AirTran Airways

Been on their 1 800 number for 20 minutes; no one picks up. I'm done.

February 2014

Flew Southwest from CT to Chicago and that flight was uneventful and fine. Flew TransAir from Chicago to Cancun. Seats were much more roomy, flight crew was fantastic. They were very pleasant and helpful. Everything was very smooth. Flew TransAir from Cancun to Atlanta GA and then onto CT. Both those flights were also excellent. Again the seats are more roomy than SouthWest and the flight crew was very helpful and pleasant. The flight from Cancun to GA the flight attendant gave us lots of helpful info about customs and the process. Will definitely fly TransAir in the future. Nice job to all their flight attendants and the pilots. Thanks

In short I will never fly with them again. The horrible customer service made me use horrendous language and ruined an entire day of my life. Had to spend 16 hours at a connecting airport because of the ridiculous people at the desk.

WILL NEVER FLY AIRTRAN AGAIN EVER!!! My father few AirTran yesterday from San Antonio with 35 lbs. of Alaskan Salmon that we caught there before I got out of the military and moved from there. Total we spent probably about $2000 in the fishing trip. His flight to Atlanta was delayed due to weather but his flight he took instead got him into DC only an hour later than he would have arrived. He asked at the gate if his bags were transferred to this plane and was assured by the agent at the gate that they were. Once my dad got into DC his bags were not there! The next morning I called them and they said that they did have the bags and were going to deliver them within 4-6 hours. We are now past that time and no delivery yet. I was also informed that per the airline's policy they do not cover perishable goods. Now here we are with likely spoiled salmon to feed my family and the airline does not want to claim responsibility for this nor reimburse us anything we spent in catching or maintaining this fish. I am SOOOOO irritated with this airline and the fact that when I spoke on the phone with them they seemed to have no care at all. They only kept saying how they weren't responsible for our baggage. I bet if their paychecks were on that flight and expired that day they would be wanting somebody to be responsible and reimburse them! So frustrated!!!

I had a very bad experience yesterday on a flight I booked through Southwest. In all fairness it was not a Southwest flight, but an Airtran flight. SWA has bought out Airtran, but appaprently Aritran employees are not aware of who they work for now. I am concerned that this takeover is diminishing the things that have made SWA my choice for domestic flights for the past 30 years. I have registered a formal complaint with SWA and have faith that they will respond, but I WILL NOT under any circumstances ever set foot on another Aritran aricraft. SWA needs to be aware that some Airtran emplyees seem to be very hostile and undermining toward their new owner.

I would like to thank AirTran for causing me great stress during my flight home for Christmas this morning to see my family. I was bumped off my flight and the reasons given to me were 1) I booked my flight through a third party. 2) I did not check in until the day of my flight 3) AirTran is "authorized" to sell 12 additional tickets than there are seats. I explained to the AirTran employee that I felt this was unfair because I paid for my ticket, received confirmation, checked in an hour before my flight and arrived at the gate before boarding. As a paying customer, (and I paid A LOT more for this flight than it was worth) I did everything the exact way I was supposed to, yet I still did not have a seat. I feel this is incredibly irresponsible for AirTran especially around the holidays when people have limited time off work to try to fly across the country to see their families. What AirTran doesn't know is how important my flight home was today. My sister just returned to America from a 9 month deployment in Afghanistan and today we were flying home at the same time to be reunited with our family. I did not care about the two free round trip tickets they were trying to offer me for my "inconvenience". A thousand free round trip tickets would not have been worth me giving up my seat today. My story has a happy ending, but not because anyone at AirTran was willing to help, but because of a kind hearted woman that gave up her seat so I could fly home for my sisters arrival. I urge AirTran to change their policy when it comes to overbooking flights, because to some people, it's more than just a flight.

I booked my flight for my girlfriend and myself in early November From BWI to Puerto Rico. The return flight BWI closed airport. I did not mind that the airplane did not go as we could not but air tran agents in puerto rico took 2 hours to finally tell us that the next flight was Thursday night. Please keep in mind that our flight was to go out Monday at 450 pm. If you plan on flying this airline for a savings of maybe 100.00 then think again about the old saying, you get what you pay for. All major carriers if flight is canceled will go to other airlines to help get you out, NOT AIR TRAN. You are stuck with them unless you know your rights. You can go to another airline to get out but you must pay the difference, again major carriers like Delta who I fly the most will exchange your ticket fo you to get home with another airline. Onbe other note and that is with Air Tran they hit you for booking advanced seating even if middle seat, if your bag is .05 over weight then you will pay the 20 some dollars unless you take the .05 pounds and place it in another check on bag. This air line will not stay in business. I made, before this fight, another flight to PR. I am going to give them the ticket and take the loss of 325.00 as I cannot stand this airline. We did book with US air the next day and got out only paying an additional 60.00 per person with no bag fee so less 25.00 and no advanced seat fee or 12.00 a seat savings. I do not care about the charge for peanuts but this is the most unprofessional cattle car that I have flown.

