Routes: Spirit Airlines-JetBlue merger on pause; Southwest offers Rapid Rewards promotion

In this week’s news, JetBlue faces two federal lawsuits: an ongoing one to block its Northeast Alliance with American and a new antitrust action to stop its merger with Spirit Airlines; the Transportation Department has rolled out a new online database to inform consumers about airlines’ policies on seating family members together, a new move in its ongoing pressure campaign, as Alaska Airlines is the latest to guarantee kids can sit with an accompanying adult at no additional cost; a federal appeals court rejects a consumer lawsuit aimed at forcing the Federal Aviation Administration to establish minimum seat sizes; JetBlue sets a starting date for new Paris service; the U.S. is reportedly ending its COVID-19 testing rule for travelers from China as governments meet to expand airline routes and frequencies; international route updates come from China Airlines, United, American and Southwest; startup carrier Northern Pacific announces its first route — and it’s not to Asia as originally planned; and a new Southwest promotion helps Rapid Rewards members achieve tier status. The U.S. Department of Justice this week announced the filing of an antitrust suit to stop the $3.8 billion acquisition of low-cost Spirit Airlines by JetBlue Airways. The move had been widely anticipated, especially since DOJ had already gone to court to block JetBlue’s Northeast Alliance with American Airlines. A judge’s decision in that case is expected anytime now. Although it’s technically not a merger, the Northeast Alliance allows the two airlines to coordinate their schedules on routes out of Boston and New York and to code-share on those flights. In its new civil antitrust lawsuit — with the attorneys general of Massachusetts, New York and the District of Columbia joining as plaintiffs — DOJ argued that JetBlue and Spirit “compete fiercely today on hundreds of routes” and “by eliminating that competition and further consolidating the United States airlines industry, the proposed transaction will increase fares and reduce choice on routes across the country, raising costs for the flying public and harming cost-conscious fliers most acutely.” It said that a merger between the two “would eliminate the ‘Spirit Effect,’ where Spirit’s presence in a market forces other carriers, including JetBlue, to lower their fares. The deal would also eliminate half of the ultra-low-cost capacity in the United States. This will lead to higher fares and fewer seats, harming millions of consumers on hundreds of routes.” JetBlue was clearly anticipating the DOJ action. The day before the Justice Department announced its antitrust suit, JetBlue issued a statement citing “updated data” that it said supports “the pro-competitive impact the merger with Spirit will have on the industry.” It argued that JetBlue “is over three times more effective than Spirit at bringing down competitor fares” — something it calls the “JetBlue effect.” It said that JetBlue and Spirit “primarily compete with other carriers, not each other … and only overlap on 11% or less of the nonstop routes on which both of them fly.” It noted that to address “potential concerns” about the overlap between their networks, “JetBlue has already made unprecedented upfront commitments to divest all of Spirit’s holdings in Boston and New York, as well as five gates and related assets at Fort Lauderdale, to allow for allocation to other ultra-low-cost carriers.” In an interview on CBS, JetBlue CEO Robin Hayes said, “We’re disappointed, but we’re not surprised” by the DOJ action. He played down the potential market impact of the merger. “This is not Pepsi buying Coke,” Hayes said. “Together we are going to be 8-9% of the market … a distant fifth-largest airline.” In other government moves related to the airline industry, the U.S. Department of Transportation rolled out a dashboard where consumers can easily find airlines’ family seating policies — an issue that DOT and even President Joe Biden have been pressing in recent weeks. As a result of that pressure, “American Airlines, Alaska Airlines, and Frontier Airlines have stepped forward to guarantee that parents can sit with their young children without getting nickel and dimed,” the agency said. “While this represents significant progress, USDOT is not stopping there — and has already begun work on a common-sense rulemaking to ban airlines from charging families junk fees to sit together.” This new dashboard, DOT said, “provides a clear comparison of services the airlines have committed to provide, which will assist consumers when deciding which airline to fly. It makes it easier to know which airlines have stepped up and guarantee adjacent seats for young children traveling with an accompanying adult at no additional cost and which airlines do not.” The renewed push to protect the rights of air travelers began last year when DOT rolled out a similar dashboard where consumers could easily find airlines’ policies for handling flight cancellations and lengthy delays. Last summer, DOT said it wanted airlines to promise that children age 13 and younger could be seated next to an accompanying adult at no extra charge. Actually, United was the first major carrier to amend its family seating policy, announcing Feb. 20 that it was now “easier than ever” for kids under 12 to sit next to an accompanying adult for free. That policy was based on an improvement to its seat maps that automatically finds empty adjacent seats at the time of booking — but United stopped short of calling it a “guarantee.” In subsequent announcements that were reported here, American and Frontier did guarantee such seating availability. And this week, Alaska Airlines did the same. The airline