Has anyone's flight info changed?

[Amy8888]

We booked our Disney Vacation online in February, through the Disney website. We specifically chose direct flights and departure times based on having a 2 hour drive to our airport and 2 small kids to lug around. The airline is AirTran. When we booked, we paid the deposit as well as the air transportation fee. So basically, it seems like they pulled a bait and switch on us.

Yesterday I paid the balance of my trip and just happened to notice the flights changed on me. There was never even any notice of the change so I could very well have not noticed that the departure time was moved up an hour, and that we now have a 3 hour layover in Atlanta both ways.

Has this happened to anyone else? Is there anything I can do or do I just have to take it? Who is responsible for this in the first place, the airline or the Disney Vacation Company?

Thanks for your advice!

 

[backyardponder]

AirTran has a bad history of making changes like this. Since you booked through Disney, I'd give Disney a call.

 

[ancestry]

This is typical for Air Tran. Disney really has no control over Air Tran's flight changes. Call Disney and see if they can get your flights moved around to something more reasonable for you. Air Tran usually allows people to change their flights if they are unhappy with schedule changed made by Air Tran. However since Disney booked the flights (they are acting as a travel agent) you have to go through Disney to make any changes.

 

[Jestocost]

Any airline ticket you purchase is a contract for the airline to transport you from point A to point B on a given date, and the airlines are free to change the specific itinerary--including flight departure times and connections. The contract is between you and the airline and--while your agent (Disney in this case) can help you determine your options--resolution ultimately resides with the airline.

What you need to determine is what--if any--other options you may have available. AirTran may in this circumstance switch you to a non-stop flight at a different time, if they have one and the times work for you, or to a different set of connecting flights; again, assuming they have any alternatives that work for you.

In the worst case AirTran likely would refund your money, leaving you free to find flights on another airline that better fit your wants. Once again, however, this assumes that there are any flights on other airlines that work better for you. The other rub here is that you would have to pay for those new tickets at the going price which may be higher (and possibly significantly higher) than what you have through AirTran.

So, what you can do is research what other options may be available through AirTran or another airline and, in the case of the latter, what the cost would be. If you have other choices, go ahead and make what changes you can. however, there's a pretty good chance that you may be stuck with what you have through AirTran now unless you're willing to shell out some additional money for flights on another airline. No harm in checking, but don't get your hopes up too much.

 

[Amy8888]

Thank you all for the feedback! So helpful. It's not a huge deal to me, although my husband is pretty mad. I think it might be okay to get the kids out and let them run around a little in Atlanta. It's their first time flying so even that part of it will be fun to them, I think.

I've contacted Disney and I'll wait to see what they say but I'm not going to push for anything to be "fixed" especially since what Airtran has done seems to be legal and consistent with their business model.