Collierkr

Allan38103

The only thing you "lost" is the amount of your original ticket which you forfeited when you were a no-show. When they cancelled your previous reservation, you simply bought a ticket at the going rate for the date (i.e., the "walk-up" fare). The same as anyone else would.

mvoight

How would the airline know he didn't originally want to return at 6AM, and later changed his mind, even if other family members stayed later?
As stated earlier, this is why you check confirmations IMMEDIATELY. In most cases, you have 24 hours to fix the problem

DesertNomad

I wish airlines (and the USA) would just use the 24-hour clock. "DEP: 0600" can't be mistaken for "DEP: 1800"

mvoight

600 PM and 600 AM are not the same thing either

Cat Man Do

As others have said, this was not a SW issue.

In terms of flexibility, SW is probably top of the heap. They're not exactly a low cost carrier anymore, but for flex, they're great.

On what other airline can you buy the cheapest fare and change it any time, paying only the fare difference? None.
Cancel that cheap fare 15 minutes before flight time? No charge. It will be travel credit, not a refund, but still - no charge.
Book a flight on spec, miss the 24 hour window? So what. Cancel, no fee.

Book a B-A flight instead of an A-B flight and discover it weeks later? Change it, paying only the difference in fare. What? New flight is cheaper? Guess what, you get a travel credit or refund, depending on which fare bucket you purchased. Still no change fee.

Decide to go A-C instead? Yep, you can do that too. Still no fees or charges. Just the difference.

Book a 6Am instead of 6PM flight? Still no charge except the fare difference, up to 10 minutes before flight time.

dmbolp

And were the two flights really exactly 6:00am and 6:00pm? I wonder if there was also a minutes differences that was also missed (multiple times) by the OP

arollins

Bolding mine, I think this is the part that you are upset about. Why did you had to pay? Did you make the booking? Yes, it shouldn't have cost YOU $500, but you paid it. What arrangements did you do with your family member to pay you back for their errors? Seems to me that you are more upset at the fact that you laid out the $500 and may not get a cent back from your relative. I wish some of my family members would have pay up for most of my mistakes, instead, it seems that they come to me to bail them out on their mistakes.

dulciusexasperis

Absolutely, couldn't agree more. How dare an airline suggest that your family member is responsible for his own actions including his mistakes. Why the utter nerve of some people is just unbelievable. He should be encouraged to sue the airline for millions of dollars. After all, don't they know he's an American and can't be treated that way. Next thing you know, someone will be trying to tell him that he is supposed to check that he booked what he thought he was booking or something. Then no doubt, they'll pull up that nonsense about reading the contract. No self-respecting red-blooded (and red-necked) American reads fine print and never has.

How this airline has treated your family member makes me just about mad enough to spit bullets at them.

jacobguo

I, too, am tempted to tease OP, but chances are they will never see the reply anyways.

zachary

This is the answer. The telephone agents don't have the flexibility that the airport agents have. It's not certain that something would have been done without an up-charge, but it's definitely possible.

In my experience, this is true of all airlines, not just WN.

Mr. Vker

Reminds of grading errors in school. When the mistake meant my grade was too low-students wanted it fixed. When it meant grade was too high, leave it alone!

nsx

Tough audience here! We all make mistakes. The correct approach is to be grateful if the other party gives you a break and to accept the result if they don't.

The approach I use is to ask myself whether it would be good business for them to give me a break. If so, that's the argument I make. If not, I don't bother.

jeffandnicole

Family members fly separately all the time. People have many reasons to split up. In this case, someone needing a 6am flight may have needed to come home for work; those on the 6pm flight didn't have to.

That said: Southwest sends confirmations and reminders approaching the flight date. When booking the flight, there's options to enter other people's email addresses. Southwest sends reminders about their 24 hour check-in as well. In fact, there's so many reminders that it almost gets irritating.

You are lucky with Southwest that the difference was only $500. Other airlines charge more for last-minute flight reservations. You're lucky there were seats on the plane available too. What was that person going to do if the flight was sold out?

This is completely on the person who wanted to buy their own ticket. There are so many ways this could've been averted.

kennycrudup

SERIOUSLY. Both Marriott, and especially TripIt- which keeps track of all my travel- give me the 24H clock option, and it's unambiguous. Although the way WN lists flights (as opposed to, IIRC, UA, with dropdowns) makes this kind of mistake harder to do on their site, I do wish WN IT could selectively indicate that too for at least post-booking communications (... OK, STOP LAUGHING WN veterans!)