As airlines go, Southwest routinely scores well in consumer satisfaction surveys. Partly because of the airline’s generally positive attitude towards their passengers, and partly because as other airlines move towards a fee structure, Southwest has actually become a “frill” airline.
The airline is hyping their “no change fee” policy. Except that policy is a bit misleading in one area. That area is standby.
The current policy, in my experience, seems mostly to be a problem for vacation travelers, and especially families. They get to the airport early, often with what I call from Southern California the “too much Disneyland” syndrome, and the flight before their ticketed flight is wide open.
But while Southwest doesn’t charge change fees, they do not allow standby, at least without paying the difference up to the last minute fare. In many cases the last minute fare is more than double what they paid in the first place. Now, for business travelers, they just pay it and get reimbursed, but for a family of four it’s often a real issue.
Passengers that purchase full fare tickets are moved without issue or any extra charges.
One of my clients told me this happened to them earlier this month. And the frustrating thing was that the Southwest gate agent told them the earlier flight was about two thirds full. But, not wanting to pay over $200, they waited in the airport.
And when they boarded their completely full flight later, the airline was looking for volunteers to be bumped. Not exactly a win win situation here.
Now, I realize that one reason Southwest does well is they keep it simple. And standby travelers can slow down a boarding process. On the other hand, it certainly behooves them from a profit and customer satisfaction perspective to get passengers from a full flight onto a flight with empty seats.
There are a few options I can think of that the airline might try. One is simply to allow standby for free. Another is to allow free standby only when the flight in question is not booked to capacity.
(Translation on “not booked to capacity” is “if everyone with a booking showed up, the plane would still have empty seats.” Since Southwest, like other carriers, overbooks, it can easily happen that a plane with say, 12 seats left to sell, might be over booked by five seats.)
Another option is to introduce a standby fee, that would still probably be lower than paying the difference between the discount fare and full fare.
Or, perhaps Southwest could just charge one fee for everyone traveling on the same record. With the airlines’ ticketless system, the reissue process is easier than for many of the legacy carriers.
Whatever they do, it seems like a situation that should perhaps be addressed. Not only to help solidify Southwest’s “no-fee/low fee” image. But also to improve the airlines’ bottom line by freeing up seats on potentially full flights.
What do you think, Consumer Traveler readers? Any other suggestions. Have any of you flown Southwest where the airline waived the standby fare add-collection? Or where their refusal to do so seemed particularly egregious?
Janice Hough is a California-based travel agent a travel blogger and a part-time comedy writer. A frequent flier herself, she’s been doing battle with airlines, hotels, and other travel companies for over three decades. Besides writing for Travelers United, Janice has a humor blog at Leftcoastsportsbabe.com (Warning, the political and sports humor therein does not represent the views of anyone but herself.)
