I don’t fly that often, and when I do, I pick the cheapest airline possible. Maybe I’m just lucky but I’ve personally never had budget airlines screw me over all that much. The delays and getting upcharged for everything is expected, but I’ve never actually been in a situation where a flight got cancelled and they just left me to sleep in the terminal overnight or anything like that, so I never really considered paying more for one of the “normal” airlines.
I’m curious as to what economy is like on a non-budget airline. They can be over double the cost of a budget airline ticket so do you actually get double the service? Anyone who has a lot of experience flying both want to weigh in on how they compare?
I can tell you about the last time I flew Spirit airlines. I was on vacation in a place with really nice weather. Back home also had really nice weather, and it was basically clear skies all the way in between.
However, there was a hurricane in Florida.
Spirit canceled my return flight about 12 hours in advance, and booked me on a flight for the next day. Never mind that my hotel reservation ended in a few hours, so I didn’t have a place to stay or a rental car planned for the extra day. They said they didn’t have to offer me anything because it was “weather related”, on account of the hurricane that was literally more than a thousand miles away from either my departure or arrival airports.
Would a different airline have handled it differently? I don’t know. I’ve had other airlines do a better job rerouting me after a cancellation, but the conditions were different. Regardless, I’ll not be giving Spirit any more of my money.