Friday, September 05, 2008

Continental to Begin Charging for the First Checked Bag

Effective Oct. 7, 2008, customers will be charged $15 for their first checked bag when traveling on tickets purchased on or after Sept. 5, 2008, within the U.S., Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Canada. The service fee will not apply to EliteAccess® customers, including those seated in First or BusinessFirst®, OnePass Elite and SkyTeam® Elite members, customers traveling on full-fare economy (Y) class tickets, or military personnel and their families traveling on official orders.

Effective for travel on or after Jan. 1, 2009, OnePass members will earn the actual miles flown rather than a minimum of 500 miles per flight for tickets purchased on or after Nov. 15, 2008. This affects base miles and Elite Qualifying Miles on flights operated by Continental* and most OnePass airline partners**.

Also effective for reward travel booked on or after Jan.1, 2009,
reward travel mileage requirements will increase
for customers traveling between North America and Tel Aviv (TLV) and between Hawaii and Tel Aviv. Effective for travel on or after March 1, 2009, Elite Mileage Bonuses will decrease for Platinum members from 125% to 100% and for Silver members from 50% to 25% for tickets purchased on or after Nov. 15, 2008. Gold members will continue to earn 100% mileage bonuses.

Full details of all changes can be found at continental.com.