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Frontier Airlines can’t stay out of the news and that’s not necessarily a good thing. P.T. Barnum once said, “There’s no such thing as bad publicity,” but stories like the one below can only hurt a brand. First of all, two of the three major Frontier Airlines stories that made national and possibly even worldwide headlines recently aren’t really their fault. There was the rat that terrorized Frontier passengers in the Orlando airport and then there was the story about an unruly passenger who had to be dragged off of one of their planes in Florida. Unfortunate, for sure – but not the airline’s fault.
But the story that I think does hurt them and will prevent me (and I’m sure plenty of others) from ever stepping aboard one of their planes, happened back in March when the airline admitted that they pay their agents a “bonus” every time they enforce their outrageous baggage fees.
That’s right. If your carry-on fit in their bag sizer but the gate agents said it didn’t fit and charged you $99, it’s because the agents got a $10 bounty.
RELATED: Flying Spirit Airlines? This is the Bag You Need So You Don’t Get Charged Extra
Infuriating, I know. Traveler @dyanavilla.tv exposed Frontier’s dirty little secret by filming her friend’s flimsy little bag fitting into the bag sizer and the gate agent saying it didn’t actually fit because she had to (lightly) push it down. See for yourself below in the video that has been viewed, at the time of this publishing, by more than 18 million people.
@dyanavilla.tv ?really? #cancelfrontierairlines #frontier #boycott #flying #frontierairlines ♬ original sound – .
Well, another traveler just exposed Frontier Airlines gate agents for doing something similar. TikToker @irinakaulitts1’s story is even more outrageous since she filmed their sales tactics and the agent not only charged her the $99 for her “oversize” bag but refused to let her board and did not refund her for either the extra baggage or her original ticket. See her video below, which she captioned as follows: ” Looking for Frontier Airlines victims who got charged for a personal item $99 which perfectly fits in a gauge with in parameters and against aggressive rude gate agents, especially in Orlando MCO I paid for my personal item. You can see in a video it fitted perfectly. They didn’t board me on the flight because I was recording them. So I lost the flight, money for luggage and 1 day of work. And they won’t refund my money. I am looking Frontier victims for class action lawsuit.”
@irinakaulitts1 Looking for Frontier Airlines victims who got charged for a personal item $99 which perfectly fits in a gauge with in parameters and against aggressive rude gate agents, especially in Orlando MCO I paid for my personal item. You can see in a video it fitted perfectly. They didn’t board me on the flight because I was recording them. So I lost the flight, money for luggage and 1 day of work. And they won’t refund my money. I am looking Frontier victims for class action lawsuit.#frontierairlines#frontierairlinessucks#frontierairlinesreview#frontierairlineswhathappened#orlando#mco#airport#gateagent ♬ original sound – irinakaulitts1
My advice to you is not to fly Frontier Airlines unless you have no problem paying their $99 carry-on fee for a personal item the size of your purse or unless you know your bag will definitely fit in their bag sizer without you giving it even the slightest push. You may also want to consider wearing a Scottevest jacket or other articles of clothing, which can essentially act as a secret third-carry-on by allowing you to carry many personal items onto the plane on your person so that you can use a smaller bag. A men’s jacket like this, for example, has 24 hidden pockets and this women’s jacket has 19 hidden pockets.
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Boy, that will prevent me from flying Frontier until they eliminate that bounty.
That’s highway robbery and naked corporate greed!
Because Frontier is a low cost airline, this practice victimizes flyers who are least able to afford the $99.
I haven’t flown frontier in over 10 years. My last trip with them, I had a round-trip flight from Atlanta to Denver booked. I was seated upfront on frontier and the flight attendant was trying to separate ice cubes in an ice bag by slamming the bag onto the floor in the galley. I could see her doing this. The bag broke. She scooped up the ice cubes and threw them into the bag off of the floor with bare hands. And then when I saw her making the water for the passengers she was using those ice cubes with her bare hands out of that broken bag to fill up cups, and then pour water into the cups, all the while, coughing into her hands from some sort of upper respiratory infection. As we were taxiing for takeoff, I logged in to my Delta account and booked my return on Delta and canceled my frontier flight. I will never fly with them again.
There are SO many reasons to not fly Frontier. ESP as other comment mentioned it is booked by MANY people who do NOT have money and are also might not be travel savvy. I had to book my college age son to Miami because his friends had already booked so I had to put him on same flight. I had seen this info (thank you for posting so others know!) and I warned the kids. And, yep, they tried it with all 4 of them but they were prepared for the scam so they did not have to fork over the $99. BUT they were delayed due to a tire issue by 5 hours. Kept deplaning and boarding just to avoid the water rule. THEN because of the delay as you and I both know by that time the crew would time out AND at busy MIA the slots would disappear…so they cancelled ‘due to weather’. SO I clicked on my Johnny Jet flight info link and saw the REAL reason – yep – traffic. The only WEATHER related that day was way out in Utah. Kids could not get out for TWO DAYS! Missing classes, incurring costs!!! And at that they only flew them back to RHODE ISLAND but the original destination was BOSTON!!!!!! SO…I have all my info and I am going to write to Frontier first and then when they don’t reply (which they won’t) I am going to file a report with the DOT…not for US for for the many others who can’t afford this type of @#$%.
Why not fight fire with fire? Simply offer the agent a crisp 20 dollar bill to let you bring the bag on board without the fee! :-)
Ship your bags with UPS when flying Frontier. Shippo or pirateship have great rates for UPS.
Just had to pay $99 at the Frontier gate in MIA for my sons bookbag. Same personal item sized as Spirit. Never had a problem with it. Fits in the personal item bag checker, SLIGHT push in. Infuriating.