Great news for travelers - there is a new airline in Bellingham! Hopefully this won’t be a repeat of the whole Western airlines fiasco. Skybus is a new airlineout of Columbus, Ohio whose mission is to offer the lowest fares out there. Period.

So, I went on their site and read all of the fine print and this is what I learnt:

• They really do have very low fares!
• All of their flights go via Columbus, OH. Cities that they service include Bellingham, San Francisco, LA, Kansas City, Boston, Richmond VA, Greenboro NC and Ft. Lauderdale.
• They offer 10 seats on each plane for $10. Apparently it is first come, first serve. However, when I went on their site today, other than a few days at the end of May, the next time a $10 fare was available was in mid-December!!!!! Did it really book up that quickly? I sent them an email asking about this.
• Flights leave once a day from Bellingham in the morning, and arrive around 4pm local time in Columbus. Return flights from Columbus leave there at 7am and arrive back in Bellingham at 8:30am. The bad part about this is that if you are going on to another city, you will have to fly back to Columbus the night before and get a hotel in order to make the early flight back to Bellingham.

So, the big question - how do they make it so cheap? Here is what I found.

• There is no assigned seating. The earlier you check in, the earlier you can get on the plane (like Southwest). However, for an extra $10 per person, per flight, you can buy your way into the first group.
• There is no in flight entertainment. But they will sell you cards or puzzles.
• You are not allowed to bring any food on board with you. However, they will gladly sell you drinks, snacks and light meals on the flight. My guess is the prices of these snacks will be super inflated. I’ve got to say, that I really don’t agree with this one. It’s one thing to not include a meal. But to not allow people to bring their own food on board? You’ve got them trapped for a 5 hour flight! Not very fair at all.
• You can have a pillow and a blanket, but you will have to buy it. But hey, you get to keep it.
• They don’t have a phone number. If you have a problem, you have to use their online help section.
• They don’t have any check-in agents. You do it all yourself.
• Your carry-on items are free. Checked luggage is $5 per bag for the first two, and $50 per bag after that.
• The gate attendant will only arrive about 5 minutes before you start boarding.
• They only fly into smaller airports which offer lower overhead costs.

The website also mentioned that they would make their money by booking vacations. They have tons of options for hotels and packages…..however they don’t fly to all of those cities which is a bit odd.

So, basically if you are looking for a super cheap no frills flight, this one will work! But just remember, it will really be no frills!