flyerguy99

I am planning travel for the solar eclipse that happens here in the US in August 2017.

Given schedule committments that I can't avoid, I must return to my Northeast home town the same day as the eclipse. That basically limits my viewing options to near-airport locales in the middle of the country, which translates to Kansas City, STL, and Nashville. From where I live, all of those mean flying Southwest. In fact, all three destinations would use exactly the same initial outbound and final return leg connecting MDW.

To allow weather options, I'd like to have tickets booked (refundable Anytime) to all three simultaneously, then cancel two at the last second and fly the day before the eclipse.

I can see two ways of doing this:

1. I book simultaneously, PVD-MDW- MCI (and return), PVD-MDW-STL, PVD-MDW-BNA. That means I would have 3 separate PNRs booked on the same PVD-MDW flight out and MDW-PVD flight at the end. Can I do that or will the system refuse (or worse yet, accept and than cancel me out sometime in the future)?

2. I book a PVD-MDW round trip for the fixed out - home legs, and use it no matter what. I then book three distinct MDW-MCI, -STL, -BNA tickets. Only one seat per any given flight, but the flights can not all be taken simultaneously of course. Will that work? (no checked bags, so no issue with having to recheck at midway)

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

(btw, I know SW doesn't have their schedule out to AUG 17 yet, but I'm booking lodging and cars now and so it ocurred to me to ask about this)

zachary

In my experience, WN does not proactively cancel duplicate/impossible reservations. It may well be a violation of the terms and conditions of using the website and I've never held the reservations until the last minute as you're suggesting. Of course, I'm not sure it's worth the effort if you are buying refundable tickets anyway. I suppose the price could go up or there could be a sell out (although you could monitor availability and buy when you see Wanna Get Away fares getting close in price to the Anytime fares).

lougord99

It is absolutely a violation of the T&C's.

There is also NO reports here of WN proactively cancelling reservations as they claim they have the right to do.

joshua362

I've done it several times, as recently as last week, never been an issue. But for some odd reason, even if you cancel all but 1 one a few days out, the cancelled reservations still stay in the system at the airport. So when I checked bags and gave the agent my id, they can get slightly annoyed having to sift through mutilple reservations and they always mention that to me. YMMV

flyerguy99

Thanks for the info, everyone.

The reason I'm interested overlapping reservations vs buying last minute is that I do think it's very likely flights to viewing locations will be sold out well in advance. Having just made hotel and car reservations, those three cities already show signs of elevated demand.

To put in perspective, for locations further west, with higher likelihood of good weather, things are already booked solid. Every single hotel in Central Oregon is sold out (well, I see one room in Bend, OR at $700/night); I'm told Madras, OR was filled in 2014. On some eclipse boards I've seen rumors that tour companies might set up some charters from Europe and Asia to PDX given anticipated demand for seats.

expert7700

do not book the same flight # a second time (even if it's the connecting flight segment).

WN proactively does cancel these (though I won't post the particular batch sweep schede for the canellations). you don't get to pick which one they cancel

their process also sees/cancels multiples of the 'same route' meaning a nonstop mco-buf and a mco-bwi-buf with connection shows as a duplicate

What it sounds like OP will need to do is to book this as two segments. book the known one way (last flight of the day etc to your hometown) as one conf #. then you could book 2 or more initial segments without scrutiny because they are different.

lougord99

The proactive cancellations that you refer to have never been reported here.

expert7700

they aren't swept until close-in to travel date. so there is a big window that it WILL work. also, once it is swept and cancelled (i have tested this a bit with my and a friends acct), it is safe once again to have a duplicate booking as it seems to still be a one time check.

nineworldseries

So you mean if I book, for example, WN 770 CMH-ATL and then WN 770 ATL-MSY as two separate one-ways instead of as a direct flight on one PNR, they will cancel one of them? Because I've done this a couple times and never experienced that.

expert7700

no, I probably shouldn't have used the same flight# terminology. What you describe is perfectly acceptable and a good way to earn extra segments

WN checks for the same routing which may include the same flight # or different flight #s.

WN international (shockingly) checks for domstic connections on the same day separate PNR and sends emails warnings trying to convince passengers to switch it so that it is all on the same PNR.

konems

Last year I had five separate points bookings for (at the time) all of the different National League options for the World Series on the same days over Halloween weekend, and then as each club was eliminated from the playoffs I canceled the respective reservation until I had the correct one. Love that you can get away with this on Southwest.

jep8821

So let me get this straight, Lets say I book MCI-BNA nonstop 8am flight and also have booked MCI-BNA nonstop 11am flight for the same day. Southwest can proactively cancel one of them without letting me choose? I have made these type of double bookings in the past and havn't had problem... Does it matter the way you book? Like Via miles vs $$?

Thanks,

Jason

toomanybooks

In Southwest's current Contract of Carriage, found on its website, there is the following:

"Multiple Reservations. Southwest prohibits multiple reservations for the same Passenger departing from the same city on the same date. Furthermore, without notice to the Passenger or purchaser, Southwest may cancel such reservations or any other reservations that it believes, in its sole discretion, were made without intent to travel."

Note that the destinations do not even have to match.

I could imagine someone like a courier having 2 legitimate departures from a single city on a single day, like MDW-ATL and back in the morning and then a trip elsewhere in the afternoon. I guess one could call and explain the situation to Customer Service.

ursine1

While its true that WN can enforce the rule against such bookings, I've never experienced them doing so, or ever heard if it happening. Yet.

After the last meltdown, I've started routinely booking backup flights for later the same day, or the following day, for trips where I absolutely must be somewhere. I use points for the backup bookings, so there's no penalty if I happen to forget to cancel (or are unable to for some reason.)

I suspect that the new software coming online will eventually close this loophole. Hopefully we'll have some notification before it does, even if that means someone here takes a bullet for us.

ENOTTY

I had booked two flights BWI-FLL for the same day next April. (One departs extremely early and arrives before the first Greyhound bus departs for my final destination, Key West. The other departs at a more reasonable hour and I would just rent a car to get down there.)

Just now I received a cancellation on my early flight.

The last time I received an unexpected cancellation, they did a schedule change and called me a week later while I wondered if my account had been hacked.

For now, I'll sit tight and avoid booking the early flight again and await their phone call.