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AMEX Tops J.D. Powers Credit Card Customer Satisfaction Study
American Express ranked highest among card issuers in customer satisfaction, as overall satisfaction levels with credit cards rose slightly from 2009 levels, according to the J.D. Power and Associates 2010 U.S. Credit Card Satisfaction Study released Thursday.
American Express scored 769 on a scale of a 1,000 in the survey, which asks users to rate cards by interaction, terms, billing and payment process, benefits and services, rewards programs and problem resolution. This is J.D. Power's fourth year to conduct the survey, and American Express has rated highest every year.
Overall, the average satisfaction level was 714, up nine points from 2009 levels. The study, however, indicated that cardholders are more inclined to consider switching issuers than the previous year.
J.D. Power fielded the study in May and June and based the results on more than 8,500 responses.
US Airlines See Big Turn Around in 2nd Quarter Profits
After losing more than a half-billion dollars in the second quarter of 2009, major U.S. carriers swung to a collective profit of $1.45 billion in 2010's second quarter, according to Air Transport World. Combined revenue in the period rose almost twice as fast as costs, and all nine carriers reported operating profits.
Cell Phone Debate: Less About Safety, More about Manners
Though some members of Congress want a permanent ban on in-flight cell phone use, many experts say the U.S. will probably follow Europe's lead in allowing flexibility for airlines to set their own policies. FAA safety arguments appear to be weakening, leading to new debates over appropriateness and good manners. If the FAA drops its longstanding ban on cell phones, the Air Transport Association says carriers would set their own policies as they see fit.
Regulators and Airlines Seek to Accommodate Bumped Flyers
With commercial airline flights fuller than ever, bumped passengers may face long waits or circuitous routes to reach their destination. Denied boarding remains extremely rare, however, and experts say volunteers can be found about 90% of the time to give up their seats in return for compensation. In those few cases where no volunteers step forward, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood wants to raise the cap on compensation for passengers who are denied boarding against their will -- from $800 to $1,300. The Air Transport Association says it will not challenge the higher limits.
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iJet Risk Intelligence Report
Travel Security Intelligence, from iJET
Argentina: Subway
Workers to Strike Aug. 24 in Buenos Aires| details
China, Vietnam: Tropical Depression
Moving toward Hainan | details
Mexico: Tropical Storm Frank Tracking Westward along
Southern Coast | details |
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Save Money - Save Time
Travel buyers were able to maintain high adoption levels for online travel booking as the economic downturn forced them to tighten policies and search for savings, according to a Business Travel News survey of 221 travel buyers.
Survey respondents reported that, on average, 68.5 percent of U.S. domestic air tickets were booked online in 2009, and more than half of respondents said their online compliance levels were in the 80 percent to 100 percent range. Similarly, the buyers reported an overall average of 62.3 percent of U.S. domestic air tickets booked without agent intervention, with just under half in the 80 percent to 100 percent range.
Those numbers are fairly consistent with what travel managers have been able to accomplish in the past several years, said Tom Wilkinson, president of TRW Travel & Expense Management in Pennington, N.J. Numbers today, however, are more meaningful, as buyers are less likely to subject compliance levels to such asterisks as excluding group travel from compliance calculations, he said.
"Most of these are pretty clean numbers," Wilkinson said. "There's growing acceptance and growing awareness and very few trips that you really can't book online."
With online booking tools fairly mature at most companies-just under two-thirds of buyers surveyed said they use them, with an additional 11 percent saying they are in the process of implementing one-buyers have been looking for ways to drive compliance even higher. Worldwide.
"In our past experience, in-policy trip with air and hotel saves $203 per reservation," Tam said. "Those savings in a moderately sized program can add up, so it's important that we understand how to make the compliance easier."
Online booking tools also can drive savings through visual guilt, he said. Not only will travelers have a clear picture of negotiated rates when they book, travel managers can use online booking tools to establish baseline costs on booking flights to events that might fall out of standard citypairs, for example. "When other people are searching, they will try to beat the first person's cost or at least find something competitively as good," Tam said.
