Air Canada has now swept out its top management and it’s trying to do what it can to avoid running out of cash. I’m sure a lot of work is being done on the finance side, but I’ve been waiting to see what they’d be doing on the revenue/promotion side of things with this new team. The first move? A low fare guarantee for those who book on the Canadian version of Air Canada’s website. Lame.

They say it’s “industry-leading,” and that may be the case in Canada, but it’s pretty similar to most of the ones that have come and gone in the US over the years. That being said, Air Canada’s fare structure makes it even harder to use than most. If you buy a ticket on AirCanada.com (Canadian version only), you have 24 hours to find a lower fare elsewhere. If you find it, you report it online and get a $50 credit plus the difference in fare. One catch. That lower fare has to be within the same fare bucket.

You’ll remember that Air Canada has a branded fare bucket approach (that I love). Tango fares are the cheapest and come with a certain set of benefits, and it moves up from there to different buckets with different benefits. So if you bought a “Latitude” fare, you would have to find another Latitude fare for cheaper somewhere else. The only problem is that I don’t know of another website that breaks down Air Canada’s fares that way. So good luck.

You could always check with a travel agent to see if there’s a lower fare around, but that’s probably the only place you could do it across all fare buckets. (And who is going to do that, anyway?) I seem to remember reading that a lot of people upsell to higher fare classes, so this may be a nice marketing message, but I’d imagine that few people will actually be able to take advantage of it. That will just confuse and annoy people, and that’s not a great way to do business.

I hope they’ve got more up their sleeve than this.

I just realized I accidentally didn’t publish this last week. Sorry!

JetBlue Challenges Southwest at BWI
The focus is on Boston and Southwest and JetBlue start throwing down with new flights to new destinations.

Swine Flu May Present Third Major Hurdle for Airlines
If it’s not fuel or a poor economy, it’s something else. This time it’s swine flu, and though we don’t know the impact yet, it’s already being felt around the airline industry.

News from the Aviation & Environment Summit 2009
A month ago, the Aviation & Environment Summit was held in Geneva. See a recap here.

Why Would Delta Reintroduce Its Online Booking Bonus?
Delta has brought back the online booking bonus for a limited time. Now the question is . . . why?

United Enters Pittsburgh – West Coast Markets
United announced this week was starting long haul from Pittsburgh to the West Coast. This is an odd move that I’ve yet to figure out.

I may be out of town, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have plenty of posts from BNET this week. I also had to pre-publish three a week while I’m gone, so you can still expect weekly wraps for the next couple Saturdays.

Continental and US Airways Report Steep Revenue Declines
March revenue reports are coming out and the news is very bad. Revenues are way down, as predicted.

International Traffic Causes Steep Load Factor Drops
March traffic reports are starting to com out as well, and the load factor drops aren’t pretty. Digging in, however, we can see that the international side is really hurting things.

Orbitz Follows Rivals, Drops Booking Fees with a Twist
Orbitz has finally followed the others and dropped booking fees, but there is a very important twist on how they did it.

Alaska Challenges Allegiant with Bellingham – Las Vegas Flights
Looks like Alaska wants to pick a fight with Allegiant. Will it work? I’m not so convinced.

March Airline Traffic Numbers
The full March traffic numbers are out, and I’ve got my monthly rundown. How do you spell “ugly”? See inside.

Hawaiian Still Having Major On-Time Problems
On the surface, Hawaiian appears to be doing well in the world of on-time performance, but when you dig down, you see that’s not the case.

News and Notes from Continental’s 10-K
Digging through Continental’s 10-K, there is plenty to talk about including all kinds of fun notes about the fleet, distribution channels, and more.

More On Premium Traffic’s Steep Decline
The IATA Premium Traffic Monitor is out, and will it surprise you to hear that things keep getting worse? I thought not.

JetBlue Launches Smart Campaign to Become the Airline for Bigwigs
JetBlue has put out a hilarious couple of spots supporting its campaign to be the replacement for the CEOs corporate jet.

Continental Reports “Significant” Yield Degradation, US Airways Doesn’t
The news from Continental is ugly this March, and it’s enough to scare anyone. But US Airways isn’t feeling the pinch nearly as much.

Branson Announces Fourth Destination, Still Short of Plan
Sun Country has recently announced service from the new Branson Airport to both Minneapolis and Dallas. It’s good news for the airport, but they still need more.

Virgin America’s Ownership Question
I thought this would be a good time to dive deeper into Virgin America’s ownership issues. What exactly is going on and how will it turn out?

There’s good news out there for those of you who like to book your travel using online travel agents. Expedia and Travelocity have both followed in Priceline’s footsteps and dropped all booking fees for flights. There don’t appear to be any catches, but this is a temporary move. Flights must be booked by May 31.

After Priceline did this ages ago, Expedia was the first to follow and drop fees. I think it’s safe to assume that this is a competitive move to try to shift more share from its competitors. Travelocity soon followed, apparently afraid it would lose too much share.

But Orbitz has yet to match. Will they hold out? Orbitz has done a lot to try to differentiate itself from other sites with its TLC and Price Assurance programs, but now the latter is being copied as well. Travelocity said it will also refund your money if someone books the same trip as you for less, but they will only do it for vacation packages. Not to be outdone, Priceline said it will do the same for both individual flight itineraries and vacation packages. Confused yet?

I just have to wonder if this move makes sense at all. You would think that the fee-sensitive travelers had stopped booking with online travel agent sites long ago and now go to the airline sites. Are they going to come back now? I doubt it. Of course, as I mentioned, it’s probably just an effort to bring people over from other online travel agents, like Priceline. Since Priceline stopped charging fees, they have attracted a greater share of the audience. Expedia must now think it’s significant to do something about it. And maybe Orbitz disagrees. Time will tell, though I think it’s more likely that they’re just preparing their response as I write this.

Mark over at Upgrade: Travel Better thinks this “temporary” fee cut may become permanent, and he very well may be right. Once you get into these competitive spirals, it’s hard to get out, even if it ends up not working out well for the bottom line.