LegalTender

Southwest frowns upon third parties – without some kind of agreement – playing around with its website, especially when they compete with the carrier’s EarlyBird service for checking passengers in.

That said, a cease-and-desist order may be harder to enforce this time.

danielonn

EBCI Checkin has been allocated X amount of boarding positions in advance. So does EBCI cut off at T-72 hours before checkin? If I were to purchase EBCI at the last minute and get A-60 vs purchasing it at the time of buying my ticket would I get a better position or is it randomly assigned?

So does WN allocate the EBCI and stop selling it after a certain amount of boarding positions? So if WN can continue EBCI you could end up with boarding group B or C?

What it sounds like is that third party websites can interfere with WN's Yield Management Systems?

I did sign up for this service and forwarded my WN itineraries and see what happens.

Since this service airlinecheckins.com is based abroad the Cease and Desist may be harder to enforce as you imply. I did use an automated checkin service eons ago and it did check me in on WN and as I recall I got a pretty good position.

And even if the Cease and Desist letter has been sent how can WN prove loss of revenue? Anyways EBCI is locked so this third party website cannot override this.

If I were airlinecheckins.com I could argue that Southwest does not "block" EBCI and that any assignment is left open. If WN really wanted to lock this down their EBCI would be really blocked. I don't see how this service competes with EBCI as that is an ancillary service like Delta Comfort+.

This system won't automatically upgrade you from Main Cabin to Delta Comfort+ or First Class so how could it override EBCI? Secondly Mark in California can checkin Sue in Maryland if he or she has their confirmation# and won't get an EBCI position so how can this website be any different? I can check in my Mother in on her behalf as I have her permission to do so.

You are giving this service the permission to check you in on your behalf. A great argument for this forum. I can't wait to see others weigh in.

Also under preferences there is a box that you tick"Keep my Paid Seats and seat assignments" and one to be seated at the Front of the Plane, Window Seat, Near the Restroom or Emergency Exit. So if you say" No don't keep my paid seat" will you get a better Economy seat. Then there is Basic Economy on the other airlines can I get a better seat by booking in Basic Economy because of this service and "work" the system?

Hmm there must be some manual input too going on. What says you?

I hope you can get where I am going? Please "chime in".

danielonn

So its a service like I can check in Sally in Hawaii for her flight and I am in California. I give airlinecheckins.com my permission(hence read the agreement you check under hazardous materials that you agree not to bring those onboard). Then read the TOS I am sure there is a clause"That you agree airlinecheckins.com the authority to check you in manually on your behalf.

Ok Southwest cannot close this service down per se because if its done manually its like Sally giving me permission to check her in.

I have checked in my Mother in for her flight when she was stuck in meetings at the T-24 mark as she gave me permission and I have her confirmaiton# as I book the flight.

You can check in your kids for their flights.

This service is not hacking Soutwest in any way by giving an unfair advantage and competing with EBCI.

What says you?

nsx

Incorrect. There is no fixed allocation. It's just the number of people who buy it. no more, no fewer.

TomMM

• I don't run an airline so I don't know the concerns
• I don't fly SWA so I don't care about boarding position

That says me.

Tanic

Which article of the United States Constitution does Southwest Airlines violate?

justhere

I say that your mom, Sally, was in a meeting for 72 hours with the X men. The meeting was somewhere between Hawaii and the babbling brook. There were some comfortable seats and some basic seats but the delta between them was hypothetical.

She wanted to check in for her flight but couldn't find the manual. She thought you were the early bird but found out that Leisure Suit Larry was going to sit next to her for free which, although it's the 157th amendment of the constitution, just wouldn't work. So she gave up and 86'd the whole thing.

am I close?

Proudelitist

WN has gone after many many many websites using API's to auto-check in pax. They usually manage to shut them down.

Even if the provider is offshore and the threat of litigation means little to them, WN can usually block the API locally.

So..yeah, this will last about as long as the others.

B747SP

Tested with a trip for tomorrow. I got the "you have been checked in" email at 9:23 for a 9:15 flight, and the position is B30-ish. It failed to check in another person on a separated PNR, so I manually checked in at around 9:35 and got B35-ish. So it kinda worked for me on this not-so-full flight, but could be very bad if you are counting on it with a busy flight.

A more serious problem though, is that I received two boarding passes of total strangers flying a totally different flight. The only connection is that both flights are at 9:15am (one on the east coast and the other on the west coast, so actually different time zones too). This is a serious security risk - I could potentially mess up the other people's trip as the board pass contains the full name and PNR number. I am afraid that my boarding passes may have been sent to other people too.

I WILL NOT USE THIS SERVICE AGAIN.

nsx

Thank you for taking one for the team, B747SP.

toomanybooks

I cannot imagine giving my personal info like this to God-knows-whom.

Remember Hillary and the Macedonian content farmers/hackers? Never know who runs these things.

LegalTender

I knew that would come up!
Killer analogue.

SpeedAdvantage

Let me share my experience with their auto-checkin service. I enrolled my flight in WN and they automatically checked me in at T-24. I was alerted when I received an email together with my boarding pass from Southwest. My position was B19.

Will this be the normal range too if I checked in manually?

dmbolp

You didn't give us any info to be able to answer your question (route, date, flight load, etc). People have posted on these boards that they've checked in manually at T-24 and probably most get B, and then A, with C being the less likely if you do T-24, all depends on several factors specific to that particular flight.

SpeedAdvantage

28th of Nov SAN-LAS with departure time of 1145 hrs. It's not a full flight from what I can remember. But the auto checkin really worked. Got email from WN with my boarding pass at T-24.