For the last decade plus, my wife has been a part of / now leads a group of ~40 teens who travel to Alabama twice a year and spend the week doing maintenance and (very) basic services at a sports camp for underprivileged kids.

Early on, the flights were organized by a WN pilot who handled all of the reservations and check-ins, etc. As he retired, my wife took more of that responsibility, and I have been the person to whom she assigned the group check-in process for each trip.

So far, so good. It used to be that I could use the group confirmation number and her name, and just check in on the main Southwest.com page. Simple and straightforward, right at 24 hours, check in the group, and then whatever handful of individual stragglers who had individual tickets.

But about two, maybe three years ago, this no longer worked for the group reservation. Check in could only be achieved over the phone at the 24-hour mark. Annoying, but it only took one call.

In the last two or three trips, however, this telephone call for the group reservation check in is taking two or three calls, and the process to finally get the entire group checked in takes up to 45 minutes, even an hour. The first line of customer service agents insist on trying to check them in, and when they are unsuccessful, only half of them know the number to forward me to for the technical / group travel support. And at least one leg, either coming or going, that technical / group support person checks in only my wife, not the whole group. So frustrating.

Does anyone know of a way to check a group reservation in online that works currently?

Does anyone know the direct number for group reservations technical assistance?

I don't do this process quite often enough to feel like I have mastered the process, but I do it sufficiently frequently to feel like WN's processes are deteriorating.