier having any fun these days.  Between their new code-share agreements, expansion into Minneapolis and general profitability (though not so much last quarter), they appear to be avoiding the difficulties that other carriers have been experiencing of late.  Yes, they are cutting capacity overall, but they seem to be doing so with much more surgical precision than other carriers who are leaving markets completely and otherwise flailing about.

And now, Southwest has gone and made a bid to serve NYC’s LaGuardia airport.  They’re bidding on the 7 slot pairs that ATA still owns in their bankrupt state.  They are pretty much the only asset ATA still has and they are a huge asset.  Southwest wants them, and they have the resources to bid on them, so things look pretty positive for their chances.  It is not a done deal yet – the bids still need to be reviewed and a decision made by the bankruptcy judge – but things look pretty good on that front.

Where will Southwest fly with their 7 flights/day?  It is hard to know for certain, though Chicago-Midway seems likely as one destination.  And there will certainly be struggles for Southwest to operate in the LaGuardia structure, with the frequent delays, troubles in bad weather and slot details all affecting their operations.  But 7 flights is certainly enough to have a significant impact on the other carriers in NYC, and that is a good thing for passengers.  It also means that I might have the opportunity to consider Southwest now for some flights, which would be a big change for me.

Being met at the airport

I have to admit that one of the little luxuries I will treat myself to on occasion is to have a car waiting for me at the airport upon arrival.  Especially in a foreign country where negotiating the taxi ranks and negotiating a fare is traditional I just don’t want to have to deal with that sort of situation, especially after a long flight.  Plus, there is really something quite wonderful about showing up and having someone waiting there with your name on a sign, even if it is a driver that you’ve paid to do that.

In Bangkok the cold towels and water bottles in the car were a very nice touch.  In India I still fondly remember my mother-in-law’s company driver knowing my name and handing me a note with a phone number to call for further instructions.  Slightly surreal and very entertaining in retrospect.  In Vietnam it was a shoddy van that barely had benches inside, much less seat belts or a decent suspension.  I paid $2 extra for that “luxury” but it meant not fighting the taxi driver on the fare or having to explain directions and that was well worth my money.

And then there is the joy of actually being met by someone who you know at the airport.  The opening and closing scenes of Love Actually capture the emotion rather well, and I have fond memories of similar events in my life. 

But I’ve never gone to an airport to welcome random strangers to their destination.  These folks did.

They actually went to the airport with signs, gifts, flowers and balloons and “welcomed home” a bunch of random strangers.  They leveraged the NYC black car drivers to get names and then staged impromptu welcome parties for complete strangers.  Sure, it is a little creepy to have a group of 20 random strangers welcome you home, especially in NYC, but it also seems like a much better welcome than a grumpy driver.  And it makes for a pretty entertaining story to share.

Nifty travel fact from today in history

One hundred twenty five years ago today, November 18, 1883, the United States finally decided to adopt a single source for telling time – Railroad Time.  Wired has a fantastic article about it, with some great bits of history mixed in to the overall development of a coordinated time schedule.

Railroad timetables used about a hundred different standards. A single railroad that traveled east to west would use multiple noons: The Union Pacific, for example, had six different settings in what are today the Central and Mountain zones. The Union Station that served multiple railroads in a big city might have five or six different clocks, one for each railroad in the station, each running on is own time.

It took a full 35 years for the United States government to catch up with the industry and declare an official Standard Time for the country.  In the interim the country simply followed the lead of the dominant industry of the time, the railroads. 

TSA wasting passenger time for no results

Hardly a surprise, really, as I don’t think anyone with critical thinking skills expected that a bunch of TSA employees could suddenly become behavior detection specialists overnight, but now there are some real statistics proving the point.

Over the past 16 months the TSA’s SPOT program has led to 160,000 additional screenings (that’s ~350/day for a staff of ~2,500 people). Those screenings have led to a whopping 1,266 people actually being arrested, mostly for drug possession or having a fake ID. That’s a conversion rate of fewer than 1%. Even worse than that, in my mind, is that about 10% of the people confronted under this program (~15,000) faced questioning by the police and still only 10% of those actually were arrested.

The TSA is doing their best to spin the results, reminding us that some people were actually doing illegal things. They seem to forget, however, that their mission is about protecting the airspace from terrorists, not from kids with fake IDs or drug dealers.

TSA spokeswoman Ellen Howe said the program has been "incredibly effective" at catching criminals at airports. "It definitely gets at things that other layers of security might miss," Howe said.

