Skift Travel News Blog

United Airlines has launched a new seat map feature that dynamically finds available adjacent seats at the time of booking, while a new policy will allow passengers to switch flights for free if none are available.

The tweak to the online seat booking engine is designed to help sit children under 12-years-old next to an adult in their party for free, and follows calls by the Biden administration to ban airlines from charging family-seating fees.

If adjacent seats aren’t available prior to travel due to last-minute bookings, full flights, or unscheduled aircraft changes, United said on Monday that it will let customers switch for free to a flight to the same destination with adjacent seat availability in the same cabin. Customers won’t be charged if there is a difference in fare price between the original and new flight.

United said many airlines try and use a more manual process to seat families together that can include blocking random seats or asking agents to facilitate seat swaps at the gate. It claims those circumstances often result in more stress and a longer boarding process.

Polaris, First Class, and Economy Plus seats are excluded from its family seating policy change.

Customers traveling with children under 12 will start to see more adjacent seat options immediately, and the complete policy change will go into effect in early March.

United Airlines is taking a subtle dig at rival Southwest Airlines’ massive number of holiday season cancellations in an ad it’s airing during the Super Bowl on Sunday.

United’s ad features a family from Denver gathering, with the on-screen text saying at the end of the 30-second spot, “United got more families in and out of Denver this holiday than any other airline. Despite the weather.” The Chicago-based carrier said it would run the ad in the Denver and Colorado Springs TV markets.

Southwest’s massive end-of-the year meltdown resulted in the company canceling roughly 15,000 flights. More than 27 percent of its scheduled seats on flights out of Denver were cancelled between December 18 and January, compared to 5 percent of United’s scheduled seats. Severe winter storms — as well as Southwest’s outdated technology — were considered to be major causes of Southwest’s large number of flight cancellations.

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.

The 4.04 million shares were issued as part of a larger deal including, additional flying for United by Mesa, that the two airlines reached in December, a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission show. As part of that agreement, United provided Mesa with a $10 million revolving loan due in January 2024, plus other financial commitments.

The equity stake comes amid a shakeup in the U.S. regional airline sector. A pilot shortage across the industry has morphed into a captain shortage at the carriers that fly small aircraft for the Big 3 — in other words, the airlines that operate American Eagle, Delta Connection, and United Express flights. The shortage has forced hundreds of the smallest jets to be parked. Delta President Glen Hauenstein said earlier in January he does not believe the situation will ease until 2024.

And a dramatic pay raise by American for pilots at the three affiliates — Envoy, Piedmont Airlines, and PSA Airlines — it owns last June, has reset the cost structure of regional flying. Mesa and others have matched the pay rates, which for some crew members are more than double what they were before. The reset has heightened concerns that regional airlines may shrink further, and cut air service to more small U.S. cities.

Mesa lost $10 million during the quarter ending in June, its latest financial statement shows. Costs during the period increased nearly 21 percent year-over-year on a 7 percent increase in revenues.

United’s investment in Mesa likely signals a closer relationship between the two going forward. The major carrier also owns stakes a 40 percent stake of its affiliate CommuteAir, and 19 percent of partner Republic Airways.

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

The FAA is working to restore its Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) system, which alerts pilots of potential hazards.

“The FAA is working to restore its Notice to Air Missions System,” it posted on Twitter earlier. “We are performing final validation checks and reloading the system now. Operations across the National Airspace System are affected. We will provide frequent updates as we make progress.”

A total of 21,464 flights are scheduled to depart airports in the U.S. today, according to data from Cirium, with nearly 2.9 million seats available on these departures.

American Airlines has the most departures from US airports today (4,819), followed by Delta Air Lines and Southwest Airlines.

The FAA in a later notice said it had ordered airlines to pause all domestic departures until 9 a.m. Eastern Time to “allow the agency to validate the integrity of flight and safety information.”

Shortly before 9 a. m. it lifted the ground stop, posting on social media: “Normal air traffic operations are resuming gradually across the U.S. following an overnight outage to the Notice to Air Missions system that provides safety info to flight crews. The ground stop has been lifted. We continue to look into the cause of the initial problem.”