Some companies have boosted compliance simply by instructing agencies not to book reservations over the phone if the trip is capable of being booked online, Wilkinson said.
Editorial Comment -
Online Booking Tools (OBTs) clearly save corporations thousands of dollars when the OBT being used is a managed, corporate mandated booking tool. Allowing travelers to go to the Internet and book off of any travel site not only diminishes the chances that the company will lower their costs, it also opens up the potential for serious safety and compliance problems.
While C I Travel endorses the Rearden Commerce Personal Assistant as the most advanced, technologically sound and forwarded looking OBT on the market, we also maintain the ability to privately brand two other OBTs for our clients. Call our Account Executives today and tell them you'd like to look at OBTs. To contact your CI Travel Account Executive, click here to send an email or call 757-461-0022.
See the link to the demo below and give us a call! Also check out the story below the contact information.
Click here to see the CI Travel Flash Demo on our online platform powered by ReardenCommerce.
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Taxes Add About $28 to Daily Travel Costs in U.S.
Anyone who has recently traveled to a major U.S. city knows the shock of finding a hotel, car rental or restaurant bill laden with extra charges. It's a growing trend among cities to add bed taxes, airport concession taxes and other charges to visitors' bills in order to fund tourism marketing campaigns, airport improvements and other projects.
Combined with sales taxes, the extra travel taxes add about $28 a day to the cost of a visitor's lodging, car rentals and meals in the nation's top 50 destination cities, according to a new study by the education and research arm of the NBTA. Some cities charge more than others.
The cities with the highest overall tax burden on travelers in the central-city area were Chicago ($38.75 a day, on average), New York ($36.53), Boston ($36.47) and Seattle ($34.46), according to the study. When sales taxes are excluded, Los Angeles ranked among the 10 cities with the lowest travel taxes charged in the central city areas. But a recent proposal to add a 1.5% assessment fee to hotel bills could bump L.A. off the list. The cities in which travelers face the lowest overall tax burden are Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; Fort Myers, Fla.; Portland, Ore.; and Detroit.
"Rest assured," warned Michael W. McCormick, executive director of the travel group, "companies are taking notice of these unfair burdens when determining how and where to spend their business travel, meetings and events dollars."
Editorial Comment - NBTA is doing everything it can to mitigate these local, state and federal taxes and their affect on corporate travel budgets. Business is unfairly paying the freight for cities because the elected of those cities unwisely believe that because these travelers don't have a vote in their elections, it is easier to raise taxes on the travelers. This is a misguided and short-sided view that fails to account for revenue from new jobs that will not come to that city because of the high taxes. Educate the local officials you know on why they shouldn't be counting on business travelers to pay the freight on local services.
In sharp contrast to this, using the services of a TMC like C I Travel Management adds less than $10 per day on most trips and the company and travelers get something in return for those services.
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C I Travel
Business Travel Newsletter
August 24, 2010 |
Greetings!
I'm back from Houston and the NBTA Convention. This year's convention had one of largest attendances to date, over 5,300 travel professionals. The educational programs were top-notch and the exhibit area one of the best ever. At most exhibits the key word was CHANGE. Mobile travel apps are coming out faster than we can keep track of. Developing a strategy for how your company travelers use mobile apps is a real necessity. Let C I Travel Management consult with you on all the issues surrounding their use.
It's also a good time to bring up the DHS Secure Flight Program and the new rules associated with flight delays. Airlines have started notifying travelers that if the correct information isn't located within your airline reservation, your reservation is subject to cancellation. See the story below on the Secure Flight Program.
The Employee/Owners of C I Travel Management thank you again for working with us to manage your travel programs. It's our profession and our pleasure!
Chris Nicholas and the Employee/Owners of C I Travel
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Airline Secure Flight Data Reminder
As you may have read, the TSA is beginning to actively enforce the Secure Flight Data system. It is imperative that the correct data be entered into all air reservations made beginning immediately. Below you'll see how some airlines will be dealing with reservations sent to them that do not have the correct information in them.
