Lufthansa began offering many new long-haul destinations including 11 new routes from North America.
Seats in Economy Class and Premium Economy Class will be available on all flights booked via Lufthansa and, from mid-March 2020,* you will also have the choice of Business Class seats. Although Business Class seats can be booked immediately
In October of 2019, Lufthansa had been flying from Frankfurt am Main to Windhoek, to Las Vegas and to the Caribbean island of Barbados. Beginning in the summer of 2020, passengers will be able to fly to Las Vegas and Orlando from Munich as well as travel from Frankfurt to Anchorage in Alaska or Phoenix in Arizona.
Also, beginning in the summer of 2020, Lufthansa will be flying from Dusseldorf to other attractive long-haul destinations regular flights to New York. Miami and Fort Myers . In addition, from 29 March 2020 a connection to Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic will feature in the timetable.
Initial Feedback is Overwhelmingly Positive! Drawing for a domestic business class ticket which will be on January 31st streamed live!
The focus of the program was to acclimate advisors of the different systems used; new material for 2020 will focus more on Regal Wings, the process of submitting quotes, what invoices look like, how to mark up fares and other service levels.
Less than a week after exiting Sabre, Air India has inked a new distribution deal with Amadeus.
Air India notified Sabre on Thursday, January 2nd, they were discontinuing content on all Sabre systems as Sabre sent an email out to its distribution network Thursday at around 1pm Eastern notifying its network of this change. “Our goal has been – and will continue to be – to provide the broadest content available to agencies, airlines and travelers alike. We strongly believe distribution through Sabre’s network of global travel agencies will provide great value to Air India. Accordingly, we will continue in our efforts to obtain the Air India content for the Sabre systems. ”
The airline also has an agreement with Travelport.as the exclusive content provider in its home market. However, Amadeus’ sellers outside India will be able to distribute the carrier’s full range of content, both domestic and international.
“We are glad to once again work with Air India and play a positive role in the airline’s growth strategy,” commented Cyril Tetaz, Amadeus’ executive vice president, airlines, Asia Pacific, on the renewed partnership said:
Meenakshi Mallik, commercial director for Air India, said: “We are pleased to renew our relationship with Amadeus to support our growth strategy globally and hope that this is the first step in our new journey together. We look forward to working closer with Amadeus to support agencies and travellers in the future.”
British Airways announced it will begin flights between Portland International Airport and London’s Heathrow Airport on June 1st 2020.
The flights will operate in both directions five days per week using a Boeing 787 Dreamliner with business, premium economy and economy classes. Flights will be on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturdays in the following schedule:
BA299 London to Portland departing 3:05PM arriving 4:55PM BA298 Portland to London departing 6:45PM arriving 12:10PM (+1 day)
This represents the latest growth for Britsih Airways on the lucrative transatlantic routes including recent additions to Austin, Charleston, Nashville, Pittsburgh, San Diego, and San Jose amongst other routes.
Boeing officially announced it would end production of its 737 MAX planes beginning in January. The company’s plant in Seattle has assembled around 40 planes a month since the MAX fleet was grounded in March.
Boeing’s official statement is in full below:
Safely returning the 737 MAX to service is our top priority. We know that the process of approving the 737 MAX’s return to service, and of determining appropriate training requirements, must be extraordinarily thorough and robust, to ensure that our regulators, customers, and the flying public have confidence in the 737 MAX updates. As we have previously said, the FAA and global regulatory authorities determine the timeline for certification and return to service. We remain fully committed to supporting this process. It is our duty to ensure that every requirement is fulfilled, and every question from our regulators answered.
Throughout the grounding of the 737 MAX, Boeing has continued to build new airplanes and there are now approximately 400 airplanes in storage. We have previously stated that we would continually evaluate our production plans should the MAX grounding continue longer than we expected. As a result of this ongoing evaluation, we have decided to prioritize the delivery of stored aircraft and temporarily suspend production on the 737 program beginning next month.
We believe this decision is least disruptive to maintaining long-term production system and supply chain health. This decision is driven by a number of factors, including the extension of certification into 2020, the uncertainty about the timing and conditions of return to service and global training approvals, and the importance of ensuring that we can prioritize the delivery of stored aircraft. We will continue to assess our progress towards return to service milestones and make determinations about resuming production and deliveries accordingly.