United Airlines told customers that they may continue to see some delays and cancellations as it works to restore its schedule, and that they should check its app or website.

The airline also activated a travel waiver for any customers who needs to change their plans, including offering refunds for customers who no longer want to travel.

The U.S. Travel Association said the “catastrophic system failure” caused 3,000 flight delays and several hundred cancellations across the country, and called for significant upgrades to be made.

“Americans deserve an end-to-end travel experience that is seamless and secure,” said president and CEO Geoff Freeman in a statement. “And our nation’s economy depends on a best-in-class air travel system. We call on federal policymakers to modernize our vital air travel infrastructure to ensure our systems are able to meet demand safely and efficiently.”

Airlines for America said it was working with the FAA and awaiting further information regarding when these issues will be resolved. It has urged travelers to download their airline’s app, visit the carrier’s website and ensure their contact information is accurate on travel records.

This breaking news story is being updated throughout the day

It’s not often that travelers have something to look forward to at Newark Liberty International Airport. The new $2.7 billion Terminal A will open in December, the latest in a series of major airport projects opening around the U.S. this year.

The first 21 gates of the 33-gate facility will open on December 8, officials said Tuesday. The remaining gates open in 2023. Air Canada, American Airlines, JetBlue Airways, and United Airlines will operate from the terminal initially, and Delta Air Lines will join them next year. The old Terminal A, which opened in 1973, will be demolished.

The last new terminal to open at Newark airport was Terminal C in 1988.

United, which has a large hub at Newark, will use up to 15 gates in the new Terminal A. The airline plans to operate flights to around 23 destinations — including to Atlanta, Austin, Dallas-Fort Worth, Nashville, Raleigh-Durham, San Diego, and Seattle-Tacoma — from the facility, Newark Chief Pilot Captain Fabian Garcia said in September.

The new terminal at Newark is the latest in a series of big airport investments around the U.S. this year. New or expanded facilities at Denver, Los Angeles, New York LaGuardia, Orlando, Phoenix Sky Harbor, Seattle-Tacoma, and Washington Dulles airports have all opened in recent months.

Construction of Terminal A at Newark began in 2018.

United Airlines saw an increase in corporate travel bookings after Labor Day, the unofficial end of summer in the U.S.

“We did see in September another several points tick up in corporate travel buying,” United Vice President of Sales Strategy & Effectiveness Glenn Hollister said at the ATPCO Elevate conference in Arlington, Va., Tuesday. Those “several points” raised corporate bookings to more than 70 percent recovered from the pandemic, he added.

Asked about the outlook for the rest of 2022, Hollister said United sees no change in corporate booking activity, which continues to gradually improve.

Also speaking at the ATPCO event, Global Business Travel Association CEO Suzanne Neufang said the organization forecasts corporate travel buying globally to recover to roughly 65 percent of 2019 levels, or a little less than $1 trillion, by the end of the year. GBTA does not expect a full recovery until 2026.

A big final step in the corporate travel recovery for United, and many other airlines, is the reopening of Asia. United was the largest U.S. airline to the region before the pandemic and, until large markets like China fully reopen, will face challenges fully recovering to 2019 corporate travel revenues.

United will provide an updated outlook when it reports its third quarter results on October 19.

United Airlines is leaving New York’s JFK International Airport again just 20 months after it returned to the New York City gateway.

“Given our current, too-small-to-be-competitive schedule out of JFK — coupled with the start of the winter season where more airlines will operate their slots as they resume JFK flying — United has made the difficult decision to temporarily suspend service at JFK,” the Chicago-based carrier told staff in a memo on Friday viewed by Skift. United will operate its last flights to and from the airport on October 29.

The move comes despite pressure by United on the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration to ease capacity constraints at JFK so the airline could operate more flights. The carrier says that its four daily flights — two to Los Angeles and two to San Francisco — are not enough to offer a competitive alternative to the likes of Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and JetBlue Airways that all operate the routes.

