Catch up on the latest stories from the Elliott Report

Analog travel: why film cameras and paper maps are back
Bob Gourley shot a trip to Muscat, Oman, on 36 frames of film and hired a travel advisor instead of booking it himself. New research from ALG Vacations found that among travelers who use AI to plan a trip, about 77 percent still want a human making the final call.

A maintenance delay is the airline’s problem. That’s about to change.
A Transportation Department rule taking effect Oct. 19 moves 10 causes of delay and cancellation out of the airline’s column in federal reporting, and unscheduled maintenance is on the list. Europe answered the same question in 2008 and answered it the other way.

An air travel watchdog woke up after three years. It wants to bark at posters.
A federal advisory committee that hasn’t met since January 2023 returns on Sept. 22 with three items on its agenda, all of them disclosure documents Congress already ordered. It won’t vote on a single recommendation, and none of the consumer protections the Transportation Department rolled back while the committee was dark made the list.

These New Zealand eco-lodges are redefining sustainability (and reaching for the stars)
Two lodges at the head of Lake Whakatipu on New Zealand’s South Island have pushed sustainability well past recycled materials and refillable soap dispensers. One generates more power over a year than it uses and sends all of its profit to a community trust, and the other is wiring an 1868 pioneer tavern into a 500-kilowatt solar microgrid.

Help! Amazon said “yes” to a $179 refund—and then it said “no”
Andrew Greenman bought $179 sneakers from a third-party seller on Amazon and injured his ankle before he had worn them out. An Amazon agent emailed him a written promise of the money back within 48 hours, and the company’s executive customer relations office later ruled that its own agent’s promise didn’t comply with policy.

Why did Dollar charge me $1,858 for a car they didn’t have?
Dennis Drake returned a Jeep Compass to Dollar at the Albuquerque airport and flew home to Texas the same afternoon. Dollar’s system logged the car as still out, and the bill that followed came to $1,858 on top of insurance he had declined at the counter.

Help! Budget says I smoked in my car — but these photos prove nothing!
Ray Oswald and his wife returned their rental to Budget at O’Hare after a family funeral and left with a clean receipt for $312. The company billed them $450 for smoke residue five days later, citing photos of a cup holder that could have been taken in any white Mazda.

One of our readers was shopping several airline sites when he kept seeing a low round-trip price. Then he watched every available return flight add hundreds of dollars once he picked his outbound segment. He checked again the next day on the carrier’s own site and got the same result. Is that opening quote a fare anyone can buy? Here’s our team’s advice on Backchannel.