Southwest's Christmas 2022 meltdown - phones, chat shut down, RR points compensation
Dec 27, 2022, 12:29 am
#61
Join Date: Dec 2003
Posts: 27
Absolutely brutal.
They literally need to be pairing off legal Captains with F/Os, finding them 3 F/As, giving them a 73G for the day and handing them a schedule to fly.
No complexity. No splitting crews. No moving from this plane to that plane at PHX. We have a legal crew with a legal plane and they're going to stick together all day.
And they should get on the phone to Atlas and see if they can charter a few 747s. Don't worry about assigned seats. Just fