I booked a flight on Spirit Airlines about a week ago out of Orlando to Las Vegas for tomorrow, August 5th. This morning, the 4th, I get a call from Spirit Airlines telling me that my flight was canceled and I needed to call an 800 number to make a new reservation. That's sucks, but hey, that's the reality of the god awful air industry here in the States (Dear Uncle Sam, please stop giving them money and let the free market work. K, thx, bye.)

I call the number, go through all the motions hitting the menu items, and then get a message telling me that due to high volume, I should use SpiritAir.com instead. The 800# then hangs up on me. I call back, hitting 0 to talk to an operator, same message, hangs up on me. I try all the appropriate sounding options on their voice mail, and get hung up on every single time. Thanks, Spirit Air! What went from a somewhat understandable situation (relativity is a bitch), now has me pissy. Finally, I try "book new flight" to speak to a spirit airlines sales agent. Sure enough, that one (the option where they take the money) works fine. I get entered into the normal "too many calls" queue and patiently wait my turn.

After a long and annoying wait, a young lady answers the phone and starts trying to help me figure out what's up. There's no reason for canceling the flight, there's only one other option -- putting me in Vegas 5 hours past my intended arrival.. The reason I chose Spirit Airlines to begin with. To add to my frustration, it's a flight that I purposely paid more money to avoid (bigger layover, late time, etc). There's no upgrades or anything like that, no option for a partner airline or a transfer, no real attempt at anything. Here's the kicker. They make you pay extra to bring a bag. They refused to even refund this $5 each way fee, not even for one the of ways.

So, instead of losing $5 on a customer who has every right to be angry, I'll write this blog post and tell all my traveling buddies to add Spirit Airlines to their growing list of airlines to avoid. If Google works their magic like they usually do, at least one of the 4,931 daily searches for "Spirit Airlines" will turn up this result and save someone the headache (and hopefully end up costing Spirit Airlines $6 or more). Yay, cluetrain! Seriously, if you are considering saving money by flying Spirit Air, pay the extra $20 and use someone else. It's not worth it.

Spirit Airlines can't be counted on, they'll nickel and dime you on things like baggage (seriously.. WTF), and they will make zero effort what so ever to rectify any situation that they create. I'm totally expecting tomorrow to be a complete debacle, and will arrive at the airport extra early. Possibly with boxing gloves (and sadly, $5 for my baggage)

Will someone, anyone, please fix air travel?

August 5th, 2007 Update
I arrived at MCO a couple hours early to find a really approachable ticket counter (no line, etc). The young lady at the desk was very helpful. I explained to her that every two years, some college buddies and I get together for a reunion of sorts, and Spirit Airlines was causing me to miss the big first-night get together. She offered to get me a free round trip travel voucher. After going into the back for a few minutes, she returned to inform me that she could not in fact give me a voucher, because the problem originated in Detroit, not Orlando (cue Celly's told-you-so laughter here). She suggested that I try calling the corporate number (where this all started), and trying to complain again (as my buddy Mike suggested to me on Facebook).

Breezing through security (Orlando's got it down to a Science), I found myself with a couple hours to kill. Evidently, Spirit Airlines phone system is just as slammed packed at noon on Sunday as it is on a late Saturday afternoon -- I was hung up on with the "We're to busy to give a shit" message once again. I knew that'd be the case, I just felt obligated to try ;). Speaking with a sales agent, I was unable to get a round trip voucher, but I was able to get a $100 credit towards my next Spirit Airlines flight from one of the supervisors. Total time of call was about 35 minutes, once you skip all the fake options and go straight for the sales desk.

$100 means that if I have am ever forced to fly Spirit, I can check 5 bags on the day of my flight! ($20/bag day of, $10 in advance). I say that in jest, but I am pleased that if you do complain repeatedly and persistently, they will at least give in somewhere.

A number of people sent me some links involving Spirit's consistently bad customer service though, and I figure I'll share them here:
There seems to be a decent amount searching around, but.. whatever. Also, Randall points out that JetBlue and Virgin already fixed air travel... I guess that rules out my hope for Steve Job's iPlane.

Anyway, I'm about to board my flight for Vegas by way of Atlantic City. Talk about an itinerary of sin... I wonder if we refuel at a New Orleans whore house? hah! If Spirit loses my baggage, and I have to buy clothes, will I have to pay for the required new baggage on the way home? So many questions.. At least I have $100 in baggage credits now.

