By Robert McGarvey

 

The number of fliers who say they are satisfied with airport security procedures jumped off the page at me.  That’s because 67.7% of us told the Travel Leaders Group we are “satisfied” with airport security.

Just 14.9% said they were “unsatisfied.”

At first I thought the numbers had to be wrong – but as I thought about I decided that indeed I too am generally satisfied and I also hear a lot less grumbling among friends than I used to.

Why?

Are the processes better or has a kind of Stockholm Syndrome kicked in?

Mind you, we are not entirely thrilled with airport procedures.  27.3% grumbled about taking off shoes.  19.2 beefed about restrictions on liquids in carry-ons.

But a stunning 20.8% said they did not want to end any security procedure.

The numbers point to important changes in our mindsets.

Partly, I think, the satisfaction is because more of us benefit from TSA Pre-Check.  Four million of us now are enrolled and, per TSA, 97% of enrollees spend five minutes or less in security lines.

I usually wait longer for a latte at an airport Starbucks in the morning.

Pre- check also ends the need to remove shoes – the number one grumble –

Laptops and liquids remain in your bag. Go ahead, wear your belt.

Travel even once a month and TSA Pre is worth the money ($85 for five years; refunded to cardholders by American Express Platinum and various other premium cards).  

TSA Pre enrollees alone have to count for a lot of generally satisfied votes.

Meantime, too, at a glance TSA itself seems to be working better, more smoothly.  I just don’t hear the loud complaints about it that I used to hear.  

And all us – TSA Pre enrollees and others – seem better adjusted to the airport security queues.  Every trip a decade ago, I used to see travelers in a world of confusion when dealing with TSAs – liquids posed continuing challenges – but now I am seeing much less friction.  

Add it up and, yes, airport security seems much less draconian and hostile and time consuming than it did perhaps a decade ago.  

Lately there have been more complaints about TSA’s “enhanced pat downs” – perhaps because this appears to be new policy.

Probably we will get used to it and TSA will do it in a less annoying fashion. Give it time.

I also applaud security because – obviously – we need it.  

But a different poll result still baffles me, even after I have thought hard about it.

What I am puzzle by is our climbing satisfaction with airplanes themselves, per the recent J. D. Power North America Airline Satisfaction Survey.  That report put our satisfaction rating at 756 out of a possible 1000 points, up 30 points over the 2016 results.

Really?

Color me  a curmudgeon because airplane trips just have become unpleasant in my scoring.  Hostile staff. Hostile passengers. Too many of the latter, squeezed into too small spaces.  I see no real light at the end of this tunnel.

Or, rather, I see no light for those who don’t fly in the front of the plane.

For those of us in coach there seems no end to the miseries that await us because, plainly, the airlines are not listening and won’t as long as the ringing of their cash register drowns out our complaints.

Drive instead of flying, Or take the bus. Or Amtrak. And the carriers might get the message.

Right now they don’t take any of these alternatives as a serious business threat and why should they?

J.D. Power, incidentally, did acknowledge it had surveyed passengers before the Dr. Dao incident on United – and the extensive press coverage of similar mishaps that has followed. There’s no saying how this would have impacted the Power satisfaction survey.

One takeaway for me – because I live in Phoenix – is that I need to be flying Southwest more. It scored highest in the Power survey. United, which I fly a lot, scored much lower.  

How dumb am I?

But at least I do know how to fix this.

How to outsmart ransomware – CUInsight http://bit.ly/2s437cL #creditunion = My reporting

Credit Union Mergers: Time to Call for a Slowdown? – The Credit Union Exchange http://bit.ly/2rVvWrU

 

 

By Robert McGarvey

 

The New York Times headline momentarily made me wonder what century I was in: “Drink Up Business Travelers, the Minibar Is On The Way Out.”

I ask you: when was the last time you used a minibar?

I honestly cannot recall.  I know it was not in this century.

I also know many businesses do not reimburse for minibar purchases, at least of alcoholic beverages (and what else has anyone ever bought from a minibar?).  Hippy Hampshire College for instance specifically notes among its non reimbursable expenses “Mini-bar alcoholic refreshments.”

Lots of other universities and many, many businesses say likewise: forget claiming minibar expenses.

That’s not why I stopped buying from them by the way.  I stopped because the markups made me gasp.  A $1 beer might cost $10 and, yes, I know hoteliers tell us they lose money on minibars ad maybe they do but if I bought from them I’d be losing my own money and I can’t abide that.

But this also means that as hotels yank out minibars I won’t object.

