Best Of

Good read that sheds light on airplane air quality and puts it in perspective versus other parts of the travel experience.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/05/18/airplanes-dont-make-you-sick-really/

Last week saw most US airlines make announcements around their plans to help keep employees and passengers safe, including in many cases a requirement to wear face coverings onboard flights.

Here is a helpful list I found compiled by The Points Guy outlining the current mask policies across US carriers:

Alaska: All Alaska employees who can’t maintain six feet of separation are required to wear face masks, and, as of May 11, all passengers are required to wear masks as well. The airline will have masks available for passengers who forget theirs at home.

American: Beginning May 11, all passengers will be required to wear a face covering onboard all American Airlines flights. The carrier had already said it would require all flight attendants to wear masks as of May 1. The airline will begin issuing sanitizing wipes and masks to travelers as well — those amenities should be available across American’s network within the next few weeks.

Delta: Delta customers are required to wear a face covering or mask. Similarly, all Delta employees and contractors are required to wear face masks when they can’t maintain a separation of at least six feet. According to the airline, “Face coverings will be required starting in the check-in lobby and across Delta touchpoints including Delta Sky Clubs, boarding gate areas, jet bridges and on board the aircraft for the duration of the flight – except during meal service.” Face masks will be available upon request at ticket counters, gates and onboard flights.

Frontier: Frontier customers will be required to wear masks onboard all flights beginning May 8, as an expansion of the carrier’s policy for flight crews, which went into effect on April 13. Unlike with American and Delta, Frontier won’t be making face masks available to customers — they’ll need to bring their own.

Hawaiian: Hawaiian Airlines is requiring all passengers to wear face coverings starting on May 8, joining a previous requirement for crew members.

JetBlue: All JetBlue crew members and passengers are required to cover their nose and mouth, with the exception of small children who are unable to wear a face covering.

Southwest: All Southwest employees will be required to wear face masks when interacting with customers, while customers will be required to wear masks as of May 11. Face masks and sanitizing wipes will be available upon request.

Spirit: As of May 11, all Spirit passengers and customer-facing employees will be required to wear masks or face coverings. According to the airline, “guests will be expected to bring their own face coverings and will be required to wear them both at the airport and throughout the flight.”

United: All passengers must cover their faces, and the airline will provide masks to travelers free of charge. Additionally, face coverings will be mandatory for all United employees onboard an aircraft, joining a previous requirement for flight attendants, which went into effect on Apr. 24.

Source: https://thepointsguy.com/news/masks-required-to-fly-us-airlines/

If you read your company travel policy/guidelines does it clearly state the following words?;

• Wellbeing
• Health
• Nutrition
• Keeping Active
• Rest and recovery
• Sleep

I am guessing that not many will includes these words.

But it probably does say words like 'Risk', 'Security', 'Emergency' and 'Insurance'?

Do you think that policy should be evolved to encourage healthy choices as part of an overall 'WELLBEING' approach to supporting travellers?

Really interested to hear the thoughts of this community/

this was a good discussion on the Office Hours session today. Visa / security providers were quoted as sources, their data is credible and updated daily. but its in a static pdf doc which isnt going to help deliver service at scale

As one of the co-founders of the Business Travel Wellbeing Community we would love to have your support for the upcoming - Global Business Travel Wellbeing Awareness Day. This event will take place on 5th May (5/5/2020) and the theme is - I TRAVEL. I AM HUMAN.

There has never been a more important moment to stop, breath and think about the future of the travel industry and the amazing people that keep the wheels of travel turning - the Humans. 

We will be hosting a virtual event on the 5th May and invite everyone to attend. We are also looking for hot topics to be discussed during the event. Please do feel free to comment on this discussion, and get involved. 

We are all in this together, and together we will come through the other side. 

Stay safe and well.

Let's not sugarcoat it...things are **** at the moment. This global pandemic is causing misery across the globe. So in these dark times, I'm looking for some light and how we can take ANYTHING positive from this crisis.

For me and my industry, I hope that this recent outbreak forces us to think about sustainability. Businesses are functioning without the need for any travel at the moment. It is FAR from ideal and the show is slower, but still going on.

When this passes (and it will pass) how are business going to react having proven they can survive without travel? Will they take steps to continue a travel reduction and how will they sustainably manage the travel they do book?

All of these questions might be for tomorrow, but one thing that I'm sure of is that TMC's will still have their part to play and as an industry, we will need to provide the tools that allow business to make these decisions.

As with a number of industries, I believe data will be king. But what data will Travel Manages want to see and what tools will they need to manage a radically different travel program?

I'm keen to hear from the forum on where they think TMC's will fit into the future of sustainable business travel.

Stay safe!

Quarantined life can make you stir crazy, but it also gives you the chance to try a lot of things you wouldn’t have normally tried. 

Here's a somewhat unique list of things I’ve tried:

• Make a big batch of cold brew coffee 
  • Because need is the mother of invention...or whatever it's called when you google something and then riffle through your cabinets to try and create a make-shift cold brew kit and then hastily follow the recipe, because you don’t feel like scrolling through it again.
• Bake yeastless bread 
  • Or a hard, lightly tanned, amorphous, carb lump
• Build and format a raspberry pi 
  • After all this effort researching, building and formatting this thing, I just realized I don’t even know what I’ll use it for
• Watch animals at the zoo
  • All these ideas don’t require effort...and I mean animals...just hanging out like nothing’s changed in the world.
• Learn a new language
  • No estoy loco, pero estoy hablando mucho conmigo mismo
• Remember Sporcle exists
  • I’m really hoping my next meeting at work is about the capital cities of Northwestern Africa
• Download free kindle books
  • Found a really cool website that lets you download kindle books for free - the public library
• Bike exploration
  • This isn’t the zombie apocalypse. You can go outside and explore those empty parks and trails around you...and act like zombies.
• Morning runs
  • I hate mornings. I hate running. Thinking about these things together actually makes me grunt audibly, but cabin-fever mixed with empty streets makes overly odious objectives oddly odiousless (eh, close enough)
• Virtually tour the Louvre
  • Accepter les cookies, get clicking and get cultured
• Deep clean your couch with baking soda
  • Like me, you’re probably spending too much time on the couch, and I do have baking soda left from that previous baking disaster...
• Start an internet radio station
  • Stole this idea from a friend, and I’m vaguely enjoying his, um, peculiar musical tastes (currently listening to pan flute played over rainforest noises)

Comment with any unique diversions you’ve taken up.

Here's some nice news from the travel industry this week: Airbnb is working with hosts to help house 100,000 COVID responders around the world. According to Airbnb's CEO, over 500 hosts opened their homes to the program in the first hour.

https://www.airbnb.com/openhomes/covid19relief

To keep yourself occupied for a few hours, and impress the others in your house, you can host a dinner at the 'Quarantine Cantina'. Print a menu of your 4 course dinner that you're cooking (or ordering in!) and beverage options, and host your partner for a special night out. To really up the ante, describe the menu with all the ingredients you've used including where they're sourced from (i.e. Free Range Chicken, Whole Foods, San Francisco, CA), and price each item ($0 if you're nice!). Set the table with a proper setting, and treat your guest as if it's your own restaurant, including but not limited to, telling them there's a 10 minute wait for their table and the kitchen is a bit backed up!