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Post by capeokw56 on Sept 19, 2024 15:34:07 GMT -5
So.. a couple of years ago Southwest left us high and dry by cancelling our flight to MCO the evening before we were supposed to fly and just left us to fend for ourselves. I was furious with SWA and swore off of them. We have driven to WDW for the last few trips but I was able to get flights for this November on Breeze. Through the summer they had changed our flights twice but by only 20 minutes or so. No big deal until yesterday. DW and I both got texts and emails from Breeze saying that they had changed our flights again.Only this time it wasn't a minor change. Our flight to MCO was changed from 6am to 8pm which would now get us to MCO after 11pm so an entire day lost.Then our return to PVD was changed from noon on the 22nd to 3pm on the 21st, so another entire day lost. They gave me the option to accept the changes, take a credit, or get a refund. I wanted the refund but what a hassle, they were unable to resolve my schedule changes, whatever that means. And, you can't call them, you can only text. Eventually I got it sorted out and hopefully we'll get our money back in a week or two. On the bright side I was able to get flights on Southwest that worked for us and we saved $570! Maybe we're back with Southwest...  |
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Post by helenabear on Sept 19, 2024 15:43:09 GMT -5
What a pain in the neck. I hope SW does better for you!
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Post by brp on Sept 19, 2024 16:08:08 GMT -5
One-off cases are often not the best to use for judgement, IME. A friend just wrote about a delightful experience on Breeze. Also a single case. But I'd never make a decision based on one (or even a small number) of case(s). Doing that means that one will never fly.
Schedule changes happen all the time, to all airlines. This does not seem a sound basis for choosing an airline since they all do it.
Cheers.
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Post by thecrusher on Sept 19, 2024 16:49:03 GMT -5
We’ve flown Breeze twice. R/t from JAX to LAS and JAX to ISP. Both times without a hitch. My cousin flew from HFD to JAX and had an issue. The Breeze aircraft had a mechanical problem. The crew drove from Hartford to Providence and flew an aircraft to Hartford as a replacement. They were delayed a few hours, but Breeze made it happen. I wouldn’t schedule a flight on Breeze if I had to make a cruise or get somewhere in a timely manner due to the number of jets that they have on hand. But it can be a good choice if the numbers work. Air travel today is a crap shoot.
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Post by baymaxfan on Sept 19, 2024 17:29:50 GMT -5
If you fly enough, you will have flights canceled and long delays. If I swore off every airline who canceled my flight or had a long delay due to a staffing or maintenance issue, I would have no airline left to fly. It is frustrating, but part of flying. The biggest advantage of flying with the big guys (American, United, Delta) is they have many more flights to accommodate cancelations and delays. Also, in the worst-case scenario, they have reciprocation with each other in case they need to put you on another carrier.
I've never flown Breeze, but I have flown Southwest a number of time. Southwest is not my favorite, but because of open seating not because of worse customer service or unusual problems with delays/cancelations.
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Post by Adelard of Bath on Sept 19, 2024 18:02:26 GMT -5
We pretty much always are flying Delta, because our airport is their hub. One time they changed our flight time by like 90 minutes. I logged in on their web page, my flight had a "cancel" button next to it because of the change. It then talked about vouchers but there was a "refund" button there. I clicked it and they refunded my credit card. Lemon squeezy.
I feel like too many of our plans are laid around flights and times for me to use an airline that's gonna be like "oh well here's one on a different day <shrug>". At least for us.
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Post by brp on Sept 20, 2024 9:40:01 GMT -5
We pretty much always are flying Delta, because our airport is their hub. One time they changed our flight time by like 90 minutes. I logged in on their web page, my flight had a "cancel" button next to it because of the change. It then talked about vouchers but there was a "refund" button there. I clicked it and they refunded my credit card. Lemon squeezy. I feel like too many of our plans are laid around flights and times for me to use an airline that's gonna be like "oh well here's one on a different day <shrug>". At least for us. This is why we fly with a major airline (AA, in our case), as baymaxfan suggests. They have options. Also, the larger airlines can make better arrangements.
An example: We were scheduled to fly AS from SJC to LIH in January. Non-stop. Like 7AM-10AM on the outbound and 1PM- 9PM on the return. Very nice,
Welp, the non-stop went away and we were not on connections through SEA, arriving like 10PM on the outbound and leaving like 11PM on the return. Very different. And this was just reality.
But they did have SJC-HNL return with similar to our original times. Then they agreed to put us on HA (and this was before the merger was even agreed, so still separate airlines) for HNL-LIH return. So, now just a couple hours different overall.
Not sure that the smaller airlines can do this.
Cheers.
