Check your airline's financial health before buying a ticket

With airlines filing for bankruptcy in rapid succession, it's hard to know what to do as a consumer. Each time you book a ticket, do you feel a bit of apprehension, wondering if you'll really get where you're going? If an airline isn't having money troubles, there are always weather and safety concerns to disrupt your flight.

So what can consumers do? Well it's important to know that when an airline stops flying, if you've paid with a credit card, you'll most likely get your money back. That alone should be incentive enough to pay for all airline tickets with a credit card. If you pay any other way, your chances of getting your money back decrease significantly.

But even if you get your money back, the inconvenience and cost of trying to find a new flight may be very painful. I don't want to be put in that position. So as silly as this sounds, I'm not booking an airline ticket to anywhere without checking the financial health of the airline first.