Is JetBlue getting cagey with prices?

American Airlines has introduced an option to pay through your checking or savings account when buying tickets online. This service is terrific for budget travelers because first, it's free, and second, it encourages you to stop putting things on your credit cards. It's cliché but true: The best way to stay out of excessive debt is to pay now rather than pay later whenever you can, as I've learned myself the hard way. The downside to this new service is that you must book your tickets through AA.com. Be sure to use another search engine to compare fares before you book through AA.com. While AA.com promises to offer you its lowest fares via its own website, another airline may be serving the same route at a lower fare--and you might miss it if you search only on AA.com. AA's payment system looks like a snap to use: You type in your bank routing and account numbers printed on the bottom of your paper check or your savings account withdrawal slip. You also enter your address and driver's license or state-issued ID number. (When purchasing a ticket, just look for the option to pay by electronic check.) Kudos to American for launching this service. Northwest Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and US Airways accept payments by PayPal, which is a similar service that allows for electronic payments to be deducted via your checking account. But you may be hit with charges, depending on how you do these transactions. Check the fine print before you pay.

Thanks to pressure from Florida's Attorney General's office, Carnival Corp. (owner of Carnival Cruises, Holland America, and Princess Cruises) will refund supplemental fuel charges for bookings made before Nov. 7 last year for trips starting Feb. 1, 2008. The fees were $5 per person per day, and the attorney general said that the fees were not properly disclosed at the time of that reservations were made, according to the Associated Press. Erik Torkells first blogged about this last November: "Adding fees after you've paid?!" He also complained about the fees on Fox Business, as noted earlier. EARLIER Royal Caribbean does the right thing.

USA Today has a story today about how the TSA is planning on testing a "kindler, gentler" screening process at Baltimore-Washington International airport. What does that mean? Mauve lighting, soothing music, and smiling employees. (Big sigh.) If the TSA is serious about making people less stressed during the screening process, they should focus on making enforcement consistent from airport to airport. It's not, and it's maddening. And for Pete's sake, please don't play music. I flew Delta last weekend, and I went crazy listening to the music they play while the plane waits for the go-ahead to push away from the gate. The songs weren't bad--it was a fairly modern playlist--but it's not enjoyable, and it doesn't remove my stress; it makes it worse. Adding music to the security process is just so fraught. I mean, I can already hear the TSA screeners yelling even more loudly at passengers ("Get your laptops out! Take off your shoes!") to be heard over the sounds of Josh Groban.

Europe has its own versions of JetBlue and Southwest, and these discount airlines can save you money when you want to hop around the Continent. The website EuroCheapo, best known for its guides to budget hotels and inns, has just launched a guide to budget airlines in Europe: eurocheapo.com/flight. On the left of this page, you'll find a column with a list of the 43 discount airlines in western and central Europe, from the ones you already know (easyJet, Ryanair) to the ones you've never heard of (Helvetic, for instance). Click on an airline name to read the review. Each review hits the pros and cons and runs down the routes that the airline offers. I particularly like how the site invites reader feedback on each airline's carry-on luggage policies. This is a weighty issue for Americans because U.S. airlines have more generous weight limits for carry on items than most European low-cost airlines. Of course, there's a fare search engine, too, powered by Wegolo.com. Like all search engines, it's not perfect, but at least this one allows you to compare the fares it fetches on the same screen with fares from major booking agencies such as Orbitz, Kayak, and so forth. I wish EuroCheapo made it easier to find their listing of routes by country. For example, if you to eurocheapo.com/flights/countries, you can scroll to the bottom of the page to see a box "find flights within Europe by departure country." You can click on a country (say, Ireland) and see a map of its major airports, all budget flights from Ireland (by arrival city and by arrival country). If you're like me, seeing the routes on a map is a faster, more intuitive way to figure out if one of Europe's low budget airlines could be of use to me as a traveler. Overall, kudos to EuroCheapo.