I don't think I will fly Airtran again . . .

[briarbud]

I called Sat. May 3 to get the confirmation number so I could book my seat assignment 24 hours in advance (couldn't figure out what my confirm. # was; turns out I didn't have it). The lady gave it to me and then told me she could make my seat assignments for me. I explained that we had 2 young children so she put us in front of each other on the side of the plane that only had 2 seats (the other side had 3 seats). She even made out seat assignments for the return flight.

So, next day we get up and are almost ready to leave so DH gets online to check on the flight at 8:15. The flight is direct and leaves at 10:25, but online it said the flight was schedued to leave at 8:15! They moved the flight earlier and never contacted us! I call the airline and am told it was Expedia's job to contact us and to get to the airport ASAP. Luckily we were almost all ready and only live 15 minutes away from it. Get there and the ticket agent says they tried to contact us. Whatever! I never got an e-mail or a phone call. My ticket says they will send an e-mail in case of changes but I never got one! So, she got us on a flight a couple of hours later to Atlanta where we had to wait a couple more hours to finally arrive after 7 at night. Then, there were delays boarding AND taking off in Atlanta so we didn't get there until after 8. Our luggage got there before we did! Ugh! It made for a long day and after our grocery stop and check-in we didn't get to bed until late.

We had to change our plans for the next day so our kids could get more sleep. We nixed EE at AK and a RFC PS! In fact, we had to go back to the hotel for naps because my DS3 was so tired he didn't smile once all morning at MGM.

I'm just glad we got there on Sunday. It was a poor start to our first-ever family vacation by plane. I was almost wishing we had driven. The kids did pretty well despite all the waiting. DS6 was just so excited by the whole trip (we've never had a vacation this big before). Luckily our flight back went off without a hitch. I just find it very disturbing that this happened. I have personally never heard of a flight time being changed earlier before, only later, so it never occurred to us to check on it earlier than the morning of the flight.

I guess the moral is check on your flight the day before, not just the morning of! The lady I spoke to the day before never metioned it; I guess she just assumed I knew but it never occurred to me to ask.

I've never had another airline do this so I just don't know if I'll trust Airtran again.

 

[helenk]

Airtran is not the only airline that has done that. There have been a few posts here about the same thing happening to other people.
Since I joined the DIS I constantly check my flight status. Last year with USair it changed quite a few times and some times I was notified, other times not.

 

[SnackyStacky]

Happened to me last year when I flew out of Buffalo to Raleigh-Durham. I think it was US Air. They changed our itinerary, and we NEVER received notification. Fortunately I found out well before we left, so we just called and had the time switch.

 

[GEM]

Sorry you had a bad experience. We've flown Airtran many, many times and never had any problems at all. We have, however had problems on Delta, Southwest, USAir, American . . . you get the picture. Things like that can happen with pretty much any airline.

 

[BrerMama]

Happened to us with Delta on our return flight last trip. Now I check my Air Tran reservation daily so that I don't have to rely on the airline to contact me.

 

[safetymom]

Welcome to the wonderful world of air travel. Especially when you are booking through an online agency like Travelocity you need to keep checking the flight times. Don't depend on receiving notifications. It also happens when you are dealing directly with an airline too.

 

[doombuggy]

To be honest, it's cheaper for you to book your flight directly with the airline, instead of going to Expedia. I am looking at a r/t flight from Phl to SFO, and if I go to united's site, I save $5 for the exact same flights. Cuts out the middle man.

When i flew to MCO last October, I flew Airtran and the filght did change. I was notified by Airtran via e-mail (I booked online). We flew USAir out of Regan national last May when I went, and that flight was also changed. I was also notified by e-mail by USAir.

They keep you on your toes, that's for sure. Airtran is a fine airline, don't let this experience sour you. I hope you enjoyed the rest of your vacation.

 

[CarolA]

Sorry in this case AIRTRAN had NO excuse. The customer called 24 hours in advance and they did not go over the flight plan with her even though it noted a change. There is NO way they did not know that the flight had changed. That was just poor service on Airtrans part.