Originally Posted by
EAJuggalo
Again, you're expecting too much from SW IT. I don't believe their systems would accept that without major code changes. Cheaper and easier on them to do it all at once.
I've already seen reports, I don't recall if they were here or another message board dealing with Florida travel, of those that had changes to their itinerary that had their tickets changed to basic with the baggage fees and credit expiration when they changed from what SW rebooked them on. I stand by my belief I posted a month ago. If you accept the WN auto rebooking, your booking will remain intact as initially booked, any user initiated changed, regardless of the reason, will change the ticket to basic with it's restrictions.
Yep, this is probably the thinking. They did not alter fare basis code structure when cutting over to new Basic fares. The second to last letter of 7 character fare basis code indicates the fare type (2 = WGA/Basic, 4 = WGA+, 6 = Anytime, 8 = BS). So you can't tell whether or not you have a WGA or Basic fare by the fare basis code alone and would also have to look at ticket issue date. It's easier coding wise to just label any fare with a '2' in second to last letter of fare basis code a 'Basic' fare regardless of ticket issue date. As long as they don't modify the original ticket issue date when changing a prior WGA booking, they can apply the old checked luggage and credit expiration (which are not addressed in the fare rules). If the ticket issue date is changed to be after cutover date, the new rules will apply.