March 2, 2007



Dear Travel Partner:


As valued Travel Partners, we want to advise you on a special announcement that South African Airways is releasing today, Monday, March 2nd regarding our service to Chicago-O’Hare International Airport.

South African Airways has made the decision to postpone the launch of service between Chicago-O’Hare International Airport and Johannesburg, South Africa that was scheduled to begin on May 9, 2007. Although the advance bookings on the new Chicago service were very encouraging, South African Airways is currently undergoing an extensive corporate restructuring program that involves the review of all new and proposed routes. While we are disappointed that we cannot start the Chicago service as planned, we will continue to move forward with the other components of our master growth plan for North America.

We realize the postponement of the Chicago service will require the reaccommodation of customers that are already booked and ticketed on the affected flights. Our reaccommodation policy will be distributed to you later today, which will outline the procedures that have been established for rebooking your clients. Our Customer Service and Sales Teams stand ready and will work to minimize the inconvenience and disruption to your clients’ travel plans.

South African Airways will continue to service Chicago and markets throughout the U.S. and Canada through our Star Alliance partner, United Airlines, via our Washington-Dulles and New York-JFK gateways. Our non-stop service to from Washington-Dulles and direct service from New York-JFK to Johannesburg offers your clients the fastest and most comfortable flights to South Africa.

If you have any questions on this information, please do not hesitate to contact the South African Airways Customer Call Center at 1-800-722-9675 or our

Thank you for your continued support of South African Airways.


Sincerely,

Todd M. Neuman
Vice President, Sales – North America
South African Airways

That is one reason why I am flying Delta this year.

I just hope Delta does not issue the same release about Atlanta route before I go in June.

Who knows with Delta!

I don't think you have anything to worry about with Delta. They don't operate like SAA with headquarters in South Africa, where everything changes from minute to minute. It is my understanding that they are pretty busy with their flights to Jo'burg and are having great success with the same.

Guess I am calling Gracy Travel on Monday. I was suppose to be on one of those flights.......

Sierrabravo45: I had the choice of booking with Delta or SAA through Shawn at Gracy. I chose Delta, even though it was slightly more expensive. Glad that I made the choice.

quote:

Originally posted by Use Enough Gun:
Sierrabravo45: I had the choice of booking with Delta or SAA through Shawn at Gracy. I chose Delta, even though it was slightly more expensive. Glad that I made the choice.

Thanks for the encouraging words. Greatly appreciate that.

I had a couple of charters in the middle of my travels (polakwane to Vic Falls and then Vic Falls to Joberg) so SAA worked out better. Guess Susan is getting a call on Monday. Ah the joys of a VACATION!!!!!!

Hello Gentlemen

Do not be so hasty in knocking SAA, they are looking too expand their bases, and they still have a great service out of JFK & Dulles

ON THE OTHER HAND

Delta started with the Atlanta flight not too long ago, on 9 Jan half of the outfitters of SA flew inot Atlanta on a Delta flight with no NO NO individual in flight entertainment and the oldes 767 I have ever seen, the flight sucked , 19 hours and the same movie on the big screen 20 rows forward, and they over bokked by ( and here the number varies 32 or 14) these guys paid for their tickets up too s6 months in advance and had too make the Dallas Safari CXlub show, ????? they lot my luggage for two days ???

Flight back same awful plane no enteretainment once again but the c\same movie of two months ago, oh yeah I aonly flew back on 25 Feb

So think again, this flight was always SAA, hten they channged alliance partnerds and Delta wants too pick up some clients, and they do not want too overspend on cost ?? looks like

I have been a Delta Platinum Medallion level (100,000 plus miles per year) for the last ten years. In the last two years Delta has cheapened their product in a number of ways to the point that I am considering taking a year of "Roughing it" to get to top milage status with a competing airline. Haven't had any luck getting the other airline to "Comp" me based on my history with Delta. Some airlines used to do that to get high milage customers into their franchise.

quote:

Originally posted by Kwan:
Hello Gentlemen

Do not be so hasty in knocking SAA, they are looking too expand their bases, and they still have a great service out of JFK & Dulles

ON THE OTHER HAND

Delta started with the Atlanta flight not too long ago, on 9 Jan half of the outfitters of SA flew inot Atlanta on a Delta flight with no NO NO individual in flight entertainment and the oldes 767 I have ever seen, the flight sucked , 19 hours and the same movie on the big screen 20 rows forward, and they over bokked by ( and here the number varies 32 or 14) these guys paid for their tickets up too s6 months in advance and had too make the Dallas Safari CXlub show, ????? they lot my luggage for two days ???

Flight back same awful plane no enteretainment once again but the c\same movie of two months ago, oh yeah I aonly flew back on 25 Feb

So think again, this flight was always SAA, hten they channged alliance partnerds and Delta wants too pick up some clients, and they do not want too overspend on cost ?? looks like

The lack of flight entertainment sucks...but what you fail to mention is that the reason Half of the SA outfitters booked on Delta is because the tickes was $500 less than SAA. So the way I see it is that if you want "free movies" then spend the extra money and fly SAA. As to the missing luggage....same thing happens every day on the SAA flight to JNB...how many clients have had to come back to the airport to pick up their gun case? I have not flown the Delta flight so I can not comment on it...but I have flown SAA 6 times and had problems on 3 of those flights! I was stuck 3 days in IAD when SAA flight crews decided to strike. In the current day of air travel all the airlines have their problems...pick your poison!

I know that one of the reasons (may be others) for the lost luggage for those coming to the Dallas Convention on Delta via Atlanta was that the luggage never made it on the Delta flight. No one could seem to locate it anywhere in the US.

When the lost luggage did arrive, it had tickets on it showing it had been placed on an SAA flight.

SAA just told me that irregardless of fare (we had the cheapest) you will automatically be booked on either the JFK or DC Flight if you were already ticketed on the Chicago flight. They said they would have all of the information including seat assignements tommorrow available for those persons previously booked through Chicago.

I can not imagine trying to check a rifle in at Ohara for a hunting trip.