I am no stranger to the downside of flying Frontier to outstations. Got bit today.

There is a late afternoon mco to bwi and back. We came up last week without drama. The plane today, tho, never left mco. I, of course, was in the Priority Pass lounge cooling off with Blue Moons rather than checking flightaware. Got an email 3 hours prior to boarding that the flight was scrubbed.

the email starts off saying we will each get a voucher for $50 in credit for our troubles.

the email listed 4 options. 1) cash refund (in my case $47), 2) flight credit (who would choose this over a clean refund), 3) $250 for alternate transportation like a train or rental car, or 4) $250 in reimbursement for a purchased ticket on another airline, booked within 24 hours and flown within 72.

I looked at United and other airlines and they were $900 for basically a walk up, one way flight.

So, we left security and went to the check in desk. They gave us the last two seats on the same flight the n3xt day. Oddly, this option was not in the email.

Then went and found the Doubletree was cheap on points, had a shuttle, and a bar.

It will be fun to see if the planes goes tomorrow.

This should serve as a warning to families and others that bad things can happen, and there will be few clean options presented by Frontier.

Seems like option 3 used to be up to $400 when I last got a Frontier cancellation back in 2018.
And you had to book the alternate flight on a specific website from a travel agency they're associated with.
This precluded use of Southwest since they don't participate on travel agency websites.
(I assume you looked at SWA's website for their last minute fare too since they do fly BWI-MCO.)
Amtrak to Orlando might have been an interesting choice.

Indeed, the website that they suggest/ require that you use does not include Southwest. I did not stop to think of them when they did not show up on the "rebookmyflight.com" (or whatever it is called).

The other issue was that I wanted to get back to the checkin desk as fast as possible to get on the next day's flight before all the seats were gone. They do not have a 'service center' airside. Then after I was re-booked, it was too late to claim the $250 for a different airline.

The trouble with a late day flight is that not only are there fewer options, but also not a lot of time to think things thru.

Last time my Frontier flight was cancelled, the rebooking site did include Southwest options. I booked a later Southwest flight and got a refund check about 2 1/2 months later.