New Digital Experiences for You, our Southwest Customers
Jul 3, 2022, 7:09 am
#1
Company Representative, Southwest Airlines
Original Poster
Join Date: Dec 2019
Location: Dallas & Indy
Programs: Southwest Rapid Rewards
Posts: 104
New Digital Experiences for You, our Southwest Customers
Hi FlyerTalk Friends,
Wow - things have been busy recently in the Southwest Digital Experience space with the launch of Wanna Get Away Plus, so I've been less "posty" than normal.
But we've launched a lot of great new capabilities that I thought you may find exciting while I have my morning coffee. You can find them all on our SWA Community where I post Digital Release Notes
Here's a few recent ones that I thought you may want to know about:
We also continue to make progress to upcoming improvements to our Digital Experience including:
Thank you as always for your support, your ideas, and your encouragement. Please let us know what you think of these new enhancements.
With LUV,
Mark
Wow - things have been busy recently in the Southwest Digital Experience space with the launch of Wanna Get Away Plus, so I've been less "posty" than normal.
But we've launched a lot of great new capabilities that I thought you may find exciting while I have my morning coffee. You can find them all on our SWA Community where I post Digital Release Notes
Here's a few recent ones that I thought you may want to know about:
- Our Inflight Flight Tracker has gotten a major upgrade. On more than 600 LUV Jets, you can now enjoy a 3D map view, explore other views such as a simulated flight deck or window view, or get information about attractions in your destination. This is much more akin to an experience you may see in a seat-back IFE system. Exciting too since more than a third of all time spent in the inflight digital experience is spent on the Flight Tracker. We hope to have the full fleet upgraded with this flight tracker soon.
- Our Route Map on the websites and app has been updated and is now mobile friendly, provides accurate nonstop & connecting market data, finds you the closest airport to your device's location, and provides an easy to use alternative list view. It doesn't have price points (yet) but it's a scalable platform that we can use in the future to add that capability.
- We continue to update our Help Center and make more of our content mobile friendly. We just launched updates to our Accessible Travel Content which is used nearly a million times a year by our Customers who may have visual or mobility needs while traveling. We also updated our Corporate Citizenship Information so you can have a better idea of what we are doing to support our People, Planet, and our commitments to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
- We didn't make a lot of hay about it during the WGA+ launch, but wanted to alert you that you can now add a previously unlinked flight credit to your account as part of the WGA+ release in May. Just open your account on desktop to, go to your Travel Funds section, and choose the lookup fund option. If your unused flight credit name matches your account we'll let you link it together. If I recall, this came up as feedback here in FT in 2019 when we launched unused flight credit lookup.
- Our app now has an offline alert feature which will let you know if we the app cannot reach the Southwest servers. We heard this is a common pain point as Customers devices sometimes unknowingly would connect to airport WiFi but the device wouldn't be able to reach the Internet. This caused frustration at the security and the gate. Now you'll get an alert if the app loses a connection. This also provides us with a platform to later activate cached trip card and cached boarding passes so you can use those features in the future once we launch the full Offline Mode with Caching soon.
We also continue to make progress to upcoming improvements to our Digital Experience including:
- Upgraded Boarding on our websites and app
- More Day of Travel & Trip Support Features. Booking with a lap infant and resolving check-in errors are some of our first focus areas.
- Mobile My Account, which we hope to launch iteratively over the next year to bring all the capabilities of your account to your mobile device on a responsive platform
- A test of nearby airport shopping on our website and app.
- And lots more we're cooking up
Thank you as always for your support, your ideas, and your encouragement. Please let us know what you think of these new enhancements.
With LUV,
Mark
Jul 3, 2022, 9:14 am
#3
Join Date: May 2014
Posts: 1,866
and of course, none of the 14 airports in Florida or the Caribbean behind those bright blues have nonstop service from SEA.
Simple fix, I'm sure, and completely legitimizes calling the route map interactive! I've been poking fun at them calling a static map interactive for years, usually when complaining about the loss of the Getaway finder - I finally have reason to hope that maybe that AMAZING resource will return soon! Being able to find a relatively cheap place to go on a specific weekend has had me using Google Flights and booking on other airlines far too often.
Last edited by synergistic; Jul 3, 2022 at 10:35 am
Jul 3, 2022, 10:01 am
#4
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: Nashville -Past DL Plat, FO, WN-CP, various hotel programs
Programs: DL-MM, AA, SW w/companion,HiltonDiamond, Hyatt PLat, IHF Plat, Miles and Points Seeker
Posts: 11,072
Thanks for sharing Mark.
