US Airways

[sharon lewis]

Has anyone flown with US Airways before? The only was we could afford to go at Easter was to fly with them through Ocean-Florida. We are going from Manchester to Philly then onto Orlando International. I thought the deal was great as there are 6 of us going and we have 2 weeks in a villa nr Disney and a week in Clearwater at the Holiday Inn Sunspree. It cost £999 each for adults and just over £500 for my 4 yr old. Has anyone else done a similar thing?

 

[paulh]

like most scheduled flights would recomend you take your first days and first nights cloths in your cary on bags as if bags lost as sometimes they do at least you got cloths to wear we learnt the hard way and had no toothbrushes or swimsuits for typhon lagoon hope i am not scaring you but us airways wre in problems with luggage a few years ago but most airlines are like this we fly scheduled most times and only had problem once just take care
Paulh

 

[sharon lewis]

We flew United to Vegas last year changing at Chicago and found it saved us over £1000 each rather than flying Virgin so we are all for saving our pennies by flying with not so popular airlines and using our money for souveniers instead! Plus I have heard immigration at Orlando is horrendous which we avoid as we go thro in Philly

 

[juliebro]

We have flown with US Airways to Orlando via Philly from Manchester four times - and would choose to fly with them every time. Never had a problem with our luggage. Flights were all fine. Occasionally Philly can be hit by some bad weather at Easter time and we have had the odd delay on the onward flights to Orlando - but nothing major. One problem you might encounter is that the US check-in staff don't always manage to put family groups together on the flights. We have heard a number of unhappy families complaining about this at Philly airport.

The in-flight entertainment is very good. personal seat-back TVs which operate like personal DVD players.

All in all - I would recommend them. Any other questions, let me know. Their website has lots of useful infromation and gives details of films shown etc.

Julie

 

[juliebro]

And also.....

Philly airport isn't too bad to spend a couple of hours in. Just be wary if you have less than 2 hours between flights. It takes a long time to get through immigration, customs and security and the terminals are huuuge! We ended up running to get our flight.

Julie

 

[catherine]

WE flew with US airways last Dec. we flew from Manchester to Philly and then onto Las Vegas. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but to be truthful it was horrendous! All of the flights were late! We missed our outbound connection at Philly and none of the US staff were helpful, in fact they were surly and one was downright rude!! We were staying with my DH's family for Christmas and NY, and while we were there we heard lots of reports about US Airways screwing up the flights, and losing lots of luggage. In fact there was going to be an inquiry into what had happened! I would imagine that this probabaly was a result of the holiday period, and hopefully now they have got their act together! I hope that their flights to Florida are better, and that you don't encounter any problems!

 

[paulh]

like any company you hear good thing and bad things
Paulh

 

[kev kendall]

Sorry - we flew US on our first trip - same route - stop over at Philly. It was AWFUL. The plane was dirty - staff rude - they forgot our babies food and refused to find anything for him (have you tried to keep a 18month old happy with no food!!!) Same happened on return flight!!!! Never, ever again!!!!!

Philly airport is actually quite nice!!!

 

[Miffy2003]

Welcome to the Dis sharon!

Sounds like you have a lovely trip planned!

 

[Merylj]

We have flown with them twice now, in fact I just sent them an email thanking them for the great service they offered DH last week.
On the international leg the planes have seat back TV`s which really put in the journey. Food was fine, however I thought they could come round with more drinks.
The staff were fine, they always seem to be more mature on the American carriers.
On the internal legs I think the planes are well past their sell by date, very tatty, but the journey was only about 2 1/2 hours so I could live with that.
The flight from Philly to Man was only 6 hour 10 mins - not bad at all!
I`d fly with them again.

 

[sharon lewis]

We have already pre-booked our seats and we have 5 hours before the flight from Philly so hopefully that will be enough time for immigration!! When we flew to Vegas with United the hostess gave us all pencils to fill in the green cards and when we got to the desk at immigration they went mad as they were 'official government documents' and should be in pen! So we had to fill them in again whilst they called others to the desk.

 

[Laurafoster]

lol, so may people fill those out wrong! They should come with "idiots guide to...visa waiver" lol. I know everytime we have been atleast 1 person in our party has to redo one!

 

[gbrchill]

lol, so may people fill those out wrong! They should come with "idiots guide to...visa waiver" lol. I know everytime we have been atleast 1 person in our party has to redo one!

