While Air India is preparing to receive its Boeing 787 Dreamliners from Boeing, which should be finally arriving somewhere in May 2012, Japan Airlines seems to have stolen the thunder from Air India by being the first airline to operate the 787 services to India. The picture you see above is from JAL’s 787 first approach at Delhi’s Airport. Japan Airlines recently received its Boeing 787 planes, and used the first one to start a Boston-Tokyo service which is a new route, with effect from May 1, 2012, they’ve also pressed this plane into service on the Tokyo-Delhi-Tokyo route, making JAL the first operator to bring the 787 planes to India commercially. There is good reason to believe this makes…
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moneylife: my column on travel benefits with credit cards
This past week, I wrote up on the various travel benefits on offer with your credit cards, and you can read it here! You can look up the previous columns here! Live From A Lounge is also present on Facebook, Twitter and available via RSS.
Amex bites the bullet on the Kingfisher Amex Credit Card
The Kingfisher First American Express Credit Card was my first American Express Card ever and I had picked it up for all the good flying benefits that came with it in late 2010. You got a KingClub Gold tier membership straight away, and the ability to earn American Express MembershipReward Points which you could use to transfer to Kingfisher’s KingClub. All this was adding up well till the good times lasted and Kingfisher Airlines was going to join oneworld. Down the line, last April (2011) Kingfisher and American Express decided to take the co-branding a step further, and compulsorily transfer all the accumulated MR Points every month to the KingClub Account. So, my rant on this was that I could…
Now, get an American Express Card at a discount via LinkedIn referrals
How I love my American Express plastic is something I have talked about in the past. I’ve been using them only for a year and a half now almost, but along with my Citibank Premier Miles Credit Card, the American Express Gold Charge Card is my go-to card. I’ve written about my views on the American Express Gold Charge Card customer service and will do a full review on this card in my upcoming series on Travel Credit Cards for India. LinkedIn and American Express India had tied up in September 2011 to source referrals for new American Express Kingfisher First Credit Cards and Platinum Reserve Credit Cards via existing LinkedIn members. Now, they are back. Under the new promotion…
Why I am loving AAdvantage all over again…
When American Airlines knocked out the ORD-DEL flight a short while after they entered Chapter 11 protection, I was slightly crossed with them. And I had good reason to be, I had just started to earn top-tier status with AAdvantage due to the OneWorld MegaDo, and was planning to make American Airlines my regular flight for travels to the USA, and switch to the oneworld network for going places outside my base at BOM. With this move, I was still going to be able to use the oneworld benefits, by taking a one stop flight via London on BA or Brussels on Jet Airways, but I was going to be unable to use my upgrade benefits fully, which are valid…
Jet Airways 48 hours Business Class Sale on April 25/26 (for International Travel)
Jet Airways is offering a 15% off on business class travel from India to select Middle East and South East Asian markets, for booking your tickets on JetAirways.com and travel commencing by 30th June 2012. The terms and conditions of the sale state that tickets need to be issued on April 25/26 for return travel from India to UAE, Oman, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh and Malaysia. There is also a condition stating, discount applicable on specific flight numbers only, where my guess is that the discounts are valid on all the operations with the Boeing 737 narrowbody planes. Jet Airways had run a similar promo offer in February, however at that point of time they were…
India just shrunk by 25% on the Jet Airways mileage map
I really thought this was a technical glitch but looks like this is not. Like I wrote a few days back, Jet Airways made a few changes to the JetPrivilege program in late March 2012. One of the main changes was the earning rate for domestic flights in India, where Jet Airways upgraded the program to offer 100% mileage credit to all domestic flights in India. Now, I really expected to earn 100% miles when this change happened but I was thoroughly confused over the past few weeks about the real offering here. Everytime I wanted to book a ticket, lets say BOM-DEL, I would be offered a 532 miles for travel, whereas the real distance between the two cities,…
5%–10% Discounts on summer fares booked on Jet Airways international
Jet Airways has come up with a cocktail of discounts on various travel markets for the summer schedule. Since they don’t all show up in one place, I thought I’d round them up in one post and put it out for all of you here. Take note that all the discounts are on booking via JetAirways.com website: India: 9W is offering a 5% discount on the base fare booked to any Jet Airways destination in Business and Economy class for booking till May 7,2012. Bahrain: 10% discount on the fare booked on Bahrain-India flights in Business and Economy class for booking till April 30, 2012. Bangladesh: 7% discount on fares booked on connections from Dhaka to an international Jet Airways…
Virgin Atlantic to launch a 3-class A330-300 to Delhi from July 2012!
As per a post put out on AirlineRoute.net, LHR-DEL will be getting a new bird i n the form of a 3-class A330-300 on the LHR-DEL-LHR route from 10th July 2012, replacing the older A340-300 planes. Service on the A330-300 will be configured to offer Economy, Premium Economy and the famous Upper Class service of Virgin Atlantic. The A340-300 will still continue to fly on the Saturday/Sunday service for the time being. London Heathrow – Delhi eff 10JUL12 Airbus A330-300 replacing A340-300 on 6 of 7 weekly serviceVS300 LHR2200 – 1100+1DEL 333 x6VS300 LHR2200 – 1100+1DEL 343 6 VS301 DEL1315 – 1755LHR 333 x7VS301 DEL1315 – 1755LHR 343 7 Virgin Atlantic is going big on the Indian market of late,…
moneylife: my column on refreshes to various FFPs
This week, I wrote up on the various changes made to Indian Frequent Flyer Programs in the past quarter, and you can read it here! You can look up the previous columns here! Live From A Lounge is also present on Facebook, Twitter and available via RSS.
More speculation on where is the Air India 787 flying?
I’m reserving comment on the bailout of Air India till a little later when I can write a long post about it, but the big news is that the airline which taught Singapore Airlines the ropes of being a magnificent airline stays in business for the time being, on a $5.3 billion dole though to which my tax payments will generously contribute. Heck, I don’t even get miles for this generous contribution to someone else’s balancesheet ! Now, I’ve been interested in tracking the progress of the Air India 787 for a long time, and that they will get these 27 planes is now confirmed with the bailout as well. I had a good look at the planes in Hyderabad…