Flybe or not Flybe? That is the question.

Has anyone flown Flybe? Yays, nays, tips, tricks or insights?

Sure, Flybe is fine.  Why, are you worried about something in particular?

I looked at the destination map which seems to have conflicting information with what's offered on the reservation screen. I want to fly from Newcastle to La Rochelle, France, a route that's not on the route map. But when I put in Newcastle, La Rochelle was one of my destination options, and I was able to choose a flight to La Rochelle (via Southhampton.) Just seemed a bit odd to me, and generally I want to make sure they're on the up and up. Plus I see they charge for baggage, so wondering if anyone has any tips/tricks in that respect.

DH and I flew Flybe from Frankfurt to Manchester on Boxing Day.  They are very typical of other low-cost carriers; separate charges for everything from seat assignments, baggage, fees and taxes, and using a credit card to pay for tickets.  My only tip for that is to pack light and small if you don't want to be charged - but it has to be very small and light for cabin baggage (see their website for details).  I would say they were significantly nicer to fly than Ryanair, but on par with Jet2.

I did see over the weekend that many smaller airports are losing routes due to the contracting economy and drop in travel.  If you are connecting in Southhampton, though, then I can see how they wouldn't consider Newcastle-La Rochelle as a single route (which has implications for your piecemeal charges, since they typically charge baggage fees per segment)

Flybe..."Fly-maybe" as we call them...because they can't seem to be on time, or actually land you at your chosen airport... ugghh....

They're definitely not a low cost airline!!!  

If you're even 1 kilo over your baggage, they'll charge you £10/kilo extra- and they don't give you a break...

Don't even get me started on the nightmare I had with them at Christmas...  

If you have to connect with them in a UK airport, flying in from the EU, in my experience, you have to go through customs, leave the security zone and start check in all over again and go through security in the UK airport.  This has happened to me a few times at different airports...

Their taxes are ridiculous- two different airlines to the exact same airports will cost you more on flybe even at the same base fare!

If you have a connection, they will charge each route seperately- not as 1 route... 

They're strict on the carry on baggage allowances...

I don't have much choice sometimes but to fly them... I wish I did!!!  

Wow Laura, I never had any problems with them at all!  I only flew internally though.  Used to take them from Edinburgh to Southampton.  I found it fine and even used the lounge which was nice.  I think they had free internet in there.  Anyway sorry to hear you've had such a nightmare with them!

I agree with exjerseygirl - definitely better than Ryanair.  Much better in my opinion!

Has anyone flown Flybe? Yays, nays, tips, tricks or insights?

We have used Flybe to go to Toulouse and Perpignan. We enjoyed the flights far more than airlines such as easyJet. Nice little Dash-80 planes, not so much regimentation.

Anyway sorry to hear you've had such a nightmare with them!

No worries-
You don't mind these things when you fly low cost- i.e- when it actually costs low cost- but to charge you £350 to fly to Gatwick, then charge you to use your credit card, charge you for baggage, restrict your carry-on size, etc- it really cheeses you off! 

I don't really have much choice though when it comes to flights, without driving all the way to Edinburgh/Glasgow/Aberdeen - so you learn to live with it.

However, I should say, I do like their planes, very quiet!  And since no one is ever on them, I don't usually have to sit next to anyone. 

Bad time to mention to some then that the reason of our move to the UK was my husband changing jobs from Horizon Air in the US to FlyBe in the UK!   

I flew Flybe for business from Edinburgh to Southampton and had no complaints. It was on time and comfortable. But then again, it was only an hour trip.

BF's parents are going on a cruise in a two weeks time, going from here straight to Southampton for a cruise they're going on and it was cancelled by Flybe on them today (I imagine not enough tickets sold to be worth their while from here!!).  Now they have to do from here to Manchester to Gatwick and then faff about on the train to get over there if they want to fly with Flybe.  They'd rather drive the 8-9 hours to get there than fly Flybe! 

Bad time to mention to some then that the reason of our move to the UK was my husband changing jobs from Horizon Air in the US to FlyBe in the UK!  

Well I'm sure they're a fine company to work for and it will all work out. As you can see, most people have had little issues-   some of us just aren't so lucky...   

We have NO choice about using them. They are the only ppl we can use!

We had to fly back with them from being in the USA in Nov and we were 42lbs over limit and they wanted to charge us 10gbp's for each lb we were overweight!

we went around the corner to a world wide shipping company and shipped it from Gatwick to the IOM for 75.00 gbps!

We have NO choice about using them. They are the only ppl we can use!

We had to fly back with them from being in the USA in Nov and we were 42lbs over limit and they wanted to charge us 10gbp's for each lb we were overweight!

we went around the corner to a world wide shipping company and shipped it from Gatwick to the IOM for 75.00 gbps!

Yeap, I paid a TON of extra money to them at Christmas. Paid more in the excess bag fare than the flight and it wasn't that cheap. And I didn't even have heavy bags- especially considering I was spending 2.5 weeks abroad and it was full of Christmas gifts. 

That was a great plan you executed!