Mach 5 air travel coming soon?

According to Reaction Engines it is! They're a UK based company who have designed an eco-friendly airliner which could make the trip from London to Sydney in under five hours. They've received funding from the European Space Agency for their work under the project Long-Term Advanced Propulsion Concepts and Technologies.

The airliner is planned to carry 300 passengers at speeds of up to mach 5. Now that's much more exciting and has much bigger repercussions for the travel industry than your latest web 2.0 fad ;-)

Internet access coming on a flight near you soon

The concept of internet access on airplanes is gaining momentum fast. In the latest announcement, JetBlue Airways Corp. have announced they will be allowing basic email and messaging access through Yahoo Inc. from next week.

They'll allow two models of Blackberry to use WiFi as well so their owners can access work email and their own services.

It's a great step in the right direction. I can't wait to be able to go on a business trip and actually be productive on the flight.

The future could open up all sorts of possibilities for the online travel market. Any customer who's booked with you could get access to your content and services while on their way to a holiday they booked on your website. Lot's of opportunities for value added services and increasing customer engagement!

Airlines misleading web customers

According to the European Commission, at least 200 European airline websites are misleading customers. The main problems seem to stem from airlines which fail to show transparent prices, often taxes, supplements and charges aren't obvious to the consumer. Another issue they've highlighted is the practice of not making the best prices available obvious or easy to find. The practice of advertising flights as free is also highlighted as a problem, often the prices aren't free due to the taxes etc.

The EC says it could force websites to shut down next year if they don't improve.

Now I work for an online travel company, we always display any lead-in prices including all taxes, supplements and also discounts. This I understood is obligatory in this country. I'm really surprised to hear this about some airlines, although I'm not surprised about the 'free' flights issue.

It will be interesting to see how this pans out. If it makes the playing field level for all airlines who advertise lead-in prices and results in more transparent pricing for consumers then that is a good thing as far as I'm concerned!