Flying the Budget Airlines
 

For an article I'm doing for Travel Holiday magazine, I'm interested in your impressions flying the biggest of the budget carriers (excluding SW)--Frontier, AirTran, ATA, JetBlue, Vanguard, etc...How is customer service at the gate on each--are agents friendly and helpful? Which airlines reprotect you when there's a cancelation? Have you ever tried to transfer bags to another airline? How is in flight service on each?

Email me at [email protected], if you'd like. Thanks for your help...

Robb Mandelbaum

Check out Epinions. There are some very entertaining reviews of the budget carriers there. Not all of them are negative, by the way.

I have taken AirTran out of the budget carriers. Everything was like clockwork. All 4 segments were on time. If the oppportunity presented itself, I shall fly AirTran again.

Some people swear by SW, but I'm not one of them. The cattle call process really ticks me off. Last minute business travel on SW out of SJC is terrible; I get bumped half of the time because I get there too late for their boarding card process.

May be off topic as yours may be a purely US oriented magazine, but the budget carriers in the UK are revolutionising things over there and now spreading their wings to the rest of Europe.....

Easyjet is the leader (with over 85% of all bookings made online, btw), but you can also add the likes of Ryanair, Go, Buzz.

Taking just one example, Edinburgh.....five years ago there were about 15 daily flights to London (two airports), now there are around 40 on at least 5 different carriers to 5 different London airports.....and the fares have come crashing down, often as low as STG19 one way off peak, not bad for a 400 mile flight !

I have had a number of experiences with Spirit...I flew from FLL to DTW a number of times, all of which were on time and they thankfully put you in terminal A, away from the hordes of Northwest pax.

However, they did cancel a flight (BTW on the opening weekend of the service) from DCA to FLL. This was at 9am. The next, and only one out was at 4pm the same day. They would not arrange any transportation on another carrier, but they did give everybody on the flight a free RT ticket! I thought that was pretty generous, although a couple of people were pushing their luck for two tickets...

I used that freebie to go to DTW for Christmas. While on the ground in FLL, there was a considerable delay. The pilot stated that there was a weight balancing problem. It turned out that there was too much weight on board, and they took off a lot of luggage (including mine), but of course that wasn't discovered until on the ground in DTW. They sent it up on the next flight the next day... no compensation for that, or the hassle of driving up the airport (an hour each way) to pick up the bag. That was a Saturday, and they couldn't get it delivered to where I was until that Monday...

But, based on the numerous good flights, as well as the experience in DCA, I'd probably give them another try....They are expanding their service out to the West Coast...maybe, maybe...!!!

Welcome to FlyerTalk, TravelRobb.

Why excluding SW? Just curious.

I have flown Vanguard once (and was delayed) and have driven to the airport to pick up friends flying Vanguard on numerous occasions. In my limited sample-set of flights, almost every one was delayed by at least 30 minutes - usually more. Not to say I wouldn't fly them if I absolutely had to choose between them and the 'Hound, but I do tend to avoid them - as well as most similar carriers.

In my experience, I've usually been able to find a comparable airfare on one of my more frequently-traveled airlines, so it's rarely an issue.

Gotta just rave about Frontier Airlines, our hometown favorite here in Denver. Low fares, advanced seat assigments, experienced and very professional crews, and they'll be offering 33" pitch in their new Airbus fleet which starts arriving in June. Their new FF program offers a 3,000 mile bonus for signing up online (www.frontierairlines.com), and offers a free ticket systemwide for only 15,000 miles. I believe they just started a promotion for double miles for anyone connecting through Denver, so a coast-to-coast would rack up 10,000 miles or so. In case I sound like a PR guy for them, I'm not. I'm a Denver travel agent who is urged to sell United because of their cozy relationship with the agency, so this posting is my chance to give Frontier the credit they're due. One caveat, they serve no meals on most flights, awful sandwiches on East Coast flights, so grab something tasty at the airport and enjoy the legroom, friendly service, and attitude-free staff.

and, of course, you can still get CO miles on Frontier, even if the new program is an even better, shinier deal.

Frontier has been nothing but first-rate in my book. If that's discount, some "traditional" carriers need to take lessons. (They're also really darn nice, which helps a lot.) Hearing of the 33" pitch in the Airbuses (that's a weird-looking plural...) is very encouraging.

Now, say what you will about WN, but it has gotten me around dirt cheap before, and i hear promising things about JetBlue, but i've not as yet flown them, even if friends rave of 'em.

I flew AirTran in Feb for the first time (ewr-fll)Flights were on time and the service was fine.No meals but polite and knowledgeable staff.While changing in atl I was offered a bump and took it.That gave me 2 hours to walk around the terminal and watch the monitors for the 20 or so gates they operate.everything on time and orderly.BTW,I flew the 717 on one segment.Very nice although even the older DC9's were clean.I will use them again

I've flown ATA three times, with three different experiences. The first time the plane was late and we ended up buying a ticket on another airline because we HAD to get to our destination. The third time was great, $89 last minute fare from Midway to FLL.