During this time, it is our plan that affected employees will continue 737-related work, or be temporarily assigned to other teams in Puget Sound. As we have throughout the 737 MAX grounding, we will keep our customers, employees, and supply chain top of mind as we continue to assess appropriate actions. This will include efforts to sustain the gains in production system and supply chain quality and health made over the last many months.
We will provide financial information regarding the production suspension in connection with our 4Q19 earnings release in late January.
As of December 13, the transport union intends to extend the strike at least through December 17, additional days expected though the holidays!
Flights to, from and over France are running as normal as of December 13th, but if you’re client’s are flying into Paris, connection services between the city and the airport are badly disrupted. Agents are advised book either one of the Paris Airport private bus services or a taxi or car service.
20% of flights departing Paris Charles de Gaulle (CDG) have been canceled beginning Thursday, December 5th, with about 13% of them being delayed.
Air France said to cancel 30 percent of its internal flights, while Ryanair and British Airways also said they had to make cancellations.
The civil authority has asked airlines operating in France to reduce their number of scheduled flights by 20 percent on Thursday due to ground staff and air traffic controllers joining the mass walk-out.
Air France flights will be the most affected as it has 11 unions representing various workers in the company on strike beginning Thursday, Decemeber 5th.
The national carrier said 30 percent of internal flights in France will be cancelled as well as 15 percent of short to medium haul international flights.
Easyjet gave a statement to The Local on Wednesday morning confirming cancellations.
“As a result of the strike, easyJet has to cancel a proportion of its French programme and 233 flights, of which 70 are UK touching, have been cancelled. We are also expecting other flights to experience delays,” the statement read.
“Due to an increased volume of calls expected to the call centre, we advise customers travelling o December 5th to check the status of their flights on our Flight Tracker page or manage their bookings using our disruption portal on our mobile app or website at www.easyjet.com.
“Any customers affected by cancellations are eligible for a refund or a free of charge transfer to a new flight.
SAA has confirmed all flights operated smoothly, except flights to East London and Livingston, on the first day back at work.
South African Airways (SAA) announced that normal operations resumed as workers returned to work Saturday, following an eight-day wage strike which ended with a deal between management and unions on Friday, 22 November 2019.
Employees affiliated to unions, the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) and the South African Cabin Crew Association (Sacca) were demanding an 8% salary increase.
On Friday, the unions and SAA management came to an agreement of a 5.9% pay increase retrospective to April this year.
Enhancements to the amenities in its much-lauded first- and business-class cabins today including new wellness menus, tableware and refreshed bedding.
Cathay’s premium cabins are highly rated thanks to double-wide seats that transform into lie-flat beds, personalized service, and excellent catering. The airline is aiming to make its onboard product even more refined with a set of improvements currently being rolled out.
Upon stepping onboard, passengers will be greeted with a newly defined service moment in the form of a welcome tray with a personalized note, a hot towel and a glass of sparkling jasmine silver needle tea from the airline’s partner, JING.
The serviceware is also getting an update and will include china from famed Japanese porcelain house Noritake, Robert Welch custom-designed cutlery, and full-size wine glasses from Riedel.
First-class guests might also get a better night’s sleep thanks to the new amenities and bedding from U.K. luxury brand Bamford including 600 thread-count sheets, a duvet and mattress pad from sustainably sourced cotton, and a full-sized soft pillow. Flight attendants will also spray a dash of Bamford Botanic Pillow Mist as part of the airline’s new turndown service.
In the business-class cabin, meanwhile, long-haul passengers will also find a new range of bedding by Bamford including a soft mattress topper, larger pillows and premium slippers. The pillowcase and two-piece duvet will both be made from sustainably sourced cotton and 400 thread count. New unisex Bamford amenity kits will also begin appearing onboard from December 1 onwards and will be presented in a rotating selection of four colors.
LTC members will be eligible for a round-trip raffle for a domestic Business Class Ticket!
Luxury Airfare Academy announces a special promotional offer for Luxury Airfare Specialists who complete the program during the month of November.
Eligible participants will be automatically entered into a drawing for a round-trip domestic business class ticket to the destination of their choice.
“We are excited to welcome new participants to the Luxury Airfare Academy as they begin their journey to become Luxury Airfare Specialists and own the vert lucrative luxury airfare travel space. We wanted to run this special promo as a way of welcoming new advisors into the program.” said Daniel Santiago, Director of the Academy.