UPDATES
Effective Sept. 15, 2010, American Airlines (AA) has announced plans to inhibit the ticketing of reservations with travel dates Nov. 1, 2010 and beyond if Secure Flight Passenger Data (SFPD) is not present in the Passenger Name Record (PNR).
Delta and United have announced similar plans to inhibit ticketing when SFPD is not present however, no effective dates have been announced.
United Airlines (UA) and Delta (DL) have integrated SFPD collection requirements in their booking policies. UA has noted in its policy that it "reserves the right to cancel any reservation not containing SFPD at least 72 hours prior to departure. PNRs created within 72 hours must include SFPD when the PNR is initially booked." Full details can be found online in DL's booking policy and UA's booking policy.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN TO TRAVELERS?!
It means that unless the travelers full name, date of birth and gender are in the record, the airline can cancel the entire reservation leaving the passenger scrambling for something else to do. TMCs will not have control over those cancellations. It is imperative that the word go out to all travelers to ask them to look over their travel profiles to make sure that their full names, date of birth and gender are in the travel profiles.
Ask your travelers to review that information immediately.
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Ground Transportation News
Car-Sharing Use, Investment on the Rise
Travel buyers are finding more uses for the car-sharing model as it spreads across the United States, particularly as major car rental suppliers increase their investments into the programs.
Long popular in Europe, car sharing-membership-based organizations in which users can access vehicles all hours of the day via the Internet and wireless technology-first came to the United States more than a decade ago through suppliers Zipcar and Flexcar. Zipcar, which merged with Flexcar in 2007, remains the biggest supplier in the United States with a fleet of more than 7,000 vehicles, but more recently legacy suppliers Hertz and Enterprise, as well as U-Haul, have introduced their own car-sharing programs in select geographies.
The models differ slightly, with U-Haul's U Car Share and Enterprise's WeCar targeting corporate, university and government accounts, while Hertz's Connect by Hertz follows a model similar to Zipcar, targeting more leisure usage, said Julian Espiritu, a former Zipcar executive who now manages Abrams CarSharing Advisors, a service launched by Abrams Consulting Group last year. All, however, do some corporate business, he said.
"We do have corporate customers who use it," said Robert Stuart, senior vice president of sales for Hertz. "A lot of corporations are encouraging carpooling, so those employees can use it if they need to travel while at work."
Other companies in urban areas use car-sharing services for short trips to meetings, Espiritu said. This saves money over standard car rental, because travelers pay hourly rather than daily rates, as car sharing includes fuel costs and provides parking, he said. Seattle's Swedish Medical Center, for example, lets its employees use Zipcar for business travel, which frees them from dealing with mileage reimbursements.
Aside from the actual vehicles, car-sharing vendors also now supply their car-sharing technology to help corporations and governments manage their own fleets. Using the technology, corporations can set up automated reservations for their fleet and monitor where their vehicles are at all times. "A lot of these corporate organizations have huge fleet-management needs," Abrams Consulting's Espiritu said. "This cuts down the cost of labor and lets them reduce their fleet expenses."
City officials in Washington, D.C., for example, recently equipped their fleet with Zipcar technology and as a result were able to reduce the fleet size by about 85 percent, he said. Hertz acquired its car-sharing technology supplier, Eileo, last year and is about to begin a pilot program to manage the fleet of the city of Philadelphia, according to Stuart.
Espiritu expects corporate usage of car-sharing programs to increase with wider distributed. For now, they are not usable by travelers whose itineraries include air travel, but he said that eventually will change. "Soon, we will see car-share operators at the airport," Espiritu said. "This is the future of car rental."
Editorial Comment - Recently at an American Express Advisory Board meeting the Avis/Budget Account Representative spoke about their Car-Share program (not yet named - publicly anyway.) I recommended they cal their program Redi-Car because it is short, sweet, and tells the client just what it is. Be on the lookout to see if they took the suggestion.
