LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — Passengers of an Allegiant Air flight are still fuming after a travel fiasco left them stranded at the Blue Grass Airport for more than 24 hours.
“It was absolutely horrible. A lot of tears were shed,” said Ramana Wagers, recounting half a dozen delays.
While her son waited more than 24 hours for his flight to leave Lexington, Wagers was waiting for him in Florida, driving from her home to the airport, only to turn back around with every delay.
According to Wagers, the family’s frustrations were met with minimal answers from the airline.
“I was on the phone with Allegiant, it kept saying ‘high call volume,’ for four hours trying to reach out to them to see what was going on,” said Wagers.
An Allegiant spokesperson shared a statement with LEX 18, explaining multiple maintenance issues and a timed-out crew. You can read the full statement here:
Unfortunately, flight 1303, scheduled to depart LEX Monday, bound for SFB, was delayed due to a maintenance issue. However, once the issue was resolved, the crew timed out, meaning they reached the maximum number of hours they are allowed to fly each day, as mandated by the FAA. Because of this, we had to reschedule the flight for the next day. We gave each customer $200 in cash via our electronic payment system so that they could book hotel accommodations overnight. Additionally, for their inconvenience, we gave them meal vouchers and $200 in vouchers to use for future travel. Yesterday, a new plane was sent to operate the flight to Florida. However, an issue with the cabin lighting system was discovered and the flight had to be delayed. A replacement aircraft was flown to LEX and departed to SFB at 10:42 pm local time. Because our passengers' travel plans were further disrupted, we have issued refunds to them for this leg of their journey.
Again, we sincerely apologize for the inconvenience this has caused our passengers. We make every attempt to avoid delays, but always operate with safety as our top priority. Customers affected by this delay have been issued refunds to their original form of payment.
If they have any questions, passengers can reach out to our Customer Care Center via phone, social media, or by utilizing our online chat portal.
The U.S. The Department of Transportation tracks late airline arrivals. They consider airlines to be on time when they arrive within 15 minutes of the scheduled arrival time.
Based on that criteria, Allegiant Air was on time 62% of the time from July 2021 to July 2022. Of the 10 major airlines, Allegiant had the lowest on-time performance over those 12 months.
While Allegiant has promised passengers of flight 1303 refunds, Wagers says it’s too little too late.
“If they would have just given us an answer and better customer service,” said Wagers.