August 9th, 2007 Update
Thanks to all the folks who left comments sharing their experiences with Spirit. I arrived back this morning after a brutal red eye (all vegas redeyes are). I wanted to chime in and mention my experience with the cramped seating some people have mentioned.

If you are over, I donno, 5'10 (I'm about 6 or 6'1), you will feel like a giant on this airline. The seat in front of me came up to about my armpit area. The seats have a pretty cool neck-holder-rest thing that adjusts and confirms like a neck pillow. The problem I ran into was that I couldn't get it to move up, so it just dug into my upper back the whole time. It was a red eye though, so I pretty much slept the whole time anyway. If you are expecting a pillow and or blanket though, bring one yourself, as Spirit doesn't have any (..about right).

Summary / Conclusion

Yes, I did buy the cheapest ticket. No, I did not save any money (add in the baggage fees, and it was actually more expensive). Yes, I got burnt and lost a day of my trip. Yes, I will avoid Spirit Airlines as much as I humanly can. Yes, I will continue to share my experience with friends through conversations, both online and off. If you've had a bad encounter with this airline, I encourage you to join our conversation down in the comments or on your own blog. The only way to improve a business's customer service is to complain about it. Viva la internet.

Response to a Comment (August 8th, 2007)
"Welcome to the real world. Things don't always go how you want them to go. You bought the cheapest possible airline tickets to Vegas and then you threw a tantrum when your flight got cancelled. You're lucky they called you the day before and gave you a chance to make other plans. Instead you chose to pout and whine. You are a vindictive spoiled child. Grow up and get over yourself." - Mike
(response posted here, as well as email)

I hope that I'm not coming off as throwing a tantrum, but rather venting on my own personal blog about some awful customer service that I've encountered with a particular airline. I post my thoughts and experiences to my personal blog to enhance communication with my friends and family. I have no idea who you are, so I'm assuming you fall outside of those two categories. Welcome to the conversation, anyhow. Ain't the internet grand?

In 2006, I lived out of a suit case for 9 out of 12 months. So far, 2007 has been significantly better, as I'm looking at about 2, maybe 3 months tops. In all of this travel, I've encountered all sorts of situations. In every single case, it's the same -- if the event is caused by 'God' (aka weather), the airline is off the hook. With Spirit Airlines, this does not seem to be the case (an argument that countless customer reviews and complaints support). Every airline I've experienced a problem with as offered some sort of token to the customer, without them asking for it, when the fault is squarely on them. It took me close to 2 hours total to receive any admission of guilt.

The domestic airline industry here in the states has encountered some interesting business model changes lately. I recommend reading Daniel Gross's latest column in Newsweek, which I ironically read in the airport last night while my plane was delayed. These changes have made air travel a complete debacle for many people, while largely increasing company profits. As consumers, we've begun to expect these headaches and accept them as part of the deal -- this is incorrect. Folks need to complain and engage in word of mouth if we expect the experience to improve. In the particular case of Spirit Airlines, I'd suggest that you read the comments on this blog post as well other customer reviews on the internet.

Thanks for the understanding and for sharing your thoughts. Oh, and thanks for the name calling. Dick.

Best,

Alex

(conversation continues a tad in the comments below)

UPDATE: Spirit Airlines Employee Responds

A reader identifying themselves as "Tonya" working out of Detroit has offered her perspective in the situation. It's enlightening to hear about Spirit's inability to handle call volume from the other side. On the same token, she explains some of the things that are out of their control.

Keep up the stories and the comments -- we're now third on Google when searching for Spirit Airlines. It's only a matter of time before someone on the corporate level checks in to see what their policies are doing to their airline.

UPDATE: Spirit CEO Sends Rude E-mail to a Commenter (August 20th, 2007)

Ben Baldanza, CEO of Spirit, needs to learn how to use the "Reply to All" button. The level of arrogance in his response to a customer's complaint is mind blowing.

UPDATE: I've had a lot of people ask me how much I paid for my Spirit Airline ticket. I paid $320 and change for a round trip fare. Factor in the baggage fees, and it was about even with another airline. I picked Spirit because of the preferable flight schedule. Yes, they do offer $9 fares, but it would seem as if you have to live in Guam to have access to them.

UPDATE: CEO's email gaffe has caused this to go national. "Let him tell the world how bad we are." -- I think we can handle that one, Ben. Here's a rant I wrote with all my random thoughts of various comments for anyone interested.
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