Southwest Airlines Cancels Its Senior Discount
Taylor Rains October 15, 2019
Senior white man relaxing in a chair in the Dubai airport waiting area. The man is dressed in a striped polo, black trousers and black shoes. (Photo: iStock)
Heads up seniors, it looks like Southwest has decided to cancel its senior discount program.
The senior fares were a benefit to flyers 65 years of age or older. Seniors could purchase “Anytime Travel” flights, which are fully refundable, at a slight discount.
However, Southwest announced that those fares would no longer be available and explained that they were not utilized by a large portion of their customers. They posed on their website, “As of December 11, 2019, Senior fares are no longer available for purchase. Our customers mean everything to us. We’re committed to providing friendly, reliable service and low fares with heart. You’ll still get all that with our other fare features.”
To put the price difference into perspective, a typical “Anytime Travel” cross-country roundtrip ticket costs almost $1200, while a senior could pay as low as $700 for the same flight.
Although this may be a disappointment to Southwest’s seniors, there are still other options for cheap tickets. The airline’s infamous “Wanna Get Away” fare is still the cheapest option, even without the senior discount, and their semi-annual flash sale will still be up for grabs. Southwest frequently promotes its semi-annual sale with $49 one-way tickets. Generally, these fares do not come with refunds but can be canceled for airline credit.
If these options aren’t enough, keep your eye out for Southwest’s flash sales they periodically promote on their website and social media pages. Remember, these sales go quick, so have your travel plans ready in advance.
December 11***
Hi cur, to address the concerns over the discount - the discounts vary. Slight discounts typically refer to short haul flights (Atlanta to Orlando, Las Vegas to Los Angeles, etc). When I did the calculation, I used Southwest's website for the fare and both ways gave a fare difference of about $250, so about $500 (total price was about $1200). I truly apologize for the confusion and appreciate the feedback. Hopefully seniors can "utilize" these sometimes more heavily discounted fares before December 1 :)
$500 off a $1200 flight? so 41 per cent discount? that's a "slight discount"? i don't know why i bother reading the stories on this site, with its typos, bizarre conclusions despite the earlier facts presented, just all around awful writing. at least the writers are volunteers?
DCAFly: Sounds like something George Carlin would say.
...so if they are not being utilised" as heavily, what would it hurt to keep them?, Those "Get Away" fares may be cheaper, but are non refundable and as a senior myself, sometimes you need to make a change of itinerary or cancel. We all don't have fat six digit retirement portfolios to throw away money on what could become a useless ticket or hefty rebooking fees.