NWAC Northwest Airlines (MM)

Northwest Offers Online Frequent Flyer Upgrade Award Redemption and Ticket Purchases Enhancement Is One of Many Made to Carrier's nwa.com Web Site MINNEAPOLIS, Jan. 18 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Northwest Airlines (NASDAQ:NWAC) announced today that members of its WorldPerks frequent flyer program can now purchase a ticket and then redeem miles for first class upgrades, all in a single online transaction, at its nwa.com Web site. The carrier also announced other enhancements to nwa.com including a new option that allows customers to search surrounding airports to help find the lowest fare, new features that allow group and meeting travel to be booked online, and the ability to book vacation packages. "These enhancements expand the convenience of ticket purchases at nwa.com to even more of our customers," said Al Lenza, vice president of distribution and e-commerce. "This new functionality is the result of feedback from our customers, who have requested these features as the type of smart solutions they expect from an airline Web site." The new functionality, which is offered for purchases in the United States and Canada, includes: -- Online mileage upgrades. Members of Northwest's WorldPerks frequent flyer program residing in the U.S. or Canada can now visit http://www.nwa.com/ to purchase their tickets and then redeem miles to upgrade to first class, all in a single transaction. On the "Flight Search" page, customers indicate whether they'd like to choose an upgrade from the lowest qualifying fare or full fare upgrade in the "Search for Mileage Upgrade" drop-down menu. After searching the flight and fare options that the customer has selected, the "Flight Selections" page then displays fares and schedules as well as how many miles are needed to upgrade to first class. -- Surrounding airport options. The extensive search capabilities at nwa.com have been further enhanced with new technology that allows customers to perform fare and schedule searches for airports located up to 100 miles from their origin or destination. This feature allows customers to search for the lowest fare or best schedule, comparing different airports they may want to consider using. On the "Flight Search" page, a new drop-down menu has been added to the "where and when do you want to travel?" screen where customers can choose to search airports within 25, 50, 75 or 100 miles of their initially requested origin or destination airport. -- Group and meeting travel. For the first time, fare discounts that Northwest extends to groups of 10-15 travelers can be obtained online at nwa.com. Groups eligible for Northwest's Meeting Travel Program can now also book travel at nwa.com. -- Dynamic packaging. Customers interested in creating and purchasing a customized travel package can now do so at nwa.com, through a special link to technology offered by Northwest's vacation package subsidiary, NWA WorldVacations. Also at nwa.com, customers with e-tickets can view or change their reservations, select seat assignments, redeem WorldPerks awards, check in for their domestic or international flight -- including their return trip up to 24 hours in advance -- and apply for ticket refunds. NORTHWEST RECOGNIZED FOR USE OF TECHNOLOGY, RELIABLE SERVICE Northwest is the recipient of the 2004 Minnesota Tekne Award in the category of "Established Technology User." Established companies were defined as those with annual revenues in excess of $50 million. Northwest was recognized as "a leader in leveraging e-commerce and new technology globally, allowing Northwest to realize the full potential of online travel services and respond to changes in the travel industry." The Tekne Awards highlight individual and company leaders in the innovation, development, commercialization and management of technology. The award recipients represent technology innovators who have made lasting contributions to enhancing the quality of life and competitiveness of Minnesota. Additional information on the Minnesota Tekne Awards is available at http://www.tekneawards.org/recipients/ . Northwest also received the Keynote Performance Award for "Best Transactional Reliability," with an average of 99.69%. The Keynote Performance Awards is a program designed to honor, recognize and celebrate excellence in Web site performance. Keynote honored the fastest and most reliable Web sites in five online categories: e-commerce, airline, hotel, travel agency and government. Keynote is a worldwide leader in e- business performance management services. The Keynote Performance Awards are based on Keynote's market-leading Web transaction performance indices in which Keynote specifies a common end-to-end business process or task that can be measured reliably and accurately at each of the sites selected for inclusion in a vertical transaction index. Speed and reliability measurements are taken on an hourly basis from the 10 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. The determination of the award-winning Web sites is based entirely on the weekly aggregated results of Keynote's e-commerce Web Transaction Performance Index, e-government Web Transaction Performance Index and Travel & Hospitality Web Transaction Performance Index. Keynote vertical Web transaction indices are the most comprehensive available today and are the first of their kind to measure the speed and reliability of leading vertical Web sites for performing common transaction tasks. Additional information on the Keynote Performance Awards is available at http://www.keynote.com/news_events/releases_2004/04oct25-awards.html . Northwest Airlines is the world's fourth largest airline with hubs at Detroit, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Memphis, Tokyo, and Amsterdam, and approximately 1,500 daily departures. Northwest is a member of SkyTeam, a global airline alliance partnership with Aeromexico, Air France, Alitalia, Continental Airlines, CSA Czech Airlines, Delta Air Lines, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, and Korean Air. SkyTeam offers customers one of the world's most extensive global networks. Northwest and its travel partners serve more than 900 cities in more than 160 countries on six continents. DATASOURCE: Northwest Airlines CONTACT: Northwest Media Relations, +1-612-726-2331 Web site: http://www.nwa.com/

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