Need Help, Flight Changes

[alady89]

We are due to be in DW in 11/22, we had perfect flight out of Indy. Now, airtran e-mailed and need to change flight since it was cancelled.

We live 4 hours from Indy so we have the option of a 7 am flight - too early unless we stay, fly, and park which adds more cost.

Second, we drive in night before and get hotel at DW night before.

Or third, we arrive really late and blow a day. We only have 3 days before cruise and did want some time at parks.

Also, I had just banked the rest of this year's pts 4 hours before I got e-mail. So much for best laid plans.

Can I borrow from next yr's pts and book 1 night or not? if they have any availability?

Thanks for any help.

Incidently, we are currently staying at BCV for 3 nights.

 

[castleri]

I think I would try to get in the night before if you can do that with the airline and either get an offsite hotel and then check in early on the day you are currently scheduled to arrive or stay at whatever Disney hotel you can get for a reasonable rate. I doubt you will be able to get another night at BCV for that time frame but you can borrow points to make a reservation if you can get one. maybe you could get one at SSR or OKW for the one night. Good luck

 

[TLSnell1981]

If I had to book a hotel, for the night before, it would definintey be at WDW!! Hey, that's a good excuse to arrive a day early!!

 

[RobDoc]

If airtran cancelled your original flight, they will book you on another without additional charge. Why not take flight 393 leaving Indy at 1:16pm and getting into MCO at 3:24pm. It's a $59 fare one-way and will still get you to your resort before 5pm. The other non-stop flights are 7:00am , 5:11pm, 6:48pm and 7:51pm. I don't know what time your original flight was, but there shoud still be something close. We fly airtran a lot and have always been able to find some reasonable flight when ours have been cancelled or changed. you can even look at some of the one-stop flights as a possibility.

Good luck!

 

[ssawka]

This is more for others reading this thread rather than for the OP, but if you book on AirTran, assume that your flights will change. We bought tickets in May of last year for this past January, and our flight was changed 4 times before we actually left. What's worse is that you may start out booking direct flights only to find that your direct flight is canceled and you'll have to do a layover. Now it is true that this could happen with any airline, but Airtran is notorious for this. If you can live with that, then you can get good deals on Airtran.

 

[thepops]

We had airtran change us quite a bit as well. And if you watch carefully, the flight they cancelled you off of, may mysteriously show back up (at higher fares) a few weeks later! :confused

 

[pixiedust23]

I have had nothing, but trouble with AirTran. As a teacher I am not able to be flexible with my flight times, as I can't get out of work early and have vacations when all the kids are off from school. I have finally decided that I would rather spend an extra $100 to be on a different airline, than deal with the shenanogens I know will ensue with AirTran.

Over the past 3 years, they have changed all 6 flights I took with them all at least twice, from the time I booked until the time I went on vacation. It's just unacceptable in my mind.

Also they don't have a field crew at Daytona, so if you have an issue with your airplane you will need to wait until someone can drive out from Orlando to fix your problem.

 

[TLSnell1981]

This happened to me with Frontier Airlines. The kicker? I found out...quite by accident. They didn't notify me. I called to ask why and was told, "they didn't have to until it was less than 30 days from departure." Nice. We were flying down for spring break. That would have been an easy, cheap ticket to get at the last minute.

 

[2binak]

OP - I would call DVC and see about gettign a room the night before. You should be able to borrow the points that you banked.

This happened to me with Frontier Airlines. The kicker? I found out...quite by accident. They didn't notify me. I called to ask why and was told, "they didn't have to until it was less than 30 days from departure." Nice. We were flying down for spring break. That would have been an easy, cheap ticket to get at the last minute.

We've had nothing but great luck flying JetBlue - until we booked our trip for this Nov. They've changed our flights 3 times since May and only notified me once. I check every 2 weeks now and plan to check every week for a month leading up to our trip and every day in the final week before we leave.

 

[tecodis]

This is more for others reading this thread rather than for the OP, but if you book on AirTran, assume that your flights will change. We bought tickets in May of last year for this past January, and our flight was changed 4 times before we actually left. What's worse is that you may start out booking direct flights only to find that your direct flight is canceled and you'll have to do a layover. Now it is true that this could happen with any airline, but Airtran is notorious for this. If you can live with that, then you can get good deals on Airtran.

I can say that Delta also messes around with the schedules alot. Around 35-45 days out is when they seem to finalize their flight schedules. Last week I traveled on Delta to NYC, booked in April. During that time the flights changed at least 7 times, including several miss-connects where the connecting flight left before the first flight arrived. During July it changed every week! Granted, they change it at no cost if I don't like the new flights but it was a complete hassle to babysit the itinerary!

Personally, I love Allegiant Air. They never change the schedule once it's published for booking.