Airlines tips

U.S. carrier United Airlines Holdings Inc said on Tuesday it is currently evaluating the market demand and operating environment to determine when to resume additional flight operations to mainland China.

United Airlines launched a new era in branding for the company this year when it unveiled its Good Leads the Way marketing campaign, its largest advertising effort in a decade.

Poland’s national airline LOT has fired its CEO Rafal Milczarski, it said on Wednesday.

U.S. airline profits are set to come under pressure in 2023 as they look to shell out more cash to retain pilots amid worries about the impact of a potential recession on travel demand.

The Lufthansa Group has made an offer to buy a 40 percent stake in Italy’s state-owned ITA Airways, it said Wednesday. The bid comes after a multi-year process, or “beauty contest” as it has been called, to find a strategic partner for ITA, and a dramatic change of fortune for Lufthansa after being counted out last August.

Travel has a labor problem, but defining it is tricky. Market dynamics vary by location and time. At any given moment, London might be a harder place to hire hotel staff than Dubai, while a tech market crash might suddenly make California a good place for travel companies to source software engineers. 

Flights across the U.S. have been grounded due to a computer glitch with the Federal Aviation Administration’s systems, according to reports.

Southwest’s debacle late last year was extreme, but mass cancellations are not unheard of in the industry. Actually, they seem to be somewhat common. 

Shareholders filed a lawsuit against Southwest Airlines Co on Thursday, accusing the carrier of fraudulently concealing problems that led last month to an operational meltdown and more than 15,000 flight cancellations.

The airline industry plans to invoke EU rights to freedom of movement to push back against environmental restrictions on short-haul flights, officials in the sector said, following a partial ban in France approved by Brussels in December.

Online travel agency Trip.com Group hopes that cross-border travel capacity for China will be back to normal by the third quarter of this year.

U.S. and European airlines will benefit from pent-up demand for travel to China after its recent border reopening, but route approvals, fresh Covid-19 testing rules and not enough large aircraft remain barriers to rising sales, analysts and industry officials say.

United Airlines took a nearly 10 percent stake in its regional partner Mesa Air Group in a deal unveiled after markets closed. The transaction is worth an estimated $10.5 million based on the closing price of Mesa’s stock of $2.61 per share on Monday.

Financiers at the center of a $200 billion industry underpinning airline fleets are meeting in Dublin this week, gambling that China’s decision to free travel will accelerate their recovery from a pandemic downturn, while warning of a shortage of jets.

United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby came out swinging with a stinging critique of the U.S. aviation system on Wednesday. Despite what he views as profound structural changes during the past four years, other players are in “denial” and failing to accept these changes — to the detriment of travelers and the entire industry.

Travelers surged back to planes last year in numbers unseen since the beginning of the pandemic. That was good news for airlines that, facing a myriad of challenges, were unable to resume flights quite as fast, which drove up fares — and revenues too. It also, however, brought an unwelcome surge in costs. 

President Joe Biden went to war against hotel resort fees and other consumer fees this past fall. He directed federal agencies to find a way to clamp down on or ban them.

Airlines operating at British airports will have to use 80 percent of their take-off and landing slots in order to keep them, the government said on Tuesday, as it brings the industry back in line with pre-pandemic rules.

American Airlines Chief Customer Officer Alison Taylor is retiring. Her departure will leave the Fort Worth, Texas- based carrier with no C-suite executive whose sole purview is customers.

The head of Air France-KLM hit out on Thursday at a Dutch decision to cut airline slots at Amsterdam’s Schiphol to reduce air and noise pollution, saying it disrupted planning for the arrival of efficient new jets better able to curb emissions.

Environmentalists protested over the weekend at the building site of a new airport in Albania’s south meant to boost tourism but which they say will endanger sanctuaries for some 200 bird species including flamingos and pelicans.