Original question by @HiddenLayer555@lemmy.ml
I don’t fly that often, and when I do, I pick the cheapest airline possible. Maybe I’m just lucky but I’ve personally never had budget airlines screw me over all that much. The delays and getting upcharged for everything is expected, but I’ve never actually been in a situation where a flight got cancelled and they just left me to sleep in the terminal overnight or anything like that, so I never really considered paying more for one of the “normal” airlines.
I’m curious as to what economy is like on a non-budget airline. They can be over double the cost of a budget airline ticket so do you actually get double the service? Anyone who has a lot of experience flying both want to weigh in on how they compare?
When I traveled enough for work to build up frequent flyer status with a single carrier, yes, it was worth it. I picked which carrier to build status with based on routes available from where I lived and where I traveled most often. And candidate carriers were the larger name-brand ones because they had more routes.
As an individual traveling once or twice a year for vacation now, I just go with what’s inexpensive, meets my schedule, and doesn’t have a shit layover like 30 min or 4+ hours. I don’t travel enough to build up a frequent flyer status, which is where perks with any particular airline kick in.