The second time you ask? Again, I was flying Midway to FLL. First they changed gate and planes (a late 60's 727), therefore our seats (1A&B) were blocked off. We're told to sit in row 2 and hope no one is assigned there. While waiting we see an attendant bring on two unaccompanied minors. She takes them to there seats and the comes back to the head attendant (pursur?) to say that the childrens' seats are occupied. After reviewing the tickets, the head attendant says, "this flight is going to Fort Lauderdale and these children are supposed to be going to New York! This is the third time this week this happens!" Needless to say by we were in shock. The only other bad thing that happened was that the plane was weight restricted and some passengers were left at the airport. I wonder if they ever got their luggage......

Would I fly them again? Yes, if the price is right. Would my wife let me? NO!

[This message has been edited by eugeneflyer (edited 04-02-2001).]

This is great news, I am flying Frontier soon to Vegas, and I was trying to get out to the west cheaply. I hope my experience is a s good as yours!

I concur! I have loved the few Frontier flights I havew taken but keep w/ united for destinations they serve...If we flew to NY or DEN more often I would be very tempted to switch!

Had the chance to fly JetBlue from JFK to MCO and back and I must say it was a great experience.
Organized boarding well - made sure people took headphones for the satellite TV - great seats (all leather) - nice F/A's with good service and good snacks (choices of several different ones in a basket with choice of drink). The fact that you have a TV that you can watch during the flight is wonderful - this combined with efficient service at a great price makes JetBlue hard to beat for a budget carrier..now if they flew more places....

This is based on second-hand knowledge:
My mom has been commuting MSP-MDW every few weeks over the past 2 years, and has flown Vanguard, Airtran, ATA, and NW. She always takes the first flight into MDW, and last flight back to MSP the same day. For on-time performance, i would rank them all close to the same (including NW) at about 75% on-time... but some of this is due to MDW's inherent problems of weather/only one runway and limited MDDW gate space. ATA seems to have the most trouble with lack of gate space as they juggle about 10 flights out of 8 gates at a given time, it seems. Thus, with some ATA delays, the aircraft is landed and sitting on the tarmac. Delays would be in the neighborhood of 30 minutes.

Delays on Vanguard were brutal: weather would push everything back an hour or two by the last flight of the night. It may be because Vanugard schedules flights with little recovery time to absorb delays. Service-wise, though, my mom liked service by the Vanguard staff most of the bunch, again including NW.

TravelRobb, you may want to break the airlines into hub-and-spoke carriers (AirTran, ATA, Frontier) and point-to-point carriers (Spirit, JetBlue) because as far as delays, passengers on point-to-point carriers may be annoyed, but they wouldn't be stranded in an intermediate city.

I would also consider the airport being served: Kansas City is much less prone to chronic delays than Chicago Midway, so passengers from LGA to LAX on ATA through Midway would have a different experience than on Vanguard through MCI. Frankly, in my mom's case, I feel better sending her on ATA because since they are MDW based, the pilots, etc. have more experience dealing with MDW's challenges-- much more than, say, ATL-based AirTran pilots.

I fly between 35 and 45 weeks a year. Being based in MYR, we have more discount carriers than majors. Vanguard, Spirit, Midway, AirTran (vs.) USAirways, ComAir, & AtlanticSoutheastAir, the latter being Delta's 'connections'.

While I've never taken the first 3, I've heard nothing but complaints and problems from people I've talked with who have flown Spirit & Vanguard. Delays from 2 hours to a day don't seem uncommon. Never hear about Midway.

I have flown AirTran about 10-12 times now in the last year, and they were only late once (actually stranded me in ATL one night), due to bad weather getting me out of MDW-Chicago. What I notice most about them is their people actually hustle to get the planes turned around & boarded, plus the FAs are almost always just as nice as can be, sort of like the old days.

I view AirTran as a viable alternative (and a threat) to USAirways, who provides excellent frequent service to MYR. Interestingly enough, both of these carriers have the same weakness for me as a business traveler - lack of West Coast service. USAir does do just 5 West cities, but misses PDX & SJC where a lot of our work is if it's in the West.

I can say that AirTran does at least a good a job as USAirways and ComAir, and is way, way, WAY ahead of AtlanticSoutheastAir, which in my opinion is the worst airline in American aviation history. ASA has never gotten me home on time, has incompetent and rude employees, and has stranded me more nights in ATL than I ever want to remember, and is the single reason I avoid using Delta if at all possible.

If AirTran had a Western US network that worked as well as its current one, I'd use them 100% exclusively. How's that for a quote?