US AIR Good or Bad

Does anyone have anything good to say about US Air to/out of San Juan? All I have read about are horror stories! I am flying with them in 3 weeks and am starting to get really nervous!:confused:

I've never flown US Air into/out of San Juan but I have flown on them many other times. I would rate them the same as any other airline. no better - no worse.

Road Warriors have nicknamed them Useless Air...but that does not mean that you will have a bad experience. Go for it and don't worry. :)

We took them to Jacksonville last year, after the Feb snow storms, and had no problem. They even waited for flights to come in to Charlotte to get to our plane. That was the only delay we had.

Does anyone have anything good to say about US Air to/out of San Juan? All I have read about are horror stories! I am flying with them in 3 weeks and am starting to get really nervous!:confused:

It's too late to worry now!

Just rejoice in the fact that I have probably sucked up ALL of the bad luck USAir can dish out already! :eek:

I think it is called US SCAIR

We used them get from Buffalo to PR for our Adventure cruise last March. It was bad because the weekend we went is when they changed over to Saber computer reservation system to be in sync with the other airlines in the Star Alliance group, they recently joined with and it was a real mess. They were hand writing boarding passes and our luggage came on the next flight even though we were at the airport 2 & 1/2 hours before our flight and we couldn't find out what was going on. Even the following weekend and Monday, when we returned the day after our cruise, there was still problems. Our original flight to PHL was cancelled but the terrrible part was that you could not get any information from their airport representatives on what was going on. They had hundreds or more people in line and were not providing any information.

I have flown with them many time previously for both business and vacation travel with no real problems. The lack of information from them was what really irritated us. We could have easily return the following day with no problems what so ever but didn't hear about them needing volunteers until we had waited over 6 hours at the airport and were finally onboard a flight. By then we were fed up and just wanted to get out of there.

I think it is called US SCAIR

Naw -- It is U. S. SCAREWAYS:D

Flew from San Juan to Buffalo in April, other than a slight delay in both airports the flights were uneventful.

Flew with them Jan. and Mar. this year to SJ. No problems. Using them again on Friday to fly to FLL.

I have flown U.S. Scareways a number of times over the years in / out of Charlotte & Pittsburgh, as they are the dominant carrier in those airports, and had no issues or problems with them.

Michael

We flew with them, completely without incident. Also, the Airbus they flew from Phillie was amazing. Each seat (even in coach) has its own tv, with about a dozen channcels and a dozen movies. I would be happy to take that flight again in an instant.

We flew with them, completely without incident. Also, the Airbus they flew from Phillie was amazing. Each seat (even in coach) has its own tv, with about a dozen channcels and a dozen movies. I would be happy to take that flight again in an instant.

My TV was broken all the way to Rome (fortunately we brought our own portable DVd).

I always liked US Airways and I hear worse things about Jet Blue to PR.

We're flying Continental to Barcelona in a month and while I don't care about the entertainment not working on the way there (I plan to sleep on the overnight flight), I will DIE if it isn't workign on the way home.

We flew with them, completely without incident. Also, the Airbus they flew from Phillie was amazing. Each seat (even in coach) has its own tv, with about a dozen channcels and a dozen movies. I would be happy to take that flight again in an instant.

While the A330 flight is quite a change from the standard 757s, flights 1071 and 1024 (the A330 flights from Philadelphia to SJU) are among the worst on-time performers for US Airways. Routine delays of over 4 hours are pretty regular on these flights; its on-time rating is below 30%.

That's a warning to people relying on this flight on cruise day - don't trust flight 1071! Our Adventure of the Seas cruise apparently had 100+ people arriving on that flight, and they were bussed directly to the terminal, checked in, and the ship left (the flight arrived at 8:30 pm, 6 hours late).

The OP is coming from SC, so should be able to avoid the Philadelphia delays (and baggage hole) that is US Airways in Philly; instead being able to fly through the marginally better Charlotte hub.

Last year I used frequent flier miles on US Airways to fly "free" between Boston and San Juan. As many airlines typically do with these types of tickets, I was only able to book a 1-stop flight on the return. However, much on a whim, I called them the day before my return flight and was able to switch to the nonstop flight back to Boston. This was much more than I anticipated.

Just check your flight times. We had a "scare from US Air" before we left the ground last June. We had booked them months before from Dallas to Phoenix - Phoenix to Lihue, Kauai. They changed the time on our Dallas to Phoenix leg, but didn't bother to notify us. Had we not checked, we would have gotten to Phoenix to find out that our flight to Kauai left an hour before we got there! Fortunately, we happened to check the times about 2 1/2 weeks ahead of time and they were able to book us on a different flight. (We are talking about a group of seven here, so we were really lucky.)

