I have not had any issues with United/Star Alliance.

I use a Bike Box Allan and have flown a good bit with it. The biggest thing is the weight limitations - 50 pounds for most, 70 pounds if flying Business Class/First class or certain status. Luckily/unluckily, I travel a good bit for work so I have up to 70 pounds on bags.

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United and Delta both charge standard bag fees for bikes under 50 pounds. I've never had them measure the dimensions as long as it comes in under 50 on the scale. I have a United card that gets me two free checked bags for me and anyone on my reservation. I've "saved" a huge amount of money traveling to races on United.

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I have flown Delta 5 round trip flights with no issues. I use Bike Box Alan. It usually weighs 55#. With my credit card/status, I have not paid any fees for traveling with my bike.

My only concern is that TSA does not always repack my bike as carefully as I do. I wish they could just X-ray it and leave the bike untouched.

That's the worst part, I am so diligent with packing and TSA always goes through and barely latches it back up. I even wrote step by step directions on my bike box alan and it rarely if ever gets followed.

In regards to the original poster, I have never had a problem with southwest ($75 each way). I flew American recently to Puerto Rico and it was pretty awesome, as long as it was under 50 pounds it flew as standard luggage. Granted 50 pounds in a bike box alan plus my bike was pretty much my bike and nearly nothing else to hit the 50lb limit.

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I usually fly United with my scicon case. I can throw some things in the bag with it and I am usually right at 50lbs.

I remove the rear derailleur and the hanger, and add padding where I can.

The challenge with the bike box alan is that their TT case is 30lbs. So adding your bike, you are almost guaranteed to break 50 without adding anything. It is also large and hard to fit into rental cars and takes up a lot of space in a hotel room/AirBnB.

The challenge with soft sided boxes is a) it is soft sided and b) United and other airlines explicitly say that they won't accept responsibility for damage to bikes in soft sided cases. I haven't had any issues with my scicon, and I like that I can smush it down when we get to a hotel, and I can fit it in most rental cars no issue.

At a certain point you are not only in the hands of the airlines but also the baggage handlers and everyone else who handles your bag.

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For those flying in/out of Canada, I've had a lot of good experiences with Air Canada. They allow you to check a bike as a regular piece of luggage up to 70lbs and I've never had trouble with them. Just call in advance to let them know if you have a bike if you're going to a race where everyone else is bringing a bike.

As well, they tend to be good managing their partners - last year at Lahti 70.3 WC, Air Canada had saved me a spot on Air Scandinavia for my initial flight Helsinki -> Copenhagen when the plane was clearly full of bikes and others were not able to get their bike on the plane coming home. I did call in advance to let Air Canada know that I'd be bringing a bike, and they made sure that there was a spot for me at each connection.

I've flown with United, Alaska, and British without any issues or fees (between status and a credit card I always have a free checked bag). Alaska counts a bike as a checked bag regardless of weight, British (flying out of Nice) asked the weight and the gal checking me in simply corrected me when I said it was 30kg to keep it under their weight limit, they were great. No issues at all.

American has caused me tons of grief. If they're a middle leg of my journey it doesn't seem to be a problem, but if the first or last flight is with them I always end up with some type of fee, delay, or other nuisance.

Southwest has also been easy, its the flat $75 fee regardless of what's in the box. I personally don't prefer SW but it works.

Flown Delta a bunch, bag almost always 50+ pounds... always counted as my first free checked bag. I find as long as it's under 70 lbs they don't seem to care.

Same with American but only maybe 10 or so lights with them with the bike. Only time I was charged was at a super small middle of nowhere airport with one gate agent who was the agent for all airlines kind of situation.

I thought pretty much all airlines in the US have adopted the bike box as regular checked luggage model, with weight limit enforced for 50lb/70lb depending on your ticket/status

Alaska has a max weight of 70 pounds I believe, which is awesome for being able to pack other things in your bike box too

Last month I flew Alaska Airlines to 70.3 Oceanside with a BBA and paid no fees. I have an Alaska credit card which allows one free checked bag per person in your reservation; since there were 3 people on my reservation, I had 3 free checked bags (1 bike + 2 suitcases), which was plenty for us. On top of this, Alaska's policy is to waive overweight and oversize fees for certain sporting equipment, which includes bikes. Additionally, I also checked in a child car seat, which also has no fee.

Air New Zealand has to be up there. If box/bag is less than 2m long, and weighs less than 23kg it's just one of your bags. If over 23kg up to 32kg then NZD60/usd40 (worldwide, less to AU or domestic). And they have cardboard bike boxes you can use, and at least within NZ they get handled well.

I appreciate that this doesn't help many, but the question was open....

Ive flown on a lot of airlines with my bike and as long as I was willing to pay as much if not more than my own ticket to fly my bike none of them refused me.
SAS was free from Chicago to Copenhagen. Every other airline charged me a bunch.

On Delta, a bike flies for the price of a normal bag. The weight limit is actually 52 lbs or 25 kilo, this is straight from 4 different agents. I fly Delta at least 4 times a year.

The weight limit for Medallion members is 75 lbs.

I flew Alaska last month WITHOUT an Alaska credit card and the baggage fees were pretty bad going to Hawaii, but almost nothing going back.
The desk agent in Canada was brutal, while the desk agent in Hawaii did not care.
The flights were paid with points, so it was less of a hit, but still.

I like Alaska, but I'll probably fly with Westjet next time as I have a Westjet credit card and have baggage fee certainty.