wcalvert

You know, you may be right. I even called to ask. It does specifically say under (c) that delay or cancellation of travel for at least 24 hours due to inclement weather.

It doesn't say anything about delay due to mechanical which I had definitely asked about. Hrmmmm. Any recommendations that would cover return air in case of long term mechanical delay?

I'm more worried about the Spirit flights to central america that only happen every few days. If I didn't use miles to get home, I would have been stuck in Managua an extra 6 days earlier this year due to the next two IAH-MGA getting cancelled.

wcalvert

LingLingFool was totally right. Policy only covers weather related delays/cancellations. They don't sell any policy for crew/maintenance/whatever because of fault of the airline.

linglingfool

Trip delay insurance will usually cover lodging and meals beyond what the airline will pay for, but I'm not aware of anything that covers just straight up cancellation by the airline. If I absolutely need to be home and am flying Spirit, I'll back myself up using Avios, and then cancel 24 hours out if the weather looks OK.

wcalvert

That's what I ended up doing, but not enough UA status for free re-crediting, so basically at the mercy of spirit. I'm more worried on routes that they don't fly every day. Most of the IAH-Central America are 3X/week. I wanted to do FLL-SXM, but it's 1X/week.

Also, about to head to the airport to buy tickets for me and 6 friends to fly IAH-LAX for a weekend in October. 7X$35.98 is big savings

Also, there are some $30-$35 RT IAH-ORD available in the fall I might book a pair of. Pizza, a hotdog, and a game at Wrigley perhaps.

linglingfool

Maybe I'm a little optimistic, but on routes like those I assume they would operate them the next day. I don't see them stranding a planeful of people for a week, or telling everyone on the outbound to go fly a kite.

Better hurry, I would not expect the Cubs to be playing baseball into a meaningful part of the fall

wcalvert

Hahahaha. Have always wanted to sit in the bleachers at Wrigley, but the bleacher seats for this game are $107/each!!! Cheapest in the stadium are $52/each. Insane prices for an Astros fan.

Well, they don't intentionally strand people that long. I flew on the inaugural IAH-MGA on a Friday night. My monday return was cancelled, then the Thursday morning was cancelled, and I would have been on the Saturday one if there was enough room.

Now up to 8 people on the same trip to LA. Spirit website says that there are at least 9 available at the price though.

linglingfool

I recently booked a trip for 12 for a Bears road game this year, and volunteered to buy tickets for everyone at the airport in exchange for a small cut of the $35.98 savings. The agent at the airport basically said I could purchase as many seats as I wanted at the price listed (i.e. way more than 9). Combined with the 5% I earned on the ticket purchase, I paid for my own flight.

wcalvert

Nice! That's a great idea. I think I'm going to start doing the same. Just charge a $10 flat fee/ticket. Everyone else saves $26 and should be happy with that haha.

wcalvert

Thought I would share one of my recent tickets on the fees/taxes/costs associated booking one of the super cheap RTs at the airport.

These flights are currently listed at $34.10 each way on Spirit.com for a total of $68.20

Normally, you can expect a savings of $35.98 by booking at the counter, but for whatever reason the $34.10 fares (and only them that I've found) actually give you a discount of $37.98.

As you can see, it actually pulls the fare down to a negative number on one of the legs. The net fare paid is -$.12. Don't feel too bad for spirit as there is a $10 other charge that I'm sure they keep.

jebr

It looks like they didn't charge you the $2 ($1.86 charge, $0.14 excise tax on the charge) "Unintended Consequences of DOT Regulations" line item of your base fare for flight 199. Not sure why that one would be skipped. It's always applied to both legs when I buy a fare at the airport (even the $34.10 round-trip ones with the "penny fare" that's really a $1.73 or $1.87 fare.)

The $10 - $12 "Other Passenger Charges" includes $1.86 each way for the "Unintended Consequences of DOT Regulations" Spirit fare line item, $0.14 each way in excise tax for that fee, and a $4 each way segment tax (this is common across all airlines, as far as I can tell.) I think the 14 cent line item for taxes is either state sales tax or some additional excise tax that's hidden on the website (but regarding that DOT line item,) but I'm not 100% sure. That part is just listed as $0.01 on the website (instead of -$0.13 fare and $0.14 tax.) It is possible that the Spirit DOT line item is $2 at the airport and the $0.14 excise tax is listed separately, with a -$0.13 "fare" to balance out the cost.

wcalvert

Well, it's only happened some of the time and only on some of the flights.

A week or two ago, I saw that Spirit had a $45 non $9 fare club DFW-SAN RT fare. Have to wonder what that would have priced out at!

Mrp Alert

I can't believe I had not seen this thread until now. I have been going to the Las Vegas ticket counter for years to buy my tickets. Before the federal excise taxes went up, I used to fly to LA for $13.01 on a -0.03 base fare. Now it's routinely $17 to a multitude of citites. I just got off LAS-ATL that was $63 online and $45 at the airport which was a match of a F9 fare sale.

Buying tickets at the LAS ticket counter is easy, efficient, and cheap. Parking is $2-$4 depending on how long the "Full Service" line is.

FallenPlat

Parking at DFW is free for 30 minutes or less. I have yet to pay. And $36 is a lot to save per ticket.

I've now also gone back and looked at my Prestige Card trip delay and trip cancellation insurance. Cancellation pays nothing absent death or illness. For a delay over 3 hours, it looks as though I'd get up to $500 for meals & hotels; and then I'd eat any walk-up fare I paid to another airline (less a refund from Spirit, if any).

So with Spirit you really do take your chances. Plus no Pre-Check or elite lines.

linglingfool

This is honestly one of the reasons I dislike flying them -- I have to show up to the airport 30-45 minutes earlier than I otherwise would.

wcalvert

I have yet to be turned away using my United elite card for security to get into elite line. That being said, the term A lines are usually pretty short in term A anyway.