My DW and I flew Spirit from ORD to MCO in early January. We were supposed to depart ORD about 10:30 am. Although the day started out with some freezing rain, this did not delay any flights out of ORD by significant amounts. Our flight, however, did not actually depart until 6:30 pm (8 hours late) due to a delay in the arriving flight (from Fr. Myers, FL, so there was not a weather problem at the other end). Delays happen, but the customer service end of the wait at ORD was the really bad part. We could get no information. In fact, since Spirit flies out of the international terminal at ORD, there are no TV screens showing arrivals in the departure areas (parties meeting arriving international passengers cannot go into the departure area, so the TV with this information are only located in the arrivals hall where people meet their arriving party after they clear customs, etc.). The "customer service" agents would not tell us anything about the flight delay. Finally about 1 pm, they offered us lunch coupons ($7/person, not too bad; you can actually get a sandwich and drink for that at O'Hare). After lunch, about 2 pm, I again inquired regarding the situation. By this time, I had figured out from the Spirit all-route schedule booklet that the arriving flight must be coming from Ft. Myers. The agent indicated that the incoming flight was "in the air", clearly not the truth, and would not even confirm where this flight was coming from. About 4 pm they announced that the flight would now depart at 5 pm. At 5 pm they announced that we would starting boarding the flight at 5:45 pm. In fact, the incoming flight actually arrived about 5:30 pm, we were boarded about 6, and actually departed about 6:30 pm.
On the plus side, our return flight was pretty close to on-time, departing only about 15 minutes late.
Finally, we were told verbally that we would get a $50 per person credit on our next round trip flight with Spirit. When I asked for a voucher, I was told to just call the 800-number reservation line and indicate that we had been on this particular flight number on the particular day in question and they would verify it on the computer and give us the credit. At the end of February, I was attempting to book a flight back to Orlando for mid-July and was checking rates for the various airlines. With the promised discount, Spirit would be lowest in price, based on the fares coming up on their web site. I called them to book, all ready to provide the information I had been told to provide. The ticket agent told me that was impossible! If I were to get such a discount, I would need a printed confirmation or voucher. So, I ended up booking ATA out of Midway instead. I suspect that the Spirit customer service agent at ORD just fed us this line to keep us quiet during the very lengthy delay with no real information.
Ralph
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It all worked out, I got a $138 on US Air Metrojet, out of LGA which is better for me (it would have cost me the difference just to get the family to Newark.) Anyway, it worked out for me, but I learned I need to not take these extra-low-fares for granted! I appreciate everyone's comments--there probably is no airline everyone will agree on.
