Business Travel

NEW YORK - Airfare wars and room-rate promotions are usually aimed at vacationers, but airlines and hotels are resorting to similar tactics to regain their traditional cash cow — the business traveler.

$641 billion in 2007 spending by U.S. residents.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - U.S. airlines, plagued by slumping business travel demand, may face lean bookings in the late summer and early fall, and some carriers hope fare sales will spur enough leisure travel demand to fill the gap, experts said on Thursday.

NEW YORK - Delta Air Lines Inc. on Monday said travel demand slowed by the H1N1 virus will result in a $250 million hit to the carrier's revenue this year.

NEW YORK - Extended Stay Hotels LLC filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Monday, citing massive debt stemming from its 2007 acquisition by the Lightstone Group and a sharp drop in business travel due to the recession.

WASHINGTON - The CEO of Internet travel site Travelocity said Wednesday that misguided criticism of business travel has led to a lot of confusion about what's acceptable.

ATLANTA - Casino pit bosses will tell you the best way to make your table action pay dividends is to sign up for a players card that is used to record points based on how much money you put down and how long you play. You often can get freebies on food, hotel rooms and merchandise.

WASHINGTON - The Federal Aviation Administration predicts that nearly 9 percent fewer passengers will board major U.S. airlines for domestic flights this year, and that traffic on international flights will also decline as the bleak economy curbs business travel and vacation plans.

GENEVA - Aviation groups in Europe announced a plan Tuesday to change the way commercial planes land in order to reduce their global-warming emissions of carbon dioxide.

MINNEAPOLIS - Continental Airlines Inc. said declining business travel is hurting a key measure of revenue, and that the drop-off has gotten worse since January.

LAS VEGAS - The White House is encouraging encouraged Americans to travel, soothing words for the tourism industry that had complained for weeks that a remark from the president about corporate junkets had a chilling effect on business travel.

HAVANA - Cubans say Washington's easing of travel and spending restrictions for Cuban-Americans visiting the communist island will be a boon to small business and a key step toward warmer relations with the United States.

U.S. automakers have been struggling to sell cars ever since the economy went south. Now it looks like a sharp drop in travel spending — specifically, on rental cars — has also caught up with the troubled industry.

MUMBAI, India - John Fesko came to Mumbai to talk with an Indian pharmaceutical company about manufacturing two high blood pressure drugs his Swiss biotech firm is developing. He went home with a bullet in his leg.

WASHINGTON - The number of passengers on U.S. airlines fell 8.4 percent in September, a decline of 5 million passengers from the year-earlier month, the Transportation Department said Thursday in the latest evidence of weakening travel demand.

ATLANTA - Delta Air Lines said on Thursday it will adopt a popular feature of Northwest Airlines' frequent-flier program, as it aims to merge the two reward systems by the end of 2009.

DALLAS - Executives of major U.S. airlines, already seeing signs of slumping travel demand, said Tuesday they were ready to cut more flights, and Delta hinted at more job losses as the carriers jockey to survive the deepening recession.

DALLAS - The chief executive of Southwest Airlines Co. said Tuesday that travel demand slumped sharply in November and the growth-happy carrier won't expand its fleet next year.