Ash Wednesday: Icelandic Volcano Impact on Airlines Worse Than 9/11 – BNET
You all know how ugly it’s been in Europe with the volcano, and now they’re saying the initial impact is worse than 9/11. Fortunately, the recovery won’t be nearly as painful.

Social Media Turns Tiny Mistakes Into Big Headaches for Delta Airlines – BNET
Delta made a small mistake online erasing the fee for last minute award travel. Normally, that would be easy to fix, but people find things like this so fast, it creates problems.

what to do if a volcano ruins your wedding – antibride.com
Lots of posts about what to do with a volcano. Here’s mine.

Flights from Boston to Europe nearing normal levels – Boston Globe
I spoke with the Globe about how we’ve been helping Concierge clients.

6 Trends to ask your IFE&C provider about – digEcor
The inflight entertainment manufacturer asked me what I wanted to see in inflight entertainment. #1? I just want it to work.

Delta’s Capacity Cuts Show Why Less Is More – BNET
It’s earnings season and that’s kind of boring. But here I looked at the correlation between capacity cuts and revenue gains at Delta.

Cranky Concierge Helps Customers Pull Travel Plans Out Of The (Volcanic) Ashes – Things With Wings/Aviation Week
Things With Wings covered some of the successes we’ve had helping people at Cranky Concierge.

To Fly Or Not to Fly: Airlines Slam European Regulators Over Airspace Closures – BNET
Now that planes are flying in Europe again, it’s time for the blame game. I actually side with the regulators on this one.

United and US Airways Merger: A Bad Idea That’s Now Dead – BNET
I can’t say I agree with the title on this (they pick them, not me), but it is true that talks have been called off.

Whenever I see discussion of an airline simplifying fees, it usually means that they’re jacking them up. Alaska, well, ok, so they are jacking up the first bag fee, but they really are simplifying as well. They had a slew of announcements yesterday, so maybe they were hoping some of this would get buried. Nope.

At left, you can see my handy chart. Basically they’re raising the $15 first bag fee to $20 and then lowering all the other fees for bags #2 and beyond. It does simplify things, and it’s nice to see them stop requiring your first born to check that fourth bag. That one was just really messy to collect.

So why are they doing this? I think it’s a safe bet that they expect to make more money. Let’s assume that a lot more people check a first bag then a second or third or fourth. That increase on the first bag fee will pay off, but it will be partially tempered by the decrease on later bags. Or will it? This could be a test to see if lower bag fees will result in more bags being checked. I suppose we’ll know the answer to that if this policy holds or if it ends up changing. Besides it seems like Alaska hates to raise a fee without giving something in return. I give them credit for that, but I’m not so sure I’m buying it this time.

The first bag fee going up by $5 doesn’t really bug me. It’s actually still lower than the $25 other airlines charge. And I suppose it’s nice that they brought the bag fees down for more than 1 checked bag, but honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever checked more than one bag in my life. But wait, there’s more.

Remember how Alaska had a baggage guarantee? They were the only ones to institute one when they added a charge for checked bags. If your bags weren’t at the carousel within 25 minutes, you were entitled to either 2,500 miles or a $25 credit for a future flight. With this new baggage structure, that’s changing. Anyone want to guess what’s happening?

That’s right. You’ll now get a 20 minute guarantee instead of 25 (who cares?), and you’ll get a $20 credit or 2,000 miles. They really like the number 20, I guess. Anyone skilled with numerology know if there’s some secret meaning here?

So where does this all leave us? Um, well, it’ll be different for everyone. There’s some good, some bad, and some that just doesn’t even matter. Hooray, that means there’s something for everyone!

I’ve decided that it’s time to start a new series here on the blog called Travel Tools I Love. Hopefully these tools are something that readers can benefit from using. With the volcano making finding any seats a very difficult prospect for our Cranky Concierge clients, I thought it would be appropriate to start with the KVS Tool.

I should make it clear that these aren’t sponsored posts, but I have had a relationship with the KVS Tool for a long time. I use it religiously and Cranky Concierge clients receive a 5% discount when they sign up for it.

So what is this tool? It’s like crack for former airline employees. The KVS Tool has a wealth of information all in one place from availability to fares to visa requirements and more. Why do I say it’s like crack for former airline employees? It’s like looking at an old green screen with airline information, and that’s something I hadn’t seen outside of the airline world since the old eAAsy Sabre days.

I should warn you. If you aren’t an airline person, then you’re better off with another tool. Something like ExpertFlyer has a more intuitive display for the non-airline folks. (ExpertFlyer also has alerts for when when an award seat comes available, which are invaluable.) How do you know if it’s for you? Look at this screenshot. If you get excited seeing this, then it’s for you.