I've filled the I94/W in more times than I can remember. I always have to fight the temptation to put the data of birth on the wrong line (above the label and not below where it should be). It does help if you can fill it in before you travel.

Chris.

 

[Halo]

Hi Sharon,

I flew US Airways a week or so ago (from London Gatwick to Fort Myers, via Charlotte). I would have no hesitation in flying them again. The transatlantic flight is in new Airbus A330-300 planes (same on Man-PHL route). These are great. In economy the seating is 2-4-2 (rather than 3-3-3) so that families can sit together in the centre and couples do not have strangers at the side. Each seat has state of the art personal video screens with Video-on-Demand systems, so you can choose what to watch and when (I saw War of the Worlds, Mr & Mrs Smith, Wedding Crashers & Madagascar, for example).

Service was ok but not as good as BA or Virgin, but ticket was £250+ cheaper. In the US they are regarded as a budget airline, similar to Ryanair, so the US fleet tends to be older - and the flight from PHL to MCO is only 2 hrs 20 or so, so it is bearable. Unlike Ryanair seats are allocated.

Soft drinks are free on all flights but you have to pay for alcohol $5 or £3 a drink. Oh and you have to pay for your headset too if you don't take your own, but the cost £5 or so buys the headset so you can take it with you afterwards. The internal flights are shorthaul so there is no entertainment or food but there is a drink service. Buy something to eat at the airport instead. On the transatlantic you will get a simple choice of meal - pasta or chicken.

I would certainly use them again.

 

[Cochise]

I was most impressed with US when we flew with them in October. The A330 is a truly brilliant plane, the inflight is great with pause rewind etc. They have about 5 films for you and one childrens (Madagascar when we flew) also there are documentries for us and aprox 99 minute each for Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon and Disney Channel exerpts made up of their best shows (Scooby Doo/Spongebob/Keenan and Kel etc.) The pitch is 34 in almost all of the aircraft which was fine for the leggier of our family (me)
The headset is $5 or £3. I cant agree they are regarded as in the "Ryan Air" category, yes they are a Low Cost Carrier but they are full service. Lets all hope Ryan Air dont go long haul eh!

Food was Chicken in a very nice sauce both ways with mash potato and veg. There are allsorts of other bits and bobs with the meal, i would rate it very highly. They also have 2 or 3 set drink/snacks runs throughout the flights

Go to the US Airways site in the UK (usairways.co.uk) and get the telephone number from there. Ring them and pre book your seats for free and order kids meals for free too (These always arrived before the rest of the planes meals)
But watch for internal flight changes, ours were changed a couple of times so make sure you get the seats you want re-booked.

The cabin staff are mature people, they are nice but efficient in an American way which possibly catches UK people out sometimes thinking they are rude. lease also bear in mind that they have gone through a torrid time over the last few years and have lost pension rights etc- Would you love your job as much?
Philadelphia has a new terminal specially built for long haul connecting pax and due to this it is excellent with loads of shops/bars and food courts. It is also quite a size. We were through and waiting to board on the second flight in an hour which was good. Look for your destination Orlando in alpha order and not time order. There is a presentation on the screen back tv's how to negotiate the airport.

Another tip is when you check in at MAN make sure you have an official letter from Ocean-Florida with your itenary as we only has an e-mail from the US Airways site so the ITS bloke was all over us saying we werent showing up at PHL-Nervous time!

The internal flight was good legroom, better than the Virgin 747's at 32in so they are comfortable. They have the snack service which was pretzels and a soft drink. There is enough at Philly to keep the kids occupied for 3hours so the final couple of hours may be a chore but not unreasonable.

Anything else dont hesitate to ask.

 

[disneyholic family]

In the US they are regarded as a budget airline, similar to Ryanair, so the US fleet tends to be older -

US Airways isn't really a budget airline.....at least not in the way Spirit and JetBlue are.....US Airways has been around forever, just with different names......it started out as a regional airline....and then merged with a bunch of other regional airlines....

its name right before it was changed to USAir (later changed to US Airways) was Allegheny Airlines (one of the main regionals that formed the company)......

they changed their name to USAir to reflect the expansion of their routes...
such a shame...
i loved the name Allegheny Airlines.....it lent itself so well to what we all called it -- <B>All Agony Airlines </B>......oh yes indeed....

but that name is now appropriate for most of the domestic service of most of the US airline companies...