Delta has introduced a $25 fee for redeeming miles for domestic tickets and a $50 fee for international tickets beginning on August 15th.  They’re calling the fee a “surcharge,” but you shouldn’t hold your breath for those fees to disappear, um, ever.  I wouldn’t be shocked, though, when these fees increase (first on the international [...]

I’m back from my quick trip on OpenSkies and I thought I’d post a very quick review:
The airline, which is a corporate cousin to British Airways (so you can get BA miles), flies 757s outfitted with 82 seats from New York to Paris (Orly). The plane is divided into Economy (nothing special there), Prem+ [...]

Delta implemented a $25 second-checked-bag fee on April 9th for flights after May 5th (you had to pay the fee regardless of whether you had already purchased a ticket for those dates prior to the announcement).  Well, it turns out they can’t do that.
If you purchased a ticket on Delta prior to April 9th, and [...]

I rarely report airline financials here, but I thought it was interesting to note that Delta announced yesterday that they expect to turn a profit in the 2nd quarter (ie, this quarter). I’m by no means suggesting that the situation isn’t gloomy (it is), but we should remember that it’s not impossible to be [...]

I know most of you don’t care about the relationships between airlines and their regional partners, but bear with me for about 3 sentences:  Delta told its regional partner Pinnacle that it will be canceling a 10-year agreement they have because Pinnacle’s on-time record isn’t meeting standards.  Pinnacle, in response, said that they told Delta [...]

The Wall St. Journal has an interesting article looking at how much it’s costing airlines to fly you from here to there – you may be surprised to hear that upwards of 70% of your fare may be going just to pay the fuel bill. For example, American’s fuel bill for a roundtrip flight [...]

I thought it might be useful/depressing to pass along a quick overview of the horrible/annoying/depressing things we’ve seen happen since the fuel hike:
Northwest/Delta merger (less service + higher fares = unhappy flyers in Minot)
American’s $15 first bag fee
Everyone else’s $25 second bag fee
US Airways removes snacks from domestic flights
American cuts domestic capacity 12% and decimates [...]

In a bit of bad news for my friend Corina (and everyone else who wants to fly to Romania), Delta will end their nonstop JFK-Bucharest service in October as part of a larger set of cutbacks they’ve been announcing. Posters on Airliners suggest that low business class loads are the culprit, and I’d buy [...]

Delta is offering a $50 Amex gift card if you book a flight between JFK and LA, San Francisco, San Diego, Portland and Seattle for travel through the end of June. Take that, JetBlue.
(Reader Tom points out that JetBlue has a similar promotion – book your JetBlue ticket by May 16 for flights until [...]

One interesting note from yesterday’s news about Delta’s earnings:  Their CEO said that the $1 billion in annual revenue and cost synergies fromthe merger are “really conservative.” As they delve further into the merger, they expect that “significantly more [cost/revenue synergy] opportunities” to be found.
Which is to say, “We have no idea what’s going to [...]