spirit airlines, how bad or good is it??

I've only heard bad things (in terms of the nickel & diming). Had a friend visiting last year from overseas. He decided to take a weekend trip to visit some family in another state, and he booked his airfare on Spirit before I could warn him. The airfare was $50 cheaper than the other carriers, but then he had to pay a fee for his carry-on (there and back), and a fee for his checked bag (there and back). By the time he was done, I think the trip cost him about $200 more than it would have if he went with one of the major carriers.
 
How do you choose your seats? We have a group of 8, one of which is disabled and will need someine from our group to sit next to her
 
I have flown Spirit once, and will never do so again! We booked Business Class tickets and they combined our flight with another, bumping us out of business class. They didn't offer us anything in return and they didn't charge us a lower price for the tickets. The flight attendant was really unprofessional. There was a man who clearly had some stomach upset on the flight, and the flight attendant was pretty much following him around with febreeze. Awful experience. I will GLADLY pay more and fly with Delta and I will NEVER fly with Spirit again.
 
Tinkerbell8956 said:
I have flown Spirit once, and will never do so again! We booked Business Class tickets and they combined our flight with another, bumping us out of business class. They didn't offer us anything in return and they didn't charge us a lower price for the tickets. The flight attendant was really unprofessional. There was a man who clearly had some stomach upset on the flight, and the flight attendant was pretty much following him around with febreeze. Awful experience. I will GLADLY pay more and fly with Delta and I will NEVER fly with Spirit again.
Click to expand...

Spirit doesn't have business class. Did you mean you booked Big Front Seat tickets? You should have requested a difference in the price after the flight.
 
This was a few years ago, so honestly I don't remember. I actually did request a difference in price, and was denied it. Tried calling their customer service line and got nowhere that way either.

I've flown Air Tran, Southwest, and Delta many many times. Never had a single problem with any of them. I very much prefer Delta and will never go back to Spirit.
 
lost*in*cyberspace said:
Did you check their website?

https://customersupport.spirit.com/hc/en-us/categories/200154256-Seats
Click to expand...
Yes I did. The website isn't very helpful. It says that we can pay for seat assignments with a starting price of $5 but without making a reservation, you don't know what the actual price will be. I tried calling a few times and no one could answer my questions as to where DD's wheelchair will be put during the flight. One person said wheelchair spaces are on a first come first serve basis and if there's no room, her chair won't make it to Orlando. The website only says that they don't charge for the chair.
 
You will then have to make a dummy booking if you want to see the seat assignment price. If I needed any special services, I wouldn't fly Spirit.
 
We have never flown Spirit. They do fly out of a smaller airport near us so we considered Spirit a few years ago. By the time, we added on all the fees for bags (you are charged for carry ons as well as checked bags), it was basically the same price to fly Southwest (free bags). We have 2 small children including an infant so we may have had more bags than most. WE chose the Southwest flight, which had more convenient flight times for us.
 
Ive heard good an bad stories about Spirit. One of the issues I have seen with them in my area is that the flights are usually at odd times and they only fly to/from certain destinations on certain days of the week.
 
Spirit air= Ghetto airlines

They up charge you for everything. Seats are very uncomfortable (I believe they don't recline) and the staff are extremely rude. Flew the once and after all the fees was paying more than a flight that had no charge for luggage and carry on.
 
I guess everyone has a different experience. From Detroit, Spirit offers flights timed perfectly for all my needs and they are direct, too. The flight is short, so any perceived inconvenience is minimal. We always just pack a personal bag and pay no bag fees. If you wait until checking in at the airport, you don't even have to pay for a seat assignment, but you get what is left. Personally, we always pay for the big seats or what someone else referred to as "business class." They aren't anymore "ghetto" than Southwest or Delta (which wins the dirtiest plane I've ever been on prize). I've never had a problem with them.
 
We won't fly Spirit again. like the others said, tiny seats, nickel and dime you to death, but the real reason we won't fly them is that they boarded us, then made us wait at the gait for 105 minutes. It was so hot in that plane, the woman in front of me became ill.
 
Just wanted to post since Spirit seems to get a lot of negative posts-wanted to post a positive experience with them. I will start by saying a lot of the negative reviews I have read stem from what I think most people not understanding what they are buying from Spirit. They are low cost, no frills-so if you know what to expect going in, I think it makes the experience better.

There were 6 of us that flew round trip Detroit to New Orleans. We did not pay for seat assignments either way, but were all together for both flights, it seems when you check in online, if there are consecutive seats available they will place you together--so I recommend checking in as close to the 24 hours in advance as you can.

Both flights left and arrived on time-this was the biggest concern for us. The seats were a bit smaller than a normal plane and they don't recline--which I actually see as a benefit. I would rather not be able to recline as long as the person in front of me can't recline also. I am a bigger guy, 6'1" 260lbs, and I sat in an isle row seat with my friends wife in window and my friend in middle seat (he is about 5'10" 200 lbs). And for the 2 hour flight it was just fine. My other friend (6'3", 220lbs) sat across isle with his wife and my wife and they all said the amount of room was just fine as well.

We had no issues at all with any of the Spirit workers--all were nice and helpful if needed.

For the 6 of us, it was just over $1000 round trip and that included 4 checked bags. With our other options it would have been $2000+

I will use them again-but I will only use them on direct flights--as their on-time record is not the best and don't want to chance missing a connecting flight.

Tips:
This bag fits as a personal bag for Spirit-next time we won't even check a bag as two of these would be plenty for us (and neither time did the gate agent make me put it in the bin, I checked it at the baggage check in and it fit, just needs to go in sideways): http://reviews.costco.com/2070/1000...ag-black-reviews/reviews.htm?sort=helpfulness

Here is a good site to track historical performance of a specific flight: http://www.flightstats.com/
 
It's great you had a good experience, but just the fact that Spirit has limited flights to many places and no interline agreements is enough to make me not consider flying them. One thing goes wrong, and you could be stuck somewhere for days before you could get rescheduled.
 
As others have said, just know what you are getting ahead of time, including how much the total price will actually be, limitations on baggage size and weight, etc. You might find you can save money by using them. And if all goes well, then you are golden. But there can be delays and cancellations, though I can't comment on whether they experience them more than average for the airline industry. And of course should you be on a flight that has problems, then regardless of the airline, it is not a good thing!
 
I have a 100 dollar rule if my flight is a 100 or more savings with spirit I use them if not I use delta.
 
Spirit can be great, but you just have to understand what you are getting into. Here are my rules for flying Spirit:
  • Know your fees. You should do this on every airline. They are not in fine print, they are right out there for all to see. IMO if you don't know the fees you are not paying attention at all.
  • No connections. Knowing that Spirit does not have a great on-time record, I will not fly them if I need to connect on another flight.
  • If the flight is greater than 3 hours, I will only book if they are still a better value when purchasing the Big Front Seats.
  • Fly only where they have daily flights or hopefully, more than one daily flight. Some places they only fly once a week so if they cancel the flight, you are SOL.
 
I live 20 minutes away from a small regional airport where Spirit is the main airline. People around here all seem to love them when asked, but you do have to be aware of the baggage fees. We're using them for the first time this November. Even after paying prepaying $120 in baggage fees, our 2 round trip tickets were still $100 cheaper than Southwest, plus they have free parking which will save me another $80 or so. Our main airport is almost 2 hours away with traffic, so 20 minutes from home is much more appealing to me. I went to the airport to buy our tickets (they're cheaper that way versus online) and the employee at the counter who helped me was very polite and helpful.
 
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