You can find flight availability via four systems – Worldspan, Apollo, Sabre, and Galileo. There is also timetable info via Amadeus and fare displays from Sabre and Galileo. This came in handy for us with the volcano blowing ash around. It’s how we uncovered availability to Europe through places like the Azores or Jordan.

If you’re looking for frequent flier availability, you can get it for the three big alliances. You can also see United’s and Cathay Pacific’s upgrade availability.

Some of the more useful functions are somewhat hidden. For example, you can look up the minimum connection time for every airport if you want to build your own connections. You can also look up visa requirements and airport taxes by country.

If you know your way around booking codes and fare displays, this tool is the fastest way to get the info you need. I use it every day.

It’s apparently Canada week here on the blog since this is my second post about that frozen country up north. This time, it’s about Virgin America’s entry into Toronto. They announced they wanted to go into Toronto back in March, and now that they have finalized the regulatory issues, they’ll start service in June. I’m still not a fan of this plan.

It’ll be morning flights to and from San Francisco with evening flights (a redeye heading east) to and from LA. Virgin America is launching with the “stellar” deal of $212 each way from LAX and $222 from San Francisco. Wait, that’s not stellar at all. Double that up for the roundtrip and add tax and you’re right around $500 a ticket. It’s actually $487.73 from LA, 19% of which is tax. Yikes. Here’s the breakdown:

And you thought domestic tickets were overtaxed. So how does a low cost carrier succeed in Canada? Well, it’s not by offering low fares, that’s for sure. This sale fare is actually more expensive than the lowest fares in the LA market right now. And they aren’t looking to offer cheap deals for last minute travel either. Their lowest fare for travel with less than a week’s advance purchase is right around $2,000 roundtrip. That’s lower than Air Canada but significantly more than American in LA.

I suppose the plan is to compete on product, though Air Canada offers a pretty strong product of its own. The corporate guys are likely bound to either Air Canada/United or American, so they’ll be looking at the small business guys who aren’t being super cool with their teleconferencing software.

I like the longer distance in this market and the fact that it’s business-based, but it’s hard to make good money in a market with such high taxes and a decent level of competition.

Poor European airline execs. They’ve suffered a great (revenue) loss and now they’re trying to cope with the pain. It looks like they’ve made it to the third stage out of five when it comes to coping with grief, but that means the toughest one (depression) lies ahead. Even though flights are finally getting back in the air, the loss will still weigh heavily for some time to come.

If you guys need help, reach out to your US-based counterparts. Those who were around during September 11 know the pain all too well. Let’s review how this works.

1. Denial
   When airlines first realized that the volcanic ash had a bullseye on Europe, they took it in stride. A few flights were canceled and it looked like any other large weather event. Sure it would have an impact, but it wouldn’t be that bad, right? They just figured it would go away and everything would be fine. If only that were true.
2. Anger
   As the shut down dragged on and on, airlines started to get angry at anyone they could. The wrath wasn’t directed at the volcano but rather at European aviation authorities. For example, a Lufthansa spokesperson said:

   The flight ban, made on the basis just of computer calculations, is resulting in billion-high losses for the economy.
   In future we demand that reliable measurements are presented before a flying ban is imposed.

   For many, this will be a welcome lambasting, but to me it seems somewhat irrational. We have plenty of examples of ash really messing things up in the past so why take chances? Even now, there are military aircraft with serious ash damage from flying around in this stuff. Sounds like some execs are just lashing out. It’s all part of the process.

3. Bargaining
   Now that the ash seems to be lifting and the airlines are seeing the financial damage rolling in, it’s time for the bargaining phase. British Airways is leading the charge with CEO Willie Walsh saying this:

   To assist us with this situation, European airlines have asked the EU and national governments for financial compensation for the closure of airspace.

   He then added, “If you can kick a little in for that strike a couple weeks ago, that’d be pretty sweet.”

4. Depression
   We haven’t moved beyond the bargaining phase yet, but I think we can assume this is what’s coming next. After the adrenalin stops pumping and the final loss numbers roll in, a general depression will hit the European industry execs. They’ll be hurting badly and many will think about just grounding the fleet and being done with it all. Stay strong; you’ll get through it.
5. Acceptance
   Finally, the execs will simply realize that this is the way it is. There’s no stopping Eyjafjallajökull and its ash-blowing, revenue-destroying power. The financial damage is done and the airlines will simply need to learn that there is no changing what happened. They need to realize that it’s not their fault that this happened. It’s just something that they need to accept and move on.

If you see an airline exec wandering aimlessly around the halls of the airport, give ‘em a pat on the back and remind that that it’s not their fault. They’ll get through this, with your help. (Oh, and with the help of large bonuses.)