About to pull the trigger and purchase flights on Airtran

[AllesonWonderland]

Give me the pep talk about how I'm going to love it and remind me not to check prices anymore after this! LOL I was waiting because I'm watching flights for my brother out of another airport. (we were going to try and coordinate arrival and departure times) But, the prices at his airport are rising and bing's price predictor says to wait. It makes me nervous about mine though. I've been watching AirTran's Branson-MCO flights in January and they've pretty much stayed the same...most legs are $90. Since I haven't purchased AT before or flown out of Branson, I don't know if that's a good price, but it seems to be. Especially when their sales come out each week and that route is always higher than $90 each way. Today the flights the day after we planned to come home dropped from $396 to $90. We'd go from a non-stop to having to change planes...but we'd get an extra day at Disney!! So, I think I'll go ahead and get 'em.

(Finally got around to the question! heehee) I can wait and purchase seat assignments later on, correct? Maybe that will be my safety net in case prices drop--I could use the credit for seats and baggage fees, right?

Thanks for listening!

 

[minnierocks]

We love Airtran! They are no frills, but we love the non-stop flights and low fares. Yes, you can purchase your seats later, but don't wait too long if you need a lot of seats together. Good luck!

 

[lost*in*cyberspace]

I can wait and purchase seat assignments later on, correct? Maybe that will be my safety net in case prices drop--I could use the credit for seats and baggage fees, right?

I don't think the price is going to drop below $90.00 each way, at least not enough to pay the other fees. That is an excellent price.

 

[TaraPA]

$90 each way is a great deal with AT right now. They used to change prices weekly, but not so much anymore. I've only seen the fares go UP from my airport in the last few months.

Yes you can wait to select seats, then use any difference in fare price credit to apply towards that! You can't do that online though, you'll have to call them to get the credit, then apply it.

 

[MidgeD79]

I wouldn't wait too long to purchase your seat selection because those prices may go up. Don't forget you have to pay for checked luggage also.

 

[Hoosier Mom]

We enjoyed our Airtran flights in the past also. However, the change air fees are horrible. We purchased one-way flights to disney for October because of my job situation.

Well, now fast forward and no job! Ugh. So we have postponed our Disney trip until January.

Because I purchased the flights at 2 one-way flights, we will be charged 75$ for each ticket (so 6 tickets). So $450 dollars in fees! The tickets were 1200$. Ugh.

Live and learn. I wish I had purchased SW tickets. They still have no change air fees. I'm in a holding pattern just in case Airtran should happen to change the flights and then I can possibly get a refund. From what I understand, Airtran has a habit of changing flight times. Praying they do that.

 

[AllesonWonderland]

Sorry to hear about your situation, Hoosier Mom! I was always trying to take advantage of SW's no change fees by booking one-ways and looking for price drops, but that never happened. I was a little worried about using a different carrier for this trip because there would be change fees. And when I first started looking for flights, all the wedding details weren't set so I didn't want to buy and have the couple change their date or plans. But now things seem to be progressing, so hopefully we're good. I'll keep my fingers crossed that you get a flight time change and don't have to pay any fees.

Thanks for all the reassurance and suggestions everyone. I went ahead and bought the flights. RT cost for the 4 of us before seat and checked bag fees is $840. So, when everything's said and done it will be over $300 more than our trip last year, but, when I priced flights for the airport/airline we used for that trip they were over $1200 so I think we still are doing well.

One more question--MidgeD79, you said to pick our seats because prices could go up, so you mean that the seats I see for $6 might not stay $6? I knew there were higher prices for premium seats like near the front or exit rows, but I didn't realize all seat prices could fluctuate.

 

[DebbieB]

We enjoyed our Airtran flights in the past also. However, the change air fees are horrible. We purchased one-way flights to disney for October because of my job situation.

Well, now fast forward and no job! Ugh. So we have postponed our Disney trip until January.

Because I purchased the flights at 2 one-way flights, we will be charged 75$ for each ticket (so 6 tickets). So $450 dollars in fees! The tickets were 1200$. Ugh.

Live and learn. I wish I had purchased SW tickets. They still have no change air fees. I'm in a holding pattern just in case Airtran should happen to change the flights and then I can possibly get a refund. From what I understand, Airtran has a habit of changing flight times. Praying they do that.

You think $75 per ticket is horrible, the legacy airlines (Continental, Delta, USAirways etc) charge $150 per ticket!

 

[Hoosier Mom]

You think $75 per ticket is horrible, the legacy airlines (Continental, Delta, USAirways etc) charge $150 per ticket!

Yeah, it's expensive to switch. In essense, it is 150 per ticket, since we are being charged 75 per each way. I could just kick myself for buying one-way tickets instead of round trips.

We got into that with Continental also when Royal Carribbean switched cruises on us. Fortunately that time, Royal Carribbean covered our change air fees. Thank the Lord.

 

[Hoosier Mom]

I might add the silver lining....because we switched our trip, it is now free dining so Disney marked 826 dollars off our balance. Yippee!