Great Price, Good Experience
Written: Apr 25 '06
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Pricing; in-flight service
Cons: Slow check-in; seat assignments; mis-handling of gate-checked infant car seat
The Bottom Line: Recommend the ATL-SFB service as inexpensive alternative to AirTran/Delta for last minute bookers or for travellers to the NE side of Orlando.
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| cruffin's Full Review: Pan American Airways |
In March, I was looking for flights from Atlanta to Orlando but had left it too late to get a reasonable fare on AirTran or Delta. I found Pan Am Clipper's web site (www.flypanam.com) and decided to give their service to Orlando Sanford airport a try. The fare was about $90 one-way.
The reservation process was straightforward enough and customer service reps were quickly accessible via the 1-800 number. One had to check in at the ticketing/check-in area as there was no way to get a boarding pass on-line in advance. Even though there were relatively few people in line, the line moved at a snail's pace. Pan Am Clipper provides flights for charter companies, and it seemed like most of the passengers in line were charter passengers continuing to an international destination. The manual process for handling the international passengers seemed to be the cause for the very slow pace.
I had been told on the phone that seating was unassigned - and followed the first-come first-served model of Southwest. When I got to the airport, I learned that the charter passengers had been assigned seats. When I boarded, I was concerned that I would be bumped from the good seat I initially sat in to a worse seat, if when a charter passenger boarded and claimed the seat. A friendly flight attendant, however, showed me to a good empty seat - and let me know that the seat next to me would also remain empty (a real bonus as I was traveling with a my unticketed 1 year old).
The plane was adequately clean and comfortable, and the flight took off and landed on time. I had gate checked an infant car seat, and, after waiting for it to appear on the jetway for 15 minutes, I was told that it had accidentally been sent through to baggage claim.
Sanford airport is a nice, small, modern airport. One can move through it far quicker than Orlando. Also, I was able to reserve a great rate on a rental car from the airport (I had been worried that rates would be far worse than at MCO due to lower volume of flights/passengers).
All-in-all, I would recommend Pan Am Clipper's ATL-SFB service as an inexpensive alternative to AirTran and Delta's service for last minute bookers - or for travellers who would rather fly in to the NE side of Orlando. Hopefully, their slow check-in processes and inconsistent seat assignment policies are just growing pains that will be fixed soon (the ATL-SFB service had only been operating for about a month when I tried it).
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
cruffin
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Reviews written: 2
Trusted by: 0 members
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