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Sharp Rise in Premium Air Travel Continues
A sharp rise in the number of passengers traveling business class was reported by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) today (August 16). In its monthly Premium Traffic Monitor, it said figures for June were 16.6% higher than for the same month in 2009.
It also said there was an increase in economy passengers of 9.5% compared with last year. IATA said strong business travel was driving both sets of figures.
The Association said the rises were a "little weaker" than May whose figures included a backlog of flights from canceled services in April due to the volcanic ash cloud. IATA said premium travel was now expanding by 9% a year and economy at 6%. It said it estimated that airline revenue was up 40% in June compared to the same month last year.
"This is not only due to the improvement in the number of passengers, but it is also driven by a strong rise in the average fare and yield supported by tighter supply-demand conditions," it said.
One of the major pluses for carriers was that premium travel within Europe rose in the month by 26.9% compared with 2009 while premium traffic on the lucrative North Atlantic route increased by 18.8%.
IATA also reported increase of 8.8%, 4.6% and 3.8% respectively on routes from Europe to, respectively, the Far East, the Middle East and Africa. Commenting on the rise in business travel IATA said: "Coincident indicators like world trade have been very strong, rising 18% in May and supporting similar growth in premium travel. "Forward-looking indicators such as business confidence have been similarly positive. "However, there has been some slippage in recent months which is consistent with expecting some deceleration in year-on-year travel growth rates in the second half of this year."
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Airline News
News from AirTran Airways
AirTran on Sept. 1 will begin charging $20 for customers to check their first piece of luggage, up from the current $15 fee, the airline said on its website.
Passengers who made their reservations before August 17 would be exempt from the additional fee, AirTran said. The carrier's charge for a second checked bag remains $25.
News from Delta Air Lines
Delta Air Lines says Medallion elite travelers now receive free upgrades on SkyMiles Award tickets. However, the upgrades will clear only after all Medallion upgrades on paid tickets have cleared. In another change, the airline says companion upgrades are now available for tickets purchased on L, U and T class fares. Those upgrades will clear only after all Medallion members are upgraded, however.
For New York business travelers bound for Chicago, there's a new shuttle in town. Opening another front in the competition for high-fare corporate passengers, Delta Air Lines Inc. is operating hourly flights between New York and Chicago, courting consumers by offering three times the usual number of frequent-flier miles. The jockeying adds a Midwest leg to the East Coast shuttle flights from New York to Boston and Washington. Delta began its service in June after shifting operations to O'Hare airport from Chicago's Midway, putting the world's largest carrier in a head- to-head matchup with American Airlines and United Airlines.
Delta has released a series of images of its upcoming Terminal 4 at New York City's JFK International Airport. The plans call for the demolition of Terminal 3, which was once the Pan Am Worldport. The updated design includes a modern interior as well as new gates and aircraft parking in place of Terminal 3.
News from American Airlines
Everyone and their uncle (and their nieces and nephews in the mainstream media) weighed in this week on American Airlines' decision to start selling seat assignments for "prime" coach seats. But the bottom line on the fees--American will charge $19-$39 each way--may be explained by the Your Choice chart on the American Web site. Amazingly, it is even more complicated, inexplicable and convoluted than the legacy carriers' fare structure. And it explains why legacy carriers now have their smallest share of the U.S. commercial aviation market ever. According to government figures, the five network airlines that can trace their lineage to pre-deregulation days commanded just 70 percent of the market in July. But Southwest Airlines is now within a rounding error of 10 percent of the market. And 10-year-old JetBlue Airways has grown to 3.67 percent. AirTran Airways is 2.67 percent of the market and Alaska is at 2.65 percent. Meanwhile, one note about American's so-called Express Seat program. They will initially be available only at the airline's airport kiosks because American's computer systems are so archaic that the carrier can't sell them through other distribution outlets. As with most other legacy carriers' seat-assignment charges, American's full-fare fliers and elite members of American AAdvantage are exempt.