The only other really strange thing was the seating assignments. I had booked all seven of us close together on the flights. We ended up with two groups of two and the other three scattered all over the plane. And, it wasn't just us. All of the groups who had booked together and reserved seats together were scattered. The last ten minutes before take-off on all four legs were devoted to people switching seats so they could get next to their travel companions. It was very odd....

Does anyone have anything good to say about US Air to/out of San Juan? All I have read about are horror stories! I am flying with them in 3 weeks and am starting to get really nervous!:confused:

We flew USAir non stop from ord to san Juan with absolutely NO problems. In fact, about a week after I made res.,I noticed the rate dropped $63 each. I called USAir and they gave us the money in coupons to use on our next flight. We are using those coupons on non stops to Miami for our next cruise. Actually ended up on a United flight which is one of their partners. The flight from Ord to Miami with our coupons cost about 125$ Can't beat that!

The only thing I do is watch for flight departure times, as I do on ANY airline. They can change and sometimes you don't get notifired.

I am flying non stop out of Charlotte so hopefully everything will be okay. Thanks for all of the info. Seems the most trouble comes from those with 1 stop or more.

Have had only one experience with US Air and it was bad. They changed our flight arrangements and never told us about it. It went from a non-stop, 3-hr flight, to a 7-hr trip involving a plane change. They let us cancel without penalty due the material change in the original itinerary, but it took me 3 months, numerous phone calls, numerous emails and a letter to get our refund! Their customer service was terrible.

Sweet Carolina Girl -- I'm also in SC and we flew CLT to SJU a couple of years ago with no problems at all. Just a little insider tip, if you're willing to part with a bit of money (I believe it was $75 each way), you can sometimes upgrade to first class on this flight. You do it at the actual gate and it doesn't matter what class your ticket is booked in. We enjoyed first class both ways on a long flight and had a very nice experience (at least with the air portion). I believe that was 2 years ago.

Unless some things have changed, however, I will warn you that the San Juan airport is not the nicest place and can be VERY crowded on cruise turn around days. Hopefully things have gotten better since we were last there, but DH and I have agreed we'll cruise to San Juan but will NOT fly there.

To the OP.....I am sure you will do fine but it was far from being the best airline I've travelled on within the US in my experience. It was a couple of years but the effects of two bankruptcies and cost cutting to stay alive was quite noticeable. Check-in was far from personable with nothing but a bank of machines with far too few personnel to help you with out being miserable about it. Personnel at the gate were not much better. The flight attendants were professional and probably the best thing about US Airways but the service was bare minimum. I have been on other US carriers before and after that US Airways flight and noted that service standards were just low on this carrier.

That's not to say I never felt US Airways was unsafe. They will get you where you are going. If you want "service" - as hard as its to find anywhere anymore - I'd look elsewhere. As you'll only be taking them for the purpose of catching a cruise and coming home it probably won't be a horrible experience. So don't necessarily say no but just don't expect the flight of a lifetime.

And as a qualifier......the airline has bounced out of bankruptcy and is now a member of the Star Alliance. How it has coped with the changes is anyone's guess. Maybe it has improved since I was on them in 2004.

David

Flew Lax to Charlotte last March on the red eye. This was the worst flight ever. We boarded the flight ands the maintenance crew was working on the "enviromental system" not know what that was I proceeded to my seat. well as soon as that door closed, .... we found out! There was a huge issue with the A/C and also the freezer, no ice, so to make along story short, we flew several hours in a hot cabin with water water and no ice. All I could think about were germs and it was so hot you could not sleep.

 

And as a qualifier......the airline has bounced out of bankruptcy and is now a member of the Star Alliance. How it has coped with the changes is anyone's guess. Maybe it has improved since I was on them in 2004.

 

David

IMHO, US Air is about 2/3 times WORSE than they were pre merger with America West. Even the Arizona Republic (Phoenix main newspaper) refers to them as the "mess in Mesa". They just CAN'T get their act together.

It would be MUCH easier for me to get on a US Air nonstop to JFK, rather than an AA one stopper through Chicago or Dallas. And the price is usually about $100.00 cheaper. I just won't get on their flights-too much chance of some kind of mishap. Doug Parker has made a total mess of two airlines.

I have no particular allegiance to US Air, but find it interesting that we have a 50/50 reaction to the airline's experiences. I'm thinking you'd find the same reactions pretty much on most airlines. We've had "not so great" experiences on United and Delta. ANd of course, Northwest really messed us up this past June. While our 2 or 3 trips on US AIr were problem free. And we always follow our reservation on the airline web site on which ever airline we travel, because even just a little "tweaking" in departure times, can change things later down the road.

Our goal is always to fly non stop when possible. Erases the chance of so many problems.