In fact I hope they also clear away the for-sale clutter that increasingly shows up on table tops in rooms, everything from sunscreen to local nuts.  Some hotel rooms look to me like a Canal Street vendor made a hasty exit and just dumped a suitcase full of junk inside my room.

Take that junk, too, please.

Incidentally, although minibars are vanishing, hotels are putting in place mini-fridges – they are becoming “the coin of the realm,” said Joe Brancatelli, who indicated that the availability of same has shaped some of his decisions about where to stay.

That’s smart on the part of hoteliers. Many travelers now have prescription drugs they want to refrigerate. Others want a place to stash a Diet Coke and a sandwich.

Hoteliers may in fact be listening. Rooms, the NYTimes tells us, are undergoing a big redesign, said to be driven by generational changes in who travels, but it’s as much a function too of how long our trips are (they now are much shorter, a couple nights instead of maybe four).

So hotels are also getting rid of closets, in favor of hanging racks.  Okay by me.  I happen to use closets but wouldn’t mind if the stuff was in the room instead.

Where you will hear my objection is in the push to save room space by eliminating the desk.  I use a desk on every trip, often as much as four or five hours a day, handing email, writing, maybe doing a little news reading.  I don’t demand much of the desk – drawers are unnecessary and probably undesirable because I might forget something I put inside — just a flat top and a decent desk chair.

But I definitely want a desk.

And lots of wall outlets.  Lots.  Most hotels are still failing on that score.  I can’t recall the last time I did not wind up unplugging something the hotel owned to make room for my stuff.  In 2017 I should no longer have to do that. What does a power bar cost anyway?  A few dollars.

At least some hotels – finally – are addressing the inroom shortage of outlets, per a a USA Today story. So some progress is getting made.

Incidentally, the Times story does report that Marriott, the chain that had led in eliminating desks, has backtracked, mainly because their guests spoke up. More progress of a sort.

Hotel rooms, too, are shrinking.  That’s mainly because trips are shorter, but also because it’s believed that Millennial travelers will prefer to hang out in communal spaces – the lobby – than in a room.  So shrink the room is a hotelier mantra of now.

They also are getting rid of business centers because usage is way down. I know I haven’t used one in five years and really don’t trust them from a cybersecurity perspective. So I’m unlikely to change my mind..  

I also am no fan of hotel gyms and, lately, many hoteliers too are looking at ways to shrink or eliminate them.  

Add this up and it sounds like a lot of what we know about hotel rooms – especially those for business travelers – may be in flux.

And probably the most interesting point in the Times piece is that hotels, right now, are confused and undecided about exactly what to put in a room – which means that it’s up to us to speak up loudly and often about what we want and what we don’t care about.

My preferences may not be yours and that’s fine.  What matters is that we make our wants known.

Hoteliers say they are listening. Let’s see if they really are.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is It Time for an Apple Watch App? – The Credit Union Forum http://bit.ly/2qtf9i2 My reporting

 

by Robert McGarvey

 

My first reaction – possibly yours too – to the talk that Homeland Security is about to ban most electronics in flights from Europe to the US was horror. How dare they!

But as the possibility sorts out in my mind, my indifference rises.  Part of me actually thinks this may be to the good.

For our safety, maybe also our relaxation.

Keep in mind, too, that the present ban involves 10 airports in the Middle East and Africa.  The scope of the new ban – if it is enacted – seems limited to Europe. All? Just some airports? We don’t know.

The idea may in fact now be “off the table” according to the latest reporting.  If so – and if the security intel supports it – that’s fine by me.

If it still comes down though – and in a Trump universe predictability is not the norm – that too is okay by me.

Here’s the deal: the vast bulk of my personal travel for business is domestic.  The last time I took an overseas business trip was maybe five years ago.

Of course it’s selfish to say I am not impacted, so why should I care?  But there is more to my thinking.

For some years, there’s been a requirement – admittedly not often enforced – that any electronic device carried by a passenger has to be able to power on.  TSA can ask to see the device light up.  I have never been asked but I did stop bringing one elderly laptop that ran fine with a cord but the battery had passed on some time before.  It just didn’t seem worth the expense to buy a new battery so I forgot about it – until the power on requirement kicked in.

The logic behind the requirement is compelling. There’s a lot of space in the battery compartment. If there’s no battery in place that space could be put to nefarious purposes.  No argument with that thinking.

And so I supported the power on requirement and now I see why it just might make good sense to ban laptops – possibly also other bigger electronics- because we apparently don’t believe many airports have the technology and systems in place to ensure that there are no hidden explosives.

I put safety of all passengers ahead of my personal entertainment convenience.

Besides, a cellphone can entertain and inform me plenty.