I WAS AT THE GATE TEN MINUTES PRIOR. THE TICKET AGENT LEFT THE GATE PROCEEDED TO NOTIFY THE PILOT TWICE. AS I AND 5 OTHER GUESTS WERE EAGERLY AWAITING TO GET ON THE FLIGHT THE TICKET AGENT BEGAN WHISPERING HERE ARE THE OTHER FIVE AND MADE A STATEMENT THAT WE MISSED OUR FLIGHT. NOT TO MENTION THAT THE AIRPLANE DID NOT MOVE FOR ANOTHER 20 MINUTES. THE TICKET AGENT THEN PROCEEDED TO LEAVE THE AREA, WHEN I CONTACTED CUSTOMER SERVICE THEY WERE RUDE AND I WAS TOLD TO FIND A SUPERVISOR. NEEDLESS TO SAY IM ABOUT 12 HOURS LATE GETTING HOME. THEY DO NOT CARE AND CUSTOMER SERVICE SUCKS. STAY AWAY FROM THEM.

RUDE flight attendants. Psy for early boarding if you have carry on. We watched passagners board the plane with back packs and carry on bags. They were allowed to put both in over heard. I were told only 1 carry on person. We were told there was no room for our carry bag and it would have to be checked in. When questioned about why there was no room we were told it's a privlege to be able to have carry on. No I do not feel this is true.. Maybe a pillow or a blanket is a privlege but to me not a carry on. At the price of airline tickets this is not a privlege.... So if fly airtrans pay the 15.00 person to board early. lol oh you and if you have a lay over you have to pay the 15.00 again. so thats an extra $30.00... Do some shopping around before you book.

AirTran WILL leave you behind, and WILL kick you off a flight due to the incompetence of the people they hire. Let me explain: I took a flight out from Boston, ended up in the TSA security line for 45 minutes before I got completely through, and that included having to cut 3/4ths of the line when I realized I was cutting it pretty close to departure time. Showed up at the gate 3 minutes late; they left without me. They NEVER paged me, they NEVER sent someone to see if I was stuck in security. They also departed BEFORE their departure time (I screenshot the flight information at the end of the night from my phone as proof). Their staff had no interest in helping me upon realizing my flight left without me, and were genuinely uninterested in my situation. They offered no help, and basically told me, "too bad". They wouldn't even look at me when they talked to me - they were typing fast away at their computers. I left a BBB complaint about the incident and they are one of only two companies I've had to leave a complaint about that had no interest in making things right. They dismissed all my grievances to the matter and blamed me, under a guise of "we shut the doors 10 minutes before departure, as it's important that we get our passengers in the air as soon as we can and prevent delays." Let me now explain to you how this is a complete farce. On the day of my rescheduled flights, on my connecting flight a flight attendant managed to get her seat wet from rain (I've flown plenty where it's rained and never heard of this happening). After we pulled out from the gate, we sit for a couple minutes and we hear the captain announce the aforementioned issue, and that they'd have to pull back in so they got "replace the seat". I think to myself, "Replace the seat? Why don't they just put plastic trash bags over it, or towels or something?" What they ended up meaning by that is that they were going to get an AirTran rep to board the plane and tell, not ask - but tell, a coach passenger they had to deboard the plane and be put on stand by. Then they told, not ask - told, a first class passenger they had to move back to the now empty coach seat. And the now vacant first class seat is where the flight attendent ended up sitting for the flight. In the end we took off about an hour late. So, they quite clearly don't value their customers, nor their scheduled arrival times/departure times, as much as they lead you to believe - their flight crew being comfortable after they screwed their own seat up was more important than 1) paging and checking on checked in, but non-boarded, passengers, 2) their customers taking their paid flight without worry of being told to get off the plane. If you make a complaint against them, they WILL lie about the details, and do what they can to not own up to their own mistakes. They claimed in their response to my BBB complaint that they confirmed that they did page me - lies - I listened intently out of worry that I was starting to cut it close and it never happened. Heard plenty of other airlines paging other passengers to other flights. I rejected their response, made a rebuttal, they then reiterated what they said the first time for the most part, and closed the case out with no consequence. Don't make the same mistake I did by flying with these guys. They gave me a bad experience the first time I flew with them 4 years ago, gave them another chance because the flight was that much cheaper, and I regret it. I lost more money in the day of work I lost in comparison to what I saved choosing them to fly with. Also keep in mind Southwest Airlines owns AirTran, so you may want to consider skipping them as well. You're a number to them. Well, this number is taking his business elsewhere. In fact I just booked a flight for next week and skipped over them despite seeing they had a cheaper flight in to where I was going. Not worth the risk.