Need quick air travel advice!

[Quantrill]

Have you tried Priceline.com?  You get to name your price.  I was gonna have to spend $400 to go home this weekend by using Orbitz.  I tried priceline and am getting a round trip ticket for $226 (after taxes). 

Just something to consider...

[Russell Kanning]

Hey Russell how'd the debriefing go?

I am not at liberty to comment.

[Russell Kanning]

OK............everybody!..........Back away from your computer...........go out and shoot off a firecracker!.......Hurry!

I am not much into that anymore
Caleb is doing a peace thing in downtown Keene and we will take a hike later today ... hopefully before the rain.

[Tom Sawyer]

Hey Russell how'd the debriefing go?

I am not at liberty to comment.

Those guys at Langley run a tight ship. 

[Russell Kanning]

I cannot say if I was in or near VA or if I was in Georgia helping KB's relative to board a plane with my special ID system

[KurtDaBear]

Most bargain airlines don't show up on the on-line discount ticket sites because they don't want to pay the fees such sites charge.  Southwest is just one.  AirTran, Song, Frontier, etc., should all be accessed from their own sites to check for cheaper fairs.  Also USAir, since its consolidation with AmericaWest, has a much broader schedule into the western and southwestern U.S.

[KBCraig]

Thanks, Spencer!

Like I said, we have little experience with commercial air travel. I love airplanes and love flying, but I've hated every single airline experience I've ever had. TSA didn't even exist the last time I flew commercially.

I am expert in very few things, but I am aware of many things. I'm no expert in air travel, but I'm culturally aware enough, and have generally paid enough attention on this journey through life (storing tidbits in the back of my brain along the way), that the idea of getting off of a scheduled itinerary before it ended, caused some little neural flag-waver to jump up and start waving a red flag.

Here's the breakdown, using the AA examples listed above:

ATL to QHO, via DFW: $182.
ATL to DFW: $286 (the exact same flight, without the second leg).
DFW to QHO: $126 (same flight as the second leg).

Booked separately, the two flights are $402. Using AA's "logic", by not getting on the second flight, you "cost" them either $104 or $220.

No wonder airlines struggle. 

As for Southwest... they sound great. Except they don't flight to or from anywhere I need to go.

[KurtDaBear]

I just checked U.S.Air, and they have a red-eye out of ATL tonight, via their Charlotte hub, into DFW for $201.  Delta, whose hub is ATL, has some direct flights into DFW in the $286 range all day long.  The U.S. Air flight is about 6 hours because of the Charlotte stop, vs. 2 hours for the Delta flights, so the question becomes, "Is your kid's time and comfort worth $22 an hour?" 

Good Luck!

P.S.:  If you haven't flown since before TSA, you won't enjoy flying any more.

[KBCraig]

Thanks, all.

I booked AirTran from Atlanta non-stop to Houston on Saturday. The extra 3 hours on the road are worth the $110 or so I saved.

I wound up using Travelocity. The fare was the same as buying direct from AirTran, and Travelocity already had my info on file, so it was easier.

This is the 2nd time she's flown (first time was two weeks ago, to Atlanta), so she wasn't comfortable changing planes. And none of the connecting flights made any sense, in terms of hassle:cost.

[Caleb]

There's no question that the airlines run a very poor operation.

Essentially, you are paying the higher price to Dallas so that they can subsidize customers to Houston. The reason:  They can't compete in the Houston market from their Dallas terminal.

A smart business would say, "Well, can't be competitive, so we just won't run a Dallas to Houston flight. We'll only run profitable flights."

Not the airlines. Nope, they say, "Hey, we could charge the guy coming in from Atlanta a higher rate, and then use that money to subsidize the Houston flight."

Why not just cancel the Houston flight, and run a reasonably priced Atlanta flight? Because that would make too much sense, and if they did that, they might not have to worry about going bankrupt next year.

But look on the bright side:  at least they have market share.

[KBCraig]

Why not just cancel the Houston flight, and run a reasonably priced Atlanta flight? Because that would make too much sense, and if they did that, they might not have to worry about going bankrupt next year.

But look on the bright side:  at least they have market share.

Yup, thanks to the same ol' story: government interference in the free market. Dallas Love Field is much more accessible and has Southwest flights, but the gummint restricts where they can fly to and from, out of Love Field.

[error]

Yup, thanks to the same ol' story: government interference in the free market. Dallas Love Field is much more accessible and has Southwest flights, but the gummint restricts where they can fly to and from, out of Love Field.

That's what the airlines over at DFW bought and paid their politicians for.