said it guarantees that children 13 and under “will be seated next to at least one accompanying adult at no additional cost, including for Saver fares” subject to certain conditions — e.g., both the child and the adult are booked on the same reservation, the flight originally booked isn’t switched to a smaller aircraft, and adjacent seats are available in the ticketed class of service at the time of purchase. Minimum standards for airline seats are next on the list, but there are some hiccups. Five years ago, Congress told the Federal Aviation Administration to set minimum standards for airline seat sizes and configurations, but the agency still hasn’t made moves to do so. Now, a suit filed by a consumer group to force the FAA’s hand has been rejected by a federal appeals court. The three-judge panel noted that the FAA’s mandate is to protect passenger safety, not passenger comfort, and it said the suit by FlyersRights.org had failed to make its case that tight seating in passenger cabins could result in slower emergency evacuations, the formation of blood clots in passengers’ legs, and other potentially safety-related impacts. According to a Reuters report, Circuit Judge Justin Walker wrote in the court’s decision, “Many airline seats are uncomfortably small. That is why some passengers pay for wider seats and extra legroom. But it is not ‘clear and indisputable’ that airline seats have become dangerously small. Unless they are dangerously small, seat-size regulations are not necessary for the safety of passengers.” Major U.S. carriers have opposed the regulation of seat size and seat pitch by the government. In another government move related to air travel, the New York Times reported that the Biden Administration was planning to drop its COVID testing requirement for all travelers coming from China on Friday, March 10. That rule was put in place at the end of 2022 after China suddenly terminated its “zero COVID” policy, leading to a surge of new cases in the country. The U.S. mandatory testing rule was strongly criticized by China at the time, and it might be no coincidence that the decision to end it came just as aviation officials from the U.S. and China were meeting to discuss opening up more air routes and increasing flight frequencies between the two countries, according to a Simple Flying report. United Airlines, which recently resumed nonstop service from San Francisco to Shanghai and Hong Kong, had been hoping to add more China routes this spring but was deterred by China’s resistance to adding more flights. In international route news, JetBlue had promised weeks ago that Paris would become its second European destination this year, and this week, it set a June 29 launch date for flights from New York JFK to Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport and started selling tickets. The carrier will operate one daily roundtrip between JFK and CDG using a long-range, single-aisle Airbus A321 with 24 Mint Suite seats and 114 main-cabin seats. JetBlue said the new route would “effectively disrupt the market” with the carrier’s “award-winning service and low fares.” The company announced a starting economy fare of $479 roundtrip, but according to USA Today, that teaser fare could only be booked through March 8 for travel in the fall. The New York-Paris market is dominated by the Delta-Air France joint venture, with multiple daily departures, and is also served by American (from JFK) and United (from Newark). In other international route news, Taiwan’s China Airlines plans to resume daily flights between Southern California’s Ontario International Airport and Taipei on March 26, using a 358-seat 777-300ER. United has revived service from Denver to Tokyo Narita after a three-year suspension, offering three 787 flights a week and going daily starting March 26. United has also started code-sharing with Eurowings Discover — a leisure-oriented subsidiary of the Lufthansa Group — by putting its UA code on that carrier’s flights to Frankfurt, Germany, from Salt Lake City; Las Vegas; Philadelphia; Orlando; Fort Myers, Florida; and Anchorage, Alaska. American Airlines plans to increase capacity to Ireland this summer, with daily flights to Dublin from Dallas-Fort Worth beginning April 4; from Charlotte, North Carolina, May 4; and from Chicago O’Hare June 1. The routes are seasonal, continuing through Oct. 27. On March 11, Southwest Airlines kicks off weekly flights from Denver to San Jose, Costa Rica. Remember Northern Pacific Airways? We’ve reported on this startup carrier (it’s not flying yet) a few times over the past couple of years, intrigued by its plan to begin 757-200 flights from the U.S. to South Korea and Japan via a stop in Anchorage. (The airline is a sister company of Ravn, an Alaskan regional carrier.) Last summer, the company suddenly switched gears and said that instead of Asia, it would start out with flights from Ontario, California, to Mexico. And now Northern Pacific has set June 4 for its service launch — not to Mexico but to Las Vegas, with weekend 757 flights from Ontario. That route is already served by Southwest. Members of Southwest Airlines’ Rapid Rewards who aspire to elite status in that loyalty program (A-List or A-List Preferred) can take advantage of a new promotion from the carrier that makes that goal a little easier this year. Members who register online for the promotion through their Rapid Rewards accounts, buy Southwest flights and travel through May 31 can earn double tier-qualifying points. They can also get tier-qualifying segments when they take reward flights through the end of May, and they can earn 3,000 tier-qualifying bonus points for every $5,000 in spending on Rapid Rewards-affiliated credit cards through May 31. Here are the details and conditions.