Service first at Allegiant Air
Posted by BrianNote to self: don’t fly Allegiant Air.
More than 20 passengers watched in disbelief this morning as a trip to Walt Disney World, a romantic cruise, scuba diving lessons, spring break plans and a 55th wedding anniversary celebration vanished when their Allegiant Air flight flew away without them at Huntsville International Airport.
They stood in line at the Allegiant Air gate, tickets to Fort Lauderdale in hand, not really sure at first what had happened.
…
Tyri Squyres, a spokeswoman for Allegiant Air, said by phone that about 25 passengers were checked in but did not get to board.
“We do view this as an operational error on our part,” she said.
…
Allegiant Air arranged for the passengers to take a 6:30 p.m. flight to Fort Lauderdale, instead of their original 8:45 a.m. flight, spokeswoman Squyres said, adding that each passenger would receive a $75 voucher for travel and free drinks aboard the flight.
Free drinks and $75. That should make it all better.
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March 14th, 2008 at 7:19 am
I flew Allegiant Air from HSV to Orlando to see the Shuttle launch this week. I bought the tickets a few hours before the flight left the ground. $69 down and $29 back was a good price for me.
However, they tacked on about $50 worth of taxes and fees. And, they were going to charge me $10 a bag.
Still, a round trip non-stop flight for $150 to Orlando at the last minute is still a good deal. The airport we flew into was not Orlando, but a smaller HSV-sized airport which made it really easy to get in and out of.
At the ticket counter in HSV, there seemed to be some confusion. The three of us that were flying together never got a ticket printed. Instead, we got a hand written notice that says we were on the flight. The notices were written by the two reps behind the counter. There was no unique identifier on the tickets.
To me, it seems very unsecure. I could recreate that “ticket” and walk right through any airport security. I could probably get on board any Allegiant plane until the flight attendants do the head count.
I was surprised at the less-than-formal ticket that we were given.
Flying back from Orlando we had another problem. It was taking 5-10 minutes for one ticket to print out. The ticket agents were jumping from computer to computer trying to find one that would work. Because of this, 8 of us were very late getting on the plane. Actually we weren’t late. We arrived about 45 minutes before boarding time. But, when we arrived at the counter, our flight was on its “final call”. Allegiant was on “final call” about 40 minutes before the plane was to take off.
When we got on the airplane I heard the captain say that “we’re waiting on a few people that were having trouble with security”, referring to a few people that were behind us.
This was not true. The problem was with Allegiant Air’s ticketing system.
To be fair, the ticket agent said that Allegiant was rolling out a new ticketing system that day. I suspect this is why other Allegiant flights had troubles.
It did appear that Allegiant needed more ticket agents at both airports.
However, I will certainly fly Allegiant again. The value to too good to pass up.
March 25th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
I agree that this airline is too good to pass up but I was one of the 20 people that got left at Huntsville airport and I was there in plenty of time to board the flight. There only had one lady working the ticket counter and the computer wasn’t working properly. I also on a previous allegiant air flight had recieved a hand written airline ticket. After the 8:45 AM flight flew off and left us, we boarded another allegiant air flight that had been diverted to pick up the 20 passengers at 6:00 PM. Allegiant air had announced to them that we got stuck in security and portrayed it to be our fault. Of course we were all mad because we were stuck at the airport all day waiting and then they wanted to put the blame on us. I wil still fly them because it’s cheap but don’t expect to get good results if you need customer service.
April 5th, 2008 at 8:50 am
I flew with my family from Chattanooga on 3-25-08 to Orlando. I booked the entire vacation(flight and hotel)thru Allegiant. Everything was great flight, weather, hotel until our return flight on 3-29-08. We arrived at the Sanford airport at 6:56am due to Spring break traffic on the toll road. The two singles in front of us were allowed to board. The lady at the ticket counter looked at my itenerary, called someone on a two way radio and we were told we couldn’t board. I’m traveling with three females ages 43 to 9 my family. Imagine the turmoil. The trip home cost me $300 for the rental car and expenses plus 12 hours of my life. I have yet to receive any type of communication from Allegiant. email me if you have had similar experience.