Shouldn’t passengers be required to power off and on a cellphone before carrying it on? Probably.

Now, as for my dismay, my initial worry was: what will I do to fill eight to twelve hours on a European flight? And then I remembered I had done quite a few trips in the pre electronics era and had no difficulty filling time.

Just bring a book, maybe some newspapers and magazines.

Also, on phablet type cellphones – I own a Nexus 6 for instance – reading Kindle books is not uncomfortable.  I have in fact done it on quite a few flights already.

I also can handle email on the Nexus 6. No, I won’t write lengthy email but I rarely write long email anyway and at least I can still use flight time to work through (erase) a backlog.

I won’t watch movies on it, or do much web surfing, but I generally don’t do that inflight when I bring a laptop or iPad.  So no big loss to me.

I just might end up being more relaxed – working less – on long flights if I travel without a laptop in hand.

When I do the assessment I see this: there are possible risks involved in allowing electronics on board.  And if most types are banned, I can still fill my time usefully and enjoyably.

Would I be so sanguine if phones too are banned?

Initially I’d howl – but, honestly, this just takes u back to air travel circa 1980.  And in many ways it was considerably more pleasant in that era. I’ll grant that the absence of electronics had nothing to do with the higher quality of the travel.

But it was more fun to fly in 1980 and I had no gear with me.

If need be, we can go back to that era. And I personally will fly comfortably.

How about you?

FWIW, in a recent poll, four of five UK travelers said a laptop ban would not impact their willingness to fly to the US.

 

And reports have surfaced that Australia, too, is mulling a laptop ban.

 

by Robert McGarvey

 

What now in terms of hotel guest insecurities?  Now that Sabre has disclosed a breach that may have impacted some 32,000 hotels that use the company’s data services.

This is bad. Potentially a lot worse than the many, many hotel breaches we have learned about over the past few years, at Trump through Mandarin.  That’s because those hotel breaches largely were confined to systems used in bars, restaurants and gift shops.  The prevention was simple: don’t used plastic at those establishments, in fact just don’t use those places at all and if you must, pay cash or sign the charges over to your room. Room-related systems, we had always heard, had not been compromised.

An exception was the recent Intercontinental Hotels breach where, it was acknowledged, reservations related data may have been hacked. IHC posted a widget for checking if hotels you have used were compromised.

That IHC breach is bad. The Sabre breach may be much worse.

Oddly, it’s gotten scant coverage in the consumer press and not a lot more in the trade press. Probably due to breach burnout.

But the Sabre breach has to be looked at closely.

Buried in Sabre’s recent 10-Q filing is this: “We are investigating an incident involving unauthorized access to payment information contained in a subset of hotel reservations processed through the Sabre Hospitality Solutions SynXis Central Reservation system. The unauthorized access has been shut off, and there is no evidence of continued unauthorized activity at this time. We have retained expert third-party advisors to assist in the investigation and are working with law enforcement. There is a risk that this investigation may reveal that PII, PCI (each as defined below), or other information may have been compromised. It is not possible at this time to determine whether we will incur, or to reasonably estimate the amount of, any liabilities in connection with this incident. We maintain insurance that covers certain aspects of our cyber risks, and we are working with our insurance carriers in this matter.”

PII data, btw, is “personally identifiable information,” meaning it potentially identifies you.

According to reporting by security blogger Brian Krebs, Sabre has said that the breach has been plugged and the situation is under control: “There is no reason to believe that any other Sabre systems beyond SynXis Central Reservations have been affected,” said Sabre in a note to its customers.

But here’s the rub: Sabre’s systems are used by literally thousands of hotels to manage guest reservations and payments. Airlines too use the systems.

Sabre has declined to share more details about the breach. Nobody knows exactly what data was lifted, for how long.

But a safe assumption is that if you have stayed in hotels and/or flown on commercial planes your payments data may now be in the hands of criminals. It may not be – because we know so few details of the hack – but caution and the hospitality industry’s track record suggests erring on the side of paranoia.

What should you do?

Start by monitoring charges, especially on the cards you use for travel expenses. Really read the monthly statements. Question anything that looks hinky.

Just stop using debit cards – ever – for travel related expenses. The protections just are not as good as they are for credit cards and, in most cases, getting wrongly used cash restored to your account can involve delays when a debit card is involved.  That can be a giant hassle when a mortgage or tax payment is due and the money just is not in your account yet.

Only use credit cards at hotels and with airlines.

More advice: it’s time to stop using hotel WiFi except for the most mundane tasks. If you want to check the Yankees’ score – and I’m with you on that – sure, use hotel WiFi for checking into ESPN.

