Hi babes!
I wish there was a way that I could start off this post super happy, but there is no way that can happen. It is my mission to make sure that I keep my viewers informed to the best of my knowledge, and let you know up front what has happened in my life. Like any blogger or anything, these are just MY experiences. However, as a consumer, watching/reading reviews and seeing how other people react, were treated etc can help us make a better decision in what we do in everyday life. So here is my honest opinion about my experience with Allegiant Air.
If you live in California, you have most likely heard about Allegiant Air. It is a very cheap airline, mostly servicing California with cheap flights to Las Vegas. That is exactly where I was going! Exactly last Thursday, I was set to fly out to Las Vegas for my vacation. I live about 8 hours driving time away from Vegas, and it is honestly a TERRIBLE drive. It is usually scorching, and smells like cow butt for majority of the trip. So, I was thinking to myself....BEEN THERE. DONE THAT. Let's just fly. My friend and I have had this trip planned for over a year, we were going to see One Direction both nights they were performing at Mandalay Bay. So we booked our flight all the way back in January, the start of 2013! That is so long ago! A few months ago, we were notified that our flight departure time had changed and that we needed to confirm the new time. I didn't really think anything of this, we still had a few months until our actual trip and I just thought I didn't really have a say in the matter. So, whatever. It happened. I soon forgot about it. Then, the trip started approaching. In preparation for the trip, I signed myself up for alerts to be sent to my iPhone, just in case there was another change in the flight. Finally, August 1 was here! I was BEYOND excited for this trip. Obviously I was going to see my 5 loves of One Direction, and I was also going to be hanging out with my other directioner friends. I was anxious and patiently waiting to get ready to leave to the airport. Our flight had been changed to leave about 5:15pm and so I literally was waiting ALL DAY. Around 1:30pm, I got a text saying the the departure time had now changed to 6:35pm. I was literally just about to leave for the airport, this text came just in time. I was already irritated that the plane was leaving so late, so when I got this message I was getting more irritated. So, I called my friend and told her we needed to wait a little bit longer to head to the airport. Then, as we were about to leave to head to the airport for our flight, I got another text saying that the new departure time wasn't until 9:35pm and we wouldn't be landing until 10:45pm! I came absolutely unglued. My friends and I had booked tickets to see Thunder from Down Under that night at 11pm. Our flight originally was supposed to get in to Vegas at about 6:30pm, more than enough time to get to the show. But now, there would be no way we could get to the show on time. We had bought them pretty early too, so we had front row seats basically! Now just imagine 2 anxious girls getting this news that not only their flight is delayed AGAIN, but now they are missing the show that they had ALREADY PAID. I was freaking out. Ya, I was mad about the entire situation, but mostly because I knew it would pretty much be impossible to get a refund on the tickets for the show. I know everyone can relate to the fact that they don't want their money just going down the toilet for nothing! I work hard for my money, as does everyone else. I was livid. As we were freaking out, my friends boyfriend said we should go to the airport and see what the heck was going on. We agreed, we needed someone to talk to. We had been trying to call Allegiant on the phone and could not get through to a person to talk to. We drive about 35 minutes to the airport only to be greeted by a man who worked for Allegiant (poor guy) and he proceeded to tell us that our flight was canceled. Ya you read that right. So I had been getting updates on my phone saying that the flight was DELAYED, not CANCELED. Why was it so hard for them to tell us that it was in fact canceled. We could have left hours ago! Yet instead, we were twirling our thumbs for the entire day. His reason for the cancelation was that our plane was stuck in Boise and they couldn't repair the plane. He gave us two options, 1) take the next flight tomorrow and 2) call this number on his little cut out piece of paper and get a refund. Just great. What a mess. I was surprised how easy it was to get the refund, however that didn't change the fact that we needed to get 8 hours away to our destination. There was absolutely no way that I was going to risk flying and having them mess up my plans that I had had for over a year. I have had my One Direction concert tickets for over a year and there was no way that I was going to let them jerk me around some more. So, we drove in my car. I have no idea how, but we made it there in 6 hours flat. We arrived in Vegas at 12:30am. On the way driving, I came to this conclusion: I will never spend a penny at Allegiant Air again. But I did figure this out. If they had just been honest and let us know what was going on sooner, I probably would keep my business with them. Instead, they kept their consumer in the dark, wasting an entire day of my vacation, potentially ruining my vacation. I am not the only person that has had a bad experience with this airline either, both my roommate/friend and my parents had bad experiences in the past 2 weeks. Both had delays in their departure, nothing but warm air circulation in the vents and mediocre service. Oh ya, here's the kicker: I didn't get a cancelation message until after 9pm. So if we hadn't of gone to the airport and if we were just listening to the text alerts, we wouldn't have known until less than 30 mins before our flight was supposed to take off. SMH.
So what is the moral of the story? It's basically you get what you pay for. This airline is a very cheap option for people to make short flights but my time was worth more than the $166 round trip flight that was refunded to me. I lost out on a experience of a show with 2 of my girlfriends, I lost out on time spending with my friends that I never get to see, and I was stressed out to no end majority of the day and night. I can't guarantee that no other airline could do this to you, but at least a more reputable airline might have more consideration and or options for you so you're not stuck and backed into a corner, helpless.
Hopefully this review you can learn something from. If anything, I hope it just makes you all aware of the experience I had with Allegiant Air. I will be doing a post about my concert experiences as well as on my YouTube channel (beaimplified). I wish you all a wonderful evening and I appreciate anyone who takes the time to read what I have to say!
Loves,
Aimee xx
