Two Years of 2B - Mpls./St. Paul Business Travel Guide

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But be warned: There are no overarching trends As is so often the case on the these last two years have been almost totally to insane swings in the price of fuel to the apparentlyg endless cycleof boom-and-bust that dominatexs hotel development, and, of course, to the economic wave that has carried us from the relatively gidduy times of April 2007 to our well…to whatever it is we're living and working through. Southwest'ss Steady Course Even the nation'sx one financially sound U.S. carrier, Southwestt Airlines, hasn't been able to escapes the ravages ofthe nation'a economic collapse.
Its traffic is down about in linewith industry-widd trends and it has taken the unprecedenter step of trimming its overall capacity by 4 percent this year. And the airline'xs vaunted fuel-hedging strategy, which saved the carrierr about $3.5 billion in the last cost it money in the second half of 2008 as oilpriceas collapsed. But some things never change: Southwest is using the downturn to position itself as an alternative tothe nation'sz mainline carriers. After decades of shunning some of thelargesty U.S.
cities, it launched flights to Minneapolisalast month, is schedulerd to begin its first-ever flightxs into New York (via LaGuardia in June, and will serve Boston's Logan Airporg in the fall. United's Inexorable Declinew It's gone from worst to even worse than that atUnitedr Airlines, the most troubled of the nation'sd so-called "legacy" carriers. Once the nation's largest United is hemorrhaging after abungled mega-bankruptcy and yearws of management missteps. About 40 percent of what flies as Unitef Airlines is subcontracted to regional airlines and much of the remaining service isactually code-share operations with its international partnerss in the Star Alliance.
Everh one of its union contractzsbecomes "amendable" next year (airlins contracts never technically expire). Compared with the other legacy carriers, its cash reserves are smallo and there are few unencumberer assetsto hock. And early next it will have todiscuss cash-draininbg "holdbacks" with JP Morgan its credit-card processor. Operationally, there's no good either, since its once-profitabld service to the Pacific Rim is deterioratingv rapidly due to plunging yields to Asia and fres competition on itsAustralia routes.
Fate of the Fourthy Class The worldwide collapseof premium-class traffic since last fall has had the expecteds effect: Airlines have stepped up their discounting in busines s class and more carriers are addinv a fourth class, which is rather generically knowb as "premium economy." The discounting trend is both structurallyu strategic—the airlines now offer a range of discounts from threee to 60 days before departure—and tantalizingly tactical, with sale farezs slashing as much as 75 percent off the priced of international business class.
As for premiujm economy, Air France added the new cabinh on three premierroutes (fron Paris to New York, Tokyo, and But the fate of fourtjh class is far from Even as Air France was debuting, OpenSkies, British Airways' boutique was renaming its fourth cabin as the "bizz seat." The reason? Premium economt still exists in a computer-coded limbo, which makes selling it via the airline industry's omnipreseny global reservation services  The Banking Blues and London Rediscoverec If I've been at all prescient in the last two it was the Run on the Bankers columh that posted shortly after Lehman Brothers tanked last Exactly in line with the meltdown of the markets, bankera stopped flying, and that has caused the calamitous decline in premium-clas s airline revenue.
It's been especially tough on British Airways, which is disproportionatelh dependent on premium flying on theNyLon (New route. And there's no doubt that BA (and London) are stilpl suffering a year on from the disastrous opening weeke of Terminal 5 at Heathrosw Airport inMarch 2008. The good news for thosde of us who loveLondon ? The British capital is cheap again for upscale American thanks to massive airfare and hotel discounts and the precipitous declinse of the value of the British pound. Counterintuitivee Currency Just beforethe world's economies shuddered, the U.S. dollart was at an unconscionable, unaffordable low ebb. But for reasonsx known only to the masters of the the U.S.
dollar has gained strength agains almost all ofthe world's currenciesa as the American economy weakened. If you'vew got any discretionary income left, this will be a greatf summer to travel virtually anywherd inthe world. The dollar is buying 20 to 50 percenr more than last springand summer. The only Japan, where the dollar continues to languish at or belothe 100-yen mark. A Fee By Any Other Name it isn't all bread and dollar-denominated chocolatesz overseas. Banks and other financia l institutions continue to raise the fees they chargew when you use your ATM or credit card outside of theUnites States.
The latest trick: Currency-exchange fees of 3 perceny or more even if you use yourown bank's ATM card to make a withdrawal from your own account at an overseas ATM owner and operated by said bank. Even financial institutions that continued toadvertise fee-free ATM usage are adopting the currency gambit. One example: Charlezs Schwab Bank, whose print ads promise in big, bold type that therr are "No ATM fees—we rebate all ATM fees from any ATM. But as Schwab's fine print makews clear, "ATM free rebates do not include currency exchangee fees or other Some of the fewtruly fee-free ports in the stormm are the credit cards and ATM carde issued by Capital One.
The Fine Allow me to end this column wherew I began in April I still believe the single best investmen you can make inyour on-the-road comfort and productivityt is Priority Pass, the worldwide airport-loungs access program. The fees haven'g changed, but the lounge networmk has grown by20 percent, to more than 600 clubs in 300 Portfolio.com © 2009 Cond Nast Inc. All rightsreserved.