Road Warrior: British Airways offers free upgrades to First class

Airlines make $44.6 billion extra revenue; GoCar to expand around the country

A  British Airways Boeing 777: the airline has launched an upgrade promotion called First. Photograph: Tim Ockenden/PA Wire
A British Airways Boeing 777: the airline has launched an upgrade promotion called First. Photograph: Tim Ockenden/PA Wire

FREE FIRST CLASS FROM BA

British Airways has launched its latest free First upgrade promotion, allowing eligible Club World customers to get a free one-way upgrade to first class. To avail of the offer, a booking must be made at the BA.com call centre or thorough a travel agent.

Bookings must be made in J class or semi-flexible C,D and R classes in Club World. Bookings must be made for outbound travel by December 23rd and inbound by December 31st.

You must request an upgrade at the time of booking. This is subject to availability on either leg of the journey.

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Executive Club members who quality for the promotion will be awarded Avios and Tier points for the cabin they fly in.

IHG’S NEW BRAND IS AVID

Intercontinental Hotel Group has revealed the name of its newest brand and has now started licensing. Avid will be the 13th brand in the IHG stable. So far, 150 owners have expressed interested in it. The first property is expected to open in 2019. Avid properties will be mid-scale and priced abut $10-$15 less than the Holiday Inn Express properties.

WIZZ AIR SELLS OVER 10 MILLION CHOCOLATE BARS

Ancillary revenues at airlines continue to grow, as the Cartrawler Yearbook of Ancillary Revenue by IdeaWorksCompany show. CarTrawler provides the B2B travel technology platform providing car rental, ancillary purchases and ground transportation options to over 700 million airline passengers.

Revenue boost as declared by 66 airlines, out of a possible 138, was $44.6 billion.

Some interesting facts from the report: Wizz Air sold 10,548,710 chocolate bars and 8.9 million cups of coffee last year. Qantas' co-branded credit card represented 36 per cent of all credit cards spending in New Zealand, and Delta's Comfort+ is expected to generate up-sell revenue of $300 million in the second half of this year.

GOCAR TO EXPAND TO 18 COUNTIES

GoCar chose Mobility Week to announce the expansion of the car sharing service to 18 additional counties. The car sharing service has been a great success in Dublin and Cork and has 10,000 members.

Go Car launched in 2008 and has grown significantly since.

An investment of €6 million will allow the company double the number of cars by 2018.

"Working with Irish Rail and county councillors throughout the country, we have made considerable progress in improving accessibility to car sharing and hope to continue expanding until car sharing is available in as many parts of Ireland as possible, " said Colm Brady. Counties to get car sharing include Galway, Kilkenny, Kildare, Waterford and Wicklow.