As of today, Fairmont and its sister brands Raffles and Swissotel have formally joined the AccorHotels group. As per the press release: “Following the approval of shareholders at the General Shareholders Meeting on July 12, 2016, the transaction with Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) and Kingdom Holding Company (KHC) of Saudi Arabia provided $840 million (€768…
I just received a communication from Singapore Airlines informing that starting 1 July 2016, KrisFlyer members will not be able to earn any KrisFlyer élite miles on Virgin Atlantic operated flights between the Americas and Europe. You are although eligible to earn KrisFlyer élite miles on the rest of Virgin Atlantic’s non-transatlantic flight network. Do…
Ever since Air India has joined the Star Alliance, things have become more and more professional for the airline as it brings in the specialist expertise to improve its service and product standards. With low fuel price helping the airline swing back into a profit. The airline is now learning from its peers and has…
Starting 31st March 2016, Garuda Indonesia has started flying direct 5 times a week (every other day except Monday and Friday) from Singapore to London (Heathrow) one way basis. The airline has done this due to the ongoing runway issues at the Jakarta airport which limits the take-off weight from the airport. The airlines 77-300ERs are…
There have been lots of exciting developments happening in the airline industry, be it cramped seating in economy class or the so-called best business seats. This news though beats everything out by a mile. According to this news article, Chinese on-line travel booking giant Qunar intends to start its own airline. The Baidu backed company intends…
There seems to be a flurry of Chinese airlines applying to grab airline routes given the first come first serve policy that only allows one airline to fly a route, the notable exception being Air China which is the de-facto state airline. Air China has now gone ahead and applied for flying rights to fly…
Air France is not really known as a very creative driven airline. Its a title that usually goes to its partner KLM who have brought in unique customer focussed initiatives like 24/7 twitter support in multiple languages, find your seat mate and many more. But this time Air France has taken a leaf out that…
An Air Canada flight from Frankfurt to Toronto had the misfortune of being diverted to London’s Heathrow airport twice on the same day in a matter of hours. According to the news article, the flight AC 873 on 3rd March 2016 took off from Frankfurt and right when it hit the UK shores, the crew detected…
The future of Airbus A380, the flagship model of the plane manufacturer from Europe hangs in balance. The only two factors justifying the jumbo are the need for transporting more people out of busy slot constrained airports such as Beijing and Heathrow and the Middle East airline giant, Emirates. The A380 super jumbo is lagging…
As part of the local capability building roadmap, the Chinese government has been luring Airbus and Boeing to build locally by doling out large orders for their jets. The latest in this case is the huge Air China order worth $3.1 billion for Airbus A330 jets. The Chinese government agency COMAC has been trying to…
As per Bloomberg report, Thai Airways has grounded its entire fleet of Airbus A340s, some of which are barely a few years old for cost efficiency purposes. The airline says that it’s unable to make any flights on these quad engine aircrafts profitable even after the substantial oil price drop. In this age of twin engines…
Malaysia Airlines is running a promo offering 50% off on redemptions made from 18th to February 22nd, 2016. The travel period for this redemption campaign is from February 20th to May 20th, 2016. The London route is served by the Airbus A380s that the airline has and is also the only remaining route of the…
Oman Air is name that won’t be familiar to many of the travelers given that they aren’t in the league of the big Middle East 3 cousins namely Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways. But the airline has started flexing its muscles to show that it means serious business. As part of this, the airline has…
Jet Airways is running a promo under which you can get up to 40% bonus JetPrivilege miles when you buy them online on their website. The offer ends on 19th February 2016 and is tiered as follows: The example provided is self-explanatory although I don’t understand the logic of having so many tiers for bonuses. You…
China’s Airline Pilots Association has issued a wacky letter that is recommending its members to stay away from prostitutes, gambling and drink ahead of this year’s Lunar New Year holiday. The open letter which was published on an aviation website goes on to state that it expects all chinese pilots to keep up the safe…
Emirates has been expanding at break neck speed in every possible nook and corner of the world. With vast amounts of easy funding available, the airline is definitely not short on cash but sometimes it’s those small policy quirks that can cause some issues. Lately Emirates has been pushing its staff to wear flag pins…
