I landed at KCRQ on July 23, 2026 at around 1pm and tower told me that the transit parking is full, so i decided to park my plane at Atlantic. I taxied onto the ramp ad there was no ramp agent to guide me where to park. After 3 minutes or so, I chose to park in one of the available spots and shut down the engine, then a lady came out of the terminal and was busy talking to someone on her walkie talkie and without any welcoming gesture or eye contact, she placed the chocks on my plane and walked away without talking to me or addressing me. Then this ramp agent comes to me a minute after the lady left and he told me that I need to move the plane. I asked him why did the lady put the chocks on if you need me to move the airplane, he said there is a miscommunication. Then after 3 minutes standing in the beaming sun, he tells me that I need to move it to Atlantic west 1 ramp, so I asked him where it is, he said that he will find out. Then he showed me where I need to taxi it to. After I secured the plane, he welcomed me to Carlsbad and he was being friendly. Once I walked into the terminal, a young lady at the front desk gave me a sharp look and asked me if I have a card for payment - no welcoming attitude whatsoever. I told her that I would like to know what are the charges, so she responded in a robotic way that there is a facility fees and security fees, she never mentioned anything about the parking reg. hourly fees. She did mention that if I buy a minimum of 11 gallons they will waive the facility fees, so I went with it. After I came back in one hour, the same young lady slammed me with a total of $148.65 just to park for 1 hour. She never mentioned that the gas price is $10/Gallon and she never mentioned there is a parking reg. Hourly fees.
I have been flying for 26 years and used a lot of FBO's across the country, I never had such bad experience with any of them including Atlantic. But I know one thing for sure, after this experience I will recommend all the pilots I know not to go to any Atlantic again. There was no need for all this attitude and the excessive charges that reflects on poor management and misinforming the customer of the true cost of parking there. read more