The other great thing that the TSA continues to tout is that possession of a fake ID is a terrorist act. They take pride in the fact that they are catching all these fake IDs since ID = security in their minds and since anyone with a fake ID must be out scouting an airport for a possible attack. Better let all those bars in college towns know that they are targets and that they need to up their security. What a joke.

There is no real reason to believe that the ~1% number is statistically any different than if the TSA just randomly picking a group of 160,000 passengers and subjecting them to an invasive and over-reaching search. But we can continue to spend money on it and grow the program because we haven't had any more attacks on the airspace so it must be working.

This program is simply the worst functioning and most misguided bit in an organization bent on suppressing privacy rights while returning zero value in actual security. So sad.

Backing off of (some) unpopular changes

Many airlines have made some very unpopular decisions over the past few months.  From selling bottled water in their lounges to charging elites for premium seats, the changes are enough to get many frequent fliers up in arms, or at least threatening to do so if any of the other programs out there weren’t similarly bad.  It also seems in some ways that these changes are being set up as low-hanging fruit for the vocal frequent travelers to attack, distracting from substantive reductions in benefits that really do matter.

Delta decided that they wanted to adopt Northwest’s “Coach Choice” program, where some of the better seats were held back to be sold to any customer rather than being given to elites for free.  That didn’t go over so well, so they backed off (effective 11.18; I just got the email alert).  But they haven’t backed off from their three-tier reward structure, huge additional fees for itineraries that originate outside of North America, partner ticketing fees, getting rid of the Delta Shuttle fleet configuration and many other things that have substantively detract from the value of the program.

US Air has apparently decided not to sell bottled water any more (as reported yesterday), but just about everything else they’ve done to their airline has been another step in the rapid drive to the absolute bottom.  They haven’t quite made it there yet, but removing in-flight entertainment systems, cutting bonus miles for elites and charging for drinks on the planes are all pretty ridiculous moves.

Continental announced on the same day that they would be removing the 500-mile minimum earned by folks flying on short flights that they would also be increasing the change fees on reward tickets from $35 to $150 in many cases, and that only their top tier elites would be exempt from such fees.  The 500-mile minimum affects far fewer passengers, but they apparently drew enough pressure on that decision that they backed down, agreeing to reinstate the 500-mile minimum earning for folks who are already elite.

What is the common theme in all of these changes?  The airlines are throwing out a bunch of bad things and then backing off on one or two less significant ones.  They get to go on about how they are “listening to their best customers” and changing their minds because of the feedback.  That’s actually exactly what tonight’s email from Delta said:

…[W]e've received substantial feedback from Medallion members like you, and your dissatisfaction was crystal clear …

Retaining your long-term loyalty is of paramount importance to us, and we're not afraid to change course when we need to.

Yeah.  So crystal clear that they’re willing to forego a tiny bit of incremental revenue to distract their customers from the emaciation of the program in other areas.  Awesome.  Don’t get me wrong – I’m glad that there are some small give backs happening.  But things still aren’t all rosy for the frequent flier.  It is harder and harder to find value in the programs, but I’m still trying and mostly finding it, at least thus far.

Getting paid to fly, part 2

There is a drug company that has a drug that has been approved for treating a number of sleep disorders, including narcolepsy and helping folks stay awake working the graveyard shift.  So now that company wants to use the same drug to “treat” jetlag.  I say put the word treat in quotes because it really isn’t a medical condition, much like “erectile dysfunction” but the drug companies don’t really care about things like that as long as they get to sell their wares.

In order to be able to market the drug as effective against jetlag the company has to test it against jet lag.  And that means human trials against people who actually are suffering from jetlag at that moment in time.  To do so in a controlled manner they’ve set up a clinical trial that involves a sleep test in the United States followed by a flight to Europe to induce jet lag and more tests over a three day period in France. 

So participants in the study get to fly in a private jet from New York to France (technically the plane lands in Switzerland but the Basel airport has exits on both sides of the border) and then undergo sleep testing in their facility there.  The flights and everything associated with the stay in France are free, though apparently the food leaves something to be desired.  And it pays $2500 for a few days’ efforts.  Not a bad gig.  I’ve enrolled in the study and am scheduled to fly in a couple weeks, assuming I pass the first sleep test in the NYC facilities.  Apparently they’ve been having trouble getting enough people who can pass the initial sleep test in NYC (only something like 25% of folks have made it to the flight stage).  I’m hopeful I make the cut.

If you want more info, check out their site here or read some of the discussion about the program here.  Oh, and no frequent flier miles since it is a private jet and you don’t actually get to do anything but look out the window in France.  Plus no alcohol or caffeine during the testing period.  So clearly some drawbacks.  But it makes for an interesting story.