Interjet Review

InterJet must have stolen a page right out of JetBlue's playbook, because they're sure standing the Mexican airline industry on its collective tailfins with their aggressive business practice of cutting fares while at the same time providing a HIGH QUALITY flight experience.

It's no secret that what makes JetBlue such an interesting young airline is not its low fares. Anybody can mark down a price. What makes them interesting is that they do it while IMPROVING the flight experience with a coach class that's got more legroom than the planes flown by any of the major competitors, by providing comfortable seats with leather upholstery, by assigning seats, and by providing extensive entertainment options without annoying add-on charges.

Southwest may get credit for being a low-fare carrier, but next to JetBlue, their flight experience is terrible.

Well, in Mexico, it's InterJet that gives you the JetBlue experience without the cutthroat cutbacks that other low-fare carriers inflict on you. InterJet rocks!

Think E-Biz

Most of the new startup carriers emphasize their web site as the single way to do business. InterJet is no exception. Visit www.interjet.com.mx to get started with flight schedules and fares. Check out the route map. They fly to all of the major cities in Mexico (with Mexico City served via nearby Toluca), and they have viable connections to a lot of the touristy destinations where folks like you or me might want to go.

The website is clean, well organized, and easy to use. In fact, it's even better than JetBlue's because you can actually BOOK every viable itinerary, whereas JetBlue has some strange flyer-hostile business rules in place that block certain flight combinations from being booked as a single ticket. InterJet's site is cleaner and better. The only thing my fellow gringos might find tough to handle is that I don't see an option to switch the site to English displays. They don't do any flights outside Mexico, so it's reasonable for them to have a Spanish-only web presence (just a little bit of a challenge for the real bargain hunting traveler). Also, remember that all prices on the site are in pesos, so if you see a fare like $590 and you're wondering what I'm smoking to recommend this airline as a low-fare carrier, remember that the conversion factor is roughly 10-to-1 so that means your fare is roughly US$59.

The only real gotcha about booking any airfares in Mexico is that airport taxes have gotten so darn high that you'd think the prices were the ones on drugs. A $59 fare might well pack another $40-50 in taxes and fees, so "low fare" sometimes becomes a relative term (just like "incest"). Still, the deals are there, and they're real.

I booked a flight from Monterrey to Guadalajara. The fare was 357 pesos with 200 pesos in taxes --- that works out to about US$55 one way. Considering that a first-class ticket is US$60 on Omnibus de Mexico and involves a 13-hour time investment, I'd say that the InterJet fare was quite the deal.

Think Service

U.S. airlines regularly gouge passengers with horrific fees for changing a reservation. It's insane! With E-tickets the norm, and websites and self-serve airport kiosks the primary ways for customers to do business, it essentially costs the airline ZERO to accomodate their customers. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, U.S. airlines suck.

At InterJet, you can make a change to your reservation right up until 2 hours before flight time, and even if you have the customer service agents in the airport help you, the change fee is a reasonable $9. Wow! InterJet is a fair-dealing company with customer-friendly policies and FAIR prices. Holy moley! Do these guys hire HUMANS instead of MINDLESS AUTOMATONS?!?!?!

Think Comfortable Flights

Stealing yet another page out JetBlue's playbook, every plane in InterJet's fleet is a brand new Airbus A320. No old planes here!

Not only that, but they're also outfitted with comfortable leather seats throughout the cabin. Plenty of leg room too. Even the interior color scheme looks like JetBlue's. The only real difference is that you don't get those nifty seatback entertainment screens on an InterJet flight, but that's okay with me since the flights are generally a lot shorter. The longest InterJet flight is 90 minutes, with most of them coming in closer to 60 minutes.

The flight is smooth and quiet, the flight attendants are young and totally hot, and they serve complimentary drinks during even short hop flights.

Bottom Line

InterJet totally rocks. Their fares are dirt cheap, their planes are comfortable and brand new, they have a service-oriented ethic, and they have a convenient schedule that can get me just about anywhere in Mexico I want to go.

If I have one complaint about InterJet, it's that they don't give me much to complain about. They ROCK!