But with anything that involves a password that matters to you, use your phone’s cellular data or use the phone to create a personal hotspot to power your laptop’s surfing.  Cellular data isn’t perfect but it is far, far safer than any public WiFi.

Also, use cash to pay at hotels wherever possible.  Hotels have shown their cybersecurity cannot be trusted – even if the hotel is doing its job, its vendors may not be.  Throwing a $10 bill on the bar for your draft beer won’t come back to haunt you.

Survey cybersecurity experts and many believe still more hotels will be breached.  Why?  Hard to say, except the obvious issue is that the industry has not invested in the systems and protections needed to keep guest data truly safe.

Just know this: you can’t trust hotels to keep your card data safe.  Act accordingly.

The battle for new credit union charters – CUInsight http://bit.ly/2qHVxoh My reporting – #creditunion

 

By Robert McGarvey

I have hung back from booking with Airbnb –it all seemed too uncertain, from check-in vagaries to check out confusions and I definitely did not want roommates.

Maybe that has changed. Now Airbnb has rolled out a “Business Travel Ready” program that has me thinking anew.  Tnooz itemizes some of the characteristics of units that qualify: “All properties designated ‘Business Travel Ready’ must meet a list of criteria: At least 60% of their reviews must earn five stars. The whole home or apartment must be available, be smoke- and pet-free and include hotel-like amenities, including Wi-Fi, laptop-friendly workspace, iron, hangers, clean towels and fresh linens, hairdryer and shampoo.”

Airbnb also says 24/7 chck in, check out is available.

Is this enough to shove me out of my habits and into new digs?

Recently I got nudged into the sharing economy via American Express’s monthly $15 Uber credit for Platinum Card holders.  I’ve been very pleased with the rides – the cars, the drivers, the app – and that has prompted me to thinking more kindly about other sharing economy services.

Like Airbnb..

I’d thought for many months that what a business traveler needs – what I need – is predictability.   Whether I am staying at a Four Seasons or – more likely with my clients – a Holiday Inn Express, I know what I am getting and I get it.  No complaints.

But is there more? better? cheaper? to be had by booking in the “Business Travel Ready” program, which Airbnb has apparently had in pilots for a couple years?

I decided to look through the Airbnb site, for possible bookings with upcoming trips.

Note: reader comments on Airbnb are open.  Use the blog’s comment form.  Anonymity is possible.  

Ever more businesses are now reimbursing for Airbnb stays.  By now, just about any business will accept it if the argument can be made that using it saves money.  Does it?

I started by looking at San Francisco, where I usually stay in JDV’s Hotel Carlton, a Lower Nob Hill hotel with rates just about always under $300 per night and a very good location for my purposes – easy walks to Union Square, Market Street, and maybe a mile and a half from the Moscone Center.  

But I have also been eyeing the Tilden, a new hotel in the gritty but gentrifying Tenderloin, where rates are under $200 per night which is jaw dropping in Baghdad by the Bay.  And I really like the Tenderloin, the neighborhood where Dashiell Hammett probably lived when he wrote Maltese Falcon, etc.  

So what would prompt me to book via Arbnb instead?

How cool is this: Airbnb is showing multiple whole apartments (studios) for under $150 per night. At a glance I am seeing nothing actually in the ‘Loin but there’s plenty in true downtown, such as this $199 eye-popper.  At 205 sq. ft it actually is smaller than a typical hotel room but the price is appealing.  I’d put it on my list as a possibility for my next San Francisco trip.

Or I could go budget with this $125 studio.  

Color me interested.

A trip to Washington DC also looms and there I always stay at the Washington Plaza, a mid century hotel in Thomas Circle, a few blocks from the White House and across the street from a building where I lived years ago, when the neighborhood was, ahem, sketchier. It’s quite posh now.  But rooms at the Washington Plaza generally have been under $300 per night, typically well under.  

Here’s a one bedroom condo in Logan Circle for $155, a couple or three blocks from the Washington Plaza.  $119 gets this place.  

Jumping to where I live – Central Phoenix – $77 gets a converted shipping container in Roosevelt Row, very on trend.  

Probably I’d go for $150 for the one bedroom on artsy Roosevelt Row.  

There are plenty of places in Central Phoenix for under $150 per night on Airbnb.  Hotel rooms are typically upwards of $250 for a standard, anonymous chain accommodation.

What’s appealing is that all these places noted in this column are in the “Business Travel Ready” program – and that takes some uncertainty out of this, at least for me.

Is that good enough to separate me from the predictable comfort of a well-run chain’s hotel room?

On my next trip, I am thinking yes, that it’s time to explore the new.

How about for you?