Holiday Air Travel Tips

(MONEY TALKS NEWS) – If the holiday season has you traveling over the river and through the woods, you should really be paying attention, or you could be paying for things some airlines don’t want to tell you.

By far, the busiest time of year is Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s. With so much increased activity at the airports, you might find travel a bit taxing.

Traveling by air sure hasn’t become any easier over the years. Missed flights, crowds and fees can turn any holiday trip into a real nightmare.

“You’re going to have a lot of people a lot of aircraft, a lot of congestion,” said Jay Rollins, retired American Airlines Captain.

Rollins, now a travel expert and writer, has spent over 3 decades in the cockpit and passenger seat. He has some advice on dealing with possible problems this holiday season. A nonstop flight is convenient and ideal, but don’t always count on it being layover free.

“It could be a marketing problem, it could be an aircraft problem, a weather problem,” Rollins tells Money Talks News.

If you find your once non-stop now comes with a few stops you didn’t expect, you can ask to be put on another non-stop flight, even with another airline. And if there’s not one available? You can ask for a refund, if the new flight gets you in more than two hours later than the old one.

Talk about tipping the scales, travel experts says many airline scales are inaccurate. Simple solution: weigh your bags at home, write down that number and compare it to the scales at the airport. If they’re different, ask for a re-weigh on another scale.

Don’t expect this overhead announcement, “Our Captain just had a heart attack, and now I’m flying the plane,” this is a scenario that actually happened. Think passengers had a clue? Nope.

Captain Rollins says, “If telling the passenger something they can’t do anything about anyway, that will disrupt that flight, they won’t give you that information.” The FAA says it’s up to the airline crew to decide whether to tell you that something has gone wrong. Captain Jay says it’s more about safety. With H1N1 threats everywhere you turn, perhaps air quality is a concern. If you’re immune system is compromised, then you might be. You can wear a mask over your face, buy a personal air purifier, or just look up.

It’s called an “eyeball vent” and Captain Rollins says, “Open that nozzle fully, even if you don’t point it directly in your face.” Air coming from that vent is straight off the intake of the aircraft and isn’t recirculated.