To preface this trip report, I'd like to say that I paid $15 to reserve seats in each direction, and paid $227 for the 2nd ticket for my girlfriend to go with me. I had recieved a free ticket because of a major customer service snafu and horrible experience overall last January. Lost bags, stuck in ATL, nobody knew where the hotel shuttles picked up, flights cancelled out of TPA, etc. It took me over 1/2 hour to convince FL to let me use this ticket on January 10th-15th because they claimed that I had to travel before Jan 5, 08. As had been told 2 weeks prior was that I had to 'purchase' by January 5th. After they relented and agreed, they told me January 10th was blacked out... once again, they quickly relented and allowed me I could use them that day.

MKE-MCO
January 10, 2008
FL #675
Dept: 1:48p (local)
Arrv: 5:22p
Seats: 17A, 17C

We boarded the flight and pushed back right on time. 17C's XM radio wasin't working, not suprising as usually about 1/2 of the time I've flown FL they have been inop. They tell you that you can read about how great it is in their inflight magazine, because you know we wouldn't actually want to listen to it. The flight was completely full. We took off from MKE on runway 07R. The flight was pretty smooth and uneventful. Drinks were served nearly immediately after takeoff once we were through the light cloud cover and on our way south. Flight lasted 2 more hours of dry throat time down to Orlando. Would have been nice had the drinks been served later towards the middle of the flight or a second round been passed out within the last hour. We landed on 35R in a parrallel approach with a Southwest 737. Overall an okay flight other than being told not to use the XM (assuming i was hooked up to an IPod) during landing because the F/A only saw my headphones and not the little ones they give out.

MCO-MKE
January 15, 2008
FL #676
Dept: 5:59p (local)
Arrv: 7:44p
Seats 17A, 17C

I could tell problems would arise with this flight as soon as the plane taxiied to our gate assigned and nobody there to greet it from FL. When boarding was called, my pass said "ZONE 5" and my girlfriends had "ZONE 6", and they wouldn't let us board together because we had different confirmation numbers. Once boarded, we found both XM radios in our seats to be inop, as well as my seatback would not stay upright. I said something to the cabin crew who seemed not to care other that to say they'd write it up. There were 10-15 other seats on our side of the plane that we could have been moved to if they 'cared', but after being yelled at twice for not putting up my seatback during landing at MKE, I asked what part of my seatback being broken didn't they get the first time? No answer. Once again we were told to read about how great XM radio is and how its available on every flight, yet there were 10-15 complaints that I could hear in our area that it wasn't working for other people. So much for having it, if you're not going to keep it in workable condition. About 20 minutes from MKE the F/A turned on ALL the lights in the cabin and left them on until shortly before landing. A lot of people were looking out at the lights of Chicago when this happened and hurt a lot of peoples eyes. Also the pressurization was apparently being adjusted during the landing sequences as I'm a very experienced flyer and have never had such horrible headaches and the feeling of my eyes about to pop out of my head as during that landing. Miraculously, after touching down at MKE, my XM radio began working.... just in time.

Overall after the horrible experience last year and the inattentiveness of the F/A's this year, I'll stick with AA, UA, NW, or YX from now on. I doubt FL could pay me $1000/leg to fly on them again.

CHECK IN: C-
BOARDING: D
XM RADIO: F
F/A's: D
CUSTOMER SERVICE: D
1-888-AIR-TRAN: D
OVERALL: D