LAN and TAM Merge Creating a Latin American Giant
Let's be honest, most of us usually pay attention to Latin American aviation only when a U.S. carrier adds or subtracts flights or a big name in Latin travel hits the skids. But attention must be paid to the prospective merger of LAN and TAM, two carriers that individually already outpace their other Latin competitors. LAN, which started in Chile, has passenger-airline subsidiaries in Argentina, Ecuador and Peru and is considered the best of the Latin carriers. TAM is one of Brazil's largest carriers. Together, LAN and TAM will serve 115 cities in 23 countries and they carry as many passengers as US Airways and the soon-to-be combined Iberia and British Airways. And as with BA and Iberia, the carriers will maintain separate identities, but be owned by a new holding company. The new holding company's name? You may have guessed it: Latam. ... Delta Air Lines will drop nonstop flights between New York/LaGuardia and Nassau in the Bahamas. It's not a replacement, but Delta does intend to launch nonstops next June to Iceland from Kennedy Airport in New York. ... Air Canada is the latest North American carrier to jump into the market for flights to Tokyo's Haneda Airport. Air Canada will launch daily nonstops from Vancouver on January 29. The Haneda service will be in addition to Air Canada's daily flight between Vancouver and Tokyo/Narita.
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Hotel News  ASK YOUR CI TRAVEL CONSULTANT FOR AVAILABILITY AT GREAT CI SELECT HOTELS ACROSS THE COUNTRY! Contact Your CI Travel Consultant to Reserve Rooms at great hotels throughout the U.S.
U.S. Hotel Chains Expanding Fast Overseas
Faced with a bearish market at home, where low nightly rates and miserable financial conditions have stressed overextended property owners, the major U.S. lodging chains have set their sights on faster expansion overseas. The international markets look promising because many parts of the world are under-represented with chain properties and overseas economies are expanding more rapidly than ours. Which is a long-winded way of explaining that virtually all of this week's hotel news involves international openings. For example, Marriott opened a 264-room JW Marriott in Bogota, Colombia, and a 155-room Courtyard by Marriott in Bremen, Germany. (The Bremen property is carved out of the Lloyd Building, an early 20th century structure used for luggage storage by a major German shipping firm.) Meanwhile, Hilton has opened a 320-room hotel at Terminal 3 at Beijing's Capital Airport. And Starwood has had a very busy week, opening resorts in Greece (a 445-room Westin on the Ionian Sea) and Thailand (a 261-room Westin in Phuket) and two properties in India. The first Indian hotel is a 130-room Aloft in Chennai on the OMR, the city's high-tech corridor. The other hotel is a conversion of the 240-room Rockwood Palace in Udaipur; the property's new name is the Sheraton Udaipur Palace. |
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Airport News
| BAA, the Spanish-owned company that operates London/Heathrow, London/Stansted and several other U.K. airports, won't be hit with a strike after all. BAA and its union have come to a wage and work rules agreement. ... The observation deck in the iconic Theme Building at Los  Angeles has reopened on weekends. The deck was closed after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Apparently, LAX and other security officials have decided that terrorists don't work weekends. ... Delta Air Lines and the agency that runs New York/Kennedy have filled in some of the blanks on Delta's move to an extension of Terminal 4. Construction of a new 9-gate facility will begin next month and is scheduled to be completed in May, 2013. At that time, Delta will move its international flights from Terminal 3 (Pan Am's old Worldport) and Terminal 3 will be demolished. Delta's domestic flights remain in Terminal 2, which will be connected to Terminal 4 by a "passenger connector." We assume that means a hallway, not an umbilical cord that physically lashes travelers together. Delta will pay about $75 million of the estimated $1.2 billion price tag. The rest of the funds will come from bond sales and the airport's $4.50 per segment passenger-facility fee. |
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The entire team at CI Travel thanks you for working with us! Our goal remains to Improve your travel ROI one trip at a time. We sincerely appreciate your business and look forward to your next call!
Sincerely,
Chris Nicholas
CI Travel
757-640-9206 |
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