See our Advertiser Disclosure here.
Since I usually book my flights many months in advance, I’ve gotten in the habit of “baby-sitting” our reservations to make sure our times and seats haven’t changed. Just a few weeks ago, I reviewed our spring break flights, and everything appeared in order. I was excited to see many empty seats on the flight. I was crossing my fingers that the flight would stay fairly empty, even though my family is taking other precautions to ward off Covid-19 on our trip.
Well, my celebration was short-lived. Last weekend, I received emails from two airlines about upcoming trips with flight changes that aren’t favorable to me.
Flight Changes
The first email I received was about our spring break trip to Florida. Apparently, American Airlines also noticed that there were a lot of empty seats, and our flight was canceled. They moved us to a later flight that is now 100% full. We now have to rearrange our transportation to the dock and our private water shuttle to the island. We’re losing 1/2 a day of our vacation, which I guess isn’t a huge deal, but just a bit of a hassle.
Just hours after that first email, I received an email from Sun Country about our summer trip to Mexico. Again, the airline canceled both of our flights. Our flight to Cancun now leaves at 6:00 a.m. That means we will need to wake up at 3:00 a.m. I’m dreading it! We will all feel like zombies on our first day. Our return flight is now earlier in the day, which makes us lose a 1/2 day at the resort.
If we don’t like the flight changes, we can either:
- Work with the airlines on other flight dates and times
- Cancel our flights for a refund (for Sun Country, this only works if the changes are more than 6 hours)
We booked our AA flights using BA Avios, so we could cancel and get our miles refunded. However, AA is the only airline that flies direct to our destination. So, we will deal with the changes.
Our flights to Cancun on Sun Country haven’t changed more than 6 hours, so we’re stuck with them. Of course, I’m not even sure if we will end up going to Mexico because of the required quarantine and just the state of the pandemic in general. Unfortunately, these flights were originally scheduled for 2020, and we were able to move them to 2021. I’m doubtful that Sun Country will let us postpone them again.
The Point
My point in writing this isn’t just to complain about my flight changes (although writing about it is somewhat cathartic). I want to remind you to continue to babysit your flight reservations to watch for schedule changes and seat changes. The earlier you catch the seat changes, the better chance you have to rearrange and get your family seated together.
I also want to warn you that your flights might not be as empty as you think due to airlines continuing to cancel low-selling flights. It makes sense from a profitability standpoint, but full flights are definitely not what we all prefer right now.
Are you seeing the same things happening on your upcoming flights?
CLICK HERE TO VIEW VARIOUS CREDIT CARDS AND AVAILABLE SIGN-UP BONUSES
Opinions expressed here are author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post.
Author: Nancy
Nancy lives near Dallas, Texas, with her husband and three kids. Her favorite vacations include the beach, cruising and everything Disney.
Sorry Nancy. That has to be incredibly frustrating. I’m concerned about this for our summer trip.
@projectx I’m hoping that virus numbers will be way down by summer, heck I’m even hoping they’re significantly down for our spring break flight.
We’ve flown twice since November on “full” flights on Delta. The planes weren’t actually full. They just blocked seats out on the seat map for some semblance of social distancing. Perhaps that’s just Delta but maybe all the airlines are doing that. I will say the social distancing “set up” seems a bit arbitrary but at least they’re trying. For instance on one flight I was sitting next to a guy from a different family but it was a 2×2 seating arrangement instead of 3×3 so there can be that kind of thing.
Honestly the chance of catching COVID on the plane is pretty low. Everyone has to wear a mask, the air is constantly circulated with new air and they have high grade air purifiers installed now. They pass out sanitizing wipes and changed the boarding and deplaning processes so people aren’t congregating as much.
Unfortunately we will not be flying as a family for awhile due to the fact that our baby just turned 2, and there’s zero chance she will wear a mask right now! Bummer
I think that Delta is only one that leaves middle seats open. Otherwise you may need to sit right next to someone who can remove their mask to eat and drink. But the social distancing doesn’t seem to apply to the airlines. However, I really don’t see that much social distancing now anywhere. I guess people are relying on the masks to keep them safe or they’re sick of the rules.
Yeah, unfortunately AA isn’t blocking the middle seats. 🙁 But, we will be wearing KN95 masks and it’s a short flight.
…and that’s why we’re not flying AA this summer. Or United. Delta on the outbound, Southwest on the return. Sure, they could open up those middle seats by then (only committed to the end of March so far) but at lease they’re ahead of the curve.