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Post by tomandrobin on Sept 20, 2024 9:42:47 GMT -5
Airline flight changes have been the norm since the pandemic. All the airlines are still struggling from so many issues....staff shortages, costs, new plane deliveries, ticketing, etc.
We fly mostly SWA, but do use others when the need arises. For us, SWA is still the best when it comes to trying to keep its customers happy. American is the worse, at least to us, for customer satisfaction.
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Post by brp on Sept 20, 2024 9:47:36 GMT -5
Airline flight changes have been the norm since the pandemic. All the airlines are still struggling from so many issues....staff shortages, costs, new plane deliveries, ticketing, etc. We fly mostly SWA, but do use others when the need arises. For us, SWA is still the best when it comes to trying to keep its customers happy. American is the worse, at least to us, for customer satisfaction. Schedule changes were the norm long before the pandemic. That hasn't helped, to be sure, but they were always around. We take 20+ flights a year and these changes are not new (or worse) since the pandemic. Since that is more recent, it may seem that way, though.
We've had good and bad experiences with just about all airlines. Delta has generally been very good with customer service, even in the face of large weather-induced delays. And we have no status with them, so this is the "regular person" treatment. WN have been quite good as well. AA have been very willing to work with us, but we have status with them, so that's a skewed experience.
Cheers.
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Post by baymaxfan on Sept 20, 2024 9:59:01 GMT -5
Whenever there are last minute changes, I highly recommend you take matters into your own hands. Look at that airline's network (Oneworld, Star Alliance, etc.) and see what shows up on Google flights. When you speak with customer service, you can specifically ask for a route rather than let them find one for you that may or may not work out. Don't forget to look at alternative nearby airports. If there was a seat available and in their network, I've never had customer service not give me the flight I requested.
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Post by bakerworld on Sept 20, 2024 10:03:33 GMT -5
As long as the flights are non-stop we can usually go with the flow but then we've never had a flight take an entire day away.
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Post by brp on Sept 20, 2024 10:14:05 GMT -5
Whenever there are last minute changes, I highly recommend you take matters into your own hands. Look at that airline's network (Oneworld, Star Alliance, etc.) and see what shows up on Google flights. When you speak with customer service, you can specifically ask for a route rather than let them find one for you that may or may not work out. Don't forget to look at alternative nearby airports. If there was a seat available and in their network, I've never had customer service not give me the flight I requested. And, as in the case I listed above, they can move you to non-network airlines. In this case, the connection on HA, who are not a partner.
Their own offer was to put us on a non-stop UA flight out of SFO. UA are not in OneWorld, although I believe that AS do some flight codeshares with them. We wanted the OneWorld credit to AA, so declined the non-stop since the SJC-HNL flights are on AS and can credit to AA.
But your main message here is very important: Go into the conversation with knowledge of what you want to happen and what's available. And don't be afraid to politely ask for a supervisor if the first agent tells you what "can't" be done. In our case, the first agent said that we could not be put on HA since they're not a partner. I asked for a supervisor. The transfer took a while, and the supervisor apologized and told me that she spent some time educating the first agent about how to find and apply the non-partner airlines for the future, and took care of things.
Go into the conversation informed!
As long as the flights are non-stop we can usually go with the flow but then we've never had a flight take an entire day away.
When you take 20+ flights a year, it's gonna happen 
(Actually, just looked at my tracking spreadsheet, and it's more like 35-40 segments a year, not counting any non-OneWorld flights)
Cheers.
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Post by nrspepe on Sept 20, 2024 11:02:32 GMT -5
We have flown Breeze twice. It was great both times. We really enjoy the rows with only 2 seats and extra legroom. But, the standard legroom is just fine.
I did have a few questions and was at first put off by having to text. But, each time they responded quickly and professionally…with all the information I was seeking.
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Post by krisephillips on Sept 20, 2024 13:38:17 GMT -5
Air travel the last year has been really difficult and the most miserable part of our trips. Unfortunately creates misery/stress on the way to vacation and on the return home. We are dealing with the same issue of constant flight time changes, and over the past year, constant LONG delays while we have already checked in for the flight (3-4-5 hr long delays). Its coming to the point I have no idea what time we will arrive or when we will actually get home.
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Post by Hi from RI on Sept 20, 2024 18:02:29 GMT -5
I flew Breeze once, and it was great that was because SWA delayed us 6 HRS!!! We have a one-way ticket with Breeze to MCO in January because the SWA flight was terrible, so we're using both. SWA has changed our November flight twice, and it's not what we wanted it is now at 5:20 AM!!!! The only other flight for the day we get in around 6pm, which stinks. So I was thinking of canceling and going to Breeze, but I was nervous. It seems like they are all becoming less reliable.
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