Looking for the ability to do A1-A15 upgrades from the app.
Looking for the ability to do A1-A15 upgrades from the app.
Jul 3, 2022, 10:17 am
#5
Join Date: Apr 2015
Location: BDL, BOS
Programs: Marriott Lifetime Titanium, AA EXP, IHG Diamond Ambassador, Hyatt Explorist
Posts: 624
Thanks Mark, impressed with the attention the app has been getting these last couple years. I remember when the SW app was woefully behind the other airlines!
Any roadmap timing for when A-List will be able to make same-day changes on a regular WGA fare?
Any roadmap timing for when A-List will be able to make same-day changes on a regular WGA fare?
Jul 3, 2022, 12:39 pm
#6
Company Representative, Southwest Airlines
Original Poster
Join Date: Dec 2019
Location: Dallas & Indy
Programs: Southwest Rapid Rewards
Posts: 104
The circles with a number indicate that there are multiple airports in that area. It's a visual grouping indicator so you can see how many airports might be there as otherwise we couldn't show you all the points. They are not indicators of co-terminals but some may indeed be co-terminals.
You can find the co-terminal guidance we offer for travel agencies during reaccomodation here. https://www.southwest.com/html/swabiz/gds-policy.html
Scroll down to item 26.2. I'm going to see if we can cross-reference this and post in the official Help Center too.
Co-terminals to be used during a rebooking are subject to change.
Hope that helps!
Jul 3, 2022, 12:41 pm
#7
Company Representative, Southwest Airlines
Original Poster
Join Date: Dec 2019
Location: Dallas & Indy
Programs: Southwest Rapid Rewards
Posts: 104
I think there's some other glitch going on - this is what comes up for Seattle:
and of course, none of the 14 airports in Florida or the Caribbean behind those bright blues have nonstop service from SEA.
Simple fix, I'm sure, and completely legitimizes calling the route map interactive! I've been poking fun at them calling a static map interactive for years, usually when complaining about the loss of the Getaway finder - I finally have reason to hope that maybe that AMAZING resource will return soon! Being able to find a relatively cheap place to go on a specific weekend has had me using Google Flights and booking on other airlines far too often.
and of course, none of the 14 airports in Florida or the Caribbean behind those bright blues have nonstop service from SEA.
Simple fix, I'm sure, and completely legitimizes calling the route map interactive! I've been poking fun at them calling a static map interactive for years, usually when complaining about the loss of the Getaway finder - I finally have reason to hope that maybe that AMAZING resource will return soon! Being able to find a relatively cheap place to go on a specific weekend has had me using Google Flights and booking on other airlines far too often.
Jul 3, 2022, 12:45 pm
#8
Company Representative, Southwest Airlines
Original Poster
Join Date: Dec 2019
Location: Dallas & Indy
Programs: Southwest Rapid Rewards
Posts: 104
We are definitely looking at adding self-service same-day change for tier members. I don't have a date to share but I will as soon as I can. Lots of things to balance on that roadmap.
Jul 4, 2022, 1:53 pm
#9
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: STL
Programs: DL, AA, UA, WN, Hyatt, HHonors, Avis Pref+
Posts: 164
Looking forward to the new flight tracker!
Jul 5, 2022, 7:24 am
#10
Company Representative, Southwest Airlines
Original Poster
Join Date: Dec 2019
Location: Dallas & Indy
Programs: Southwest Rapid Rewards
Posts: 104
I see it also when using TUS as the origin. When I zoom in, each circle that is incorrectly blue includes an airport that is grayed out because "We do not currently offer published service for this route." I bet that's the glitch.
Looking forward to the new flight tracker!
Looking forward to the new flight tracker!
Thank you all for your feedback and for your support of our digital improvements at Southwest.
Jul 11, 2022, 8:27 pm
#11
Company Representative, Southwest Airlines
Original Poster
Join Date: Dec 2019
Location: Dallas & Indy
Programs: Southwest Rapid Rewards
Posts: 104
Hi FlyerTalk Customers! Wanted to let you know that we fixed the zoom issue where some airport group bubbles were appearing as non-stops inadvertently. As always, thanks for your support of Southwest!
Jul 18, 2022, 5:15 am
#13
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Houston (HOU/IAH)
Programs: WN, UA, DL, AA, Chase UR, Amex MR
Posts: 2,267