United resumed flights to JFK in March 2020 five years after it first suspended flights to the airport. In 2017, the airline’s then-president Scott Kirby (now CEO) called the move the “wrong decision,” even as he took responsibility for it in his prior role at American.

United continues to fly between Newark Liberty airport to the west of Manhattan and both Los Angeles and San Francisco.

In the latest hint of a major change to Emirates’ U.S. strategy, the Dubai-based airline is ending its partnership with JetBlue Airways on October 30.

The change, which was first reported by The Points Guy, comes as Emirates prepares to hold a joint “special event” with United Airlines on September 14. The United announcement is expected to include a codeshare partnership that would see both Emirates and United connect their passengers onto the other carriers’ flights.

Emirates and JetBlue have been partners since 2012. The tie up has had commercial ripples through the industry, for example, it forced United to end flights to Dubai in 2016 after the partners won the U.S. government contract for travel to the Gulf city. And Fort Lauderdale — a major base for JetBlue — was Emirates’ sole destination in South Florida from 2016 until 2020; Emirates swapped Fort Lauderdale for Miami in 2021, according to Diio by Cirium schedules.

JetBlue, like Emirates, notified frequent flyers on its website that the partnership with Emirates would end on October 30.

Air travelers in the U.S. now have a one-stop shop when it comes to knowing what airlines will provide them with in the event of a lengthy flight delay or cancellation.

The new Airline Customer Service Dashboard by the Department of Transportation is designed to “ensure the traveling public has easy access” to airline commitments in the event of a disrupted trip, the regulator said Thursday. The commitments, which are largely a list of existing airline policies compiled together in one place, only apply to “controllable” events, or one where the airline is at fault, for example staff shortages.

“Passengers deserve transparency and clarity on what to expect from an airline when there is a cancelation or disruption,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said. “This dashboard collects that information in one place so travelers can easily understand their rights, compare airline practices, and make informed decisions.”

For example, if a travelers flight is delayed more than three hours due to a mechanical problem with the aircraft, the dashboard shows that they are guaranteed a meal voucher on almost all major airlines except Allegiant Air. However, if their flight is cancelled, only American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Hawaiian Airlines, JetBlue Airways, and United Airlines will rebook them on another carrier.

“Carriers welcome opportunities to simplify travel policies, clarify existing practices and increase transparency for travelers,” a spokesperson for trade group Airlines for America said.

The new dashboard follows a spike in flight delays and cancellations earlier this year that resulted in a blame game between airlines and authorities. While acknowledging their own staffing issues, airlines have claimed that air traffic control staffing has exacerbated the situation while the DOT has argued that the situation is primarily the fault airlines and weather. Whatever the reason, the regulator has moved to improve airline passenger protections, including a new rule that would guarantee cash refunds.

United Airlines and Emirates appear poised to unveil a wide-ranging new partnership that could see the two global airlines offer travelers significantly more flight options.

The carriers sent invites Tuesday for a joint “special event” in Washington, D.C., on September 14. The invites came hours after The Air Current reported that United and Emirates were near a new codeshare partnership. Such a pact would allow each airline to sell tickets on certain flights operated by the other that would give travelers broad connectivity across the airlines’ respective route networks. United would likely gain new markets in Africa, the Middle East, and India, and Emirates significantly more access to the U.S. market.

A partnership would represent a dramatic warming of relations between United and Emirates. In 2015, United, American Airlines, and Delta Air Lines launched an all-out campaign to limit the growth of the Gulf carriers, including Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar Airways, to the U.S. arguing that they were essentially dumping capacity in the market with the financial backing of their respective governments. As The Air Current reported Tuesday, in 2017 United’s then-CEO Oscar Munoz called the Gulf airlines “international branding vehicles” for the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

But tensions have eased in recent years. American and Qatar Airways unveiled a broad partnership in 2020 that saw the former add flights to Doha — its first ever nonstop the Gulf — in June. If the United-Emirates pact comes to pass, only Delta would be left without a partner in the Gulf.

For now, we have to wait until September 14 to find out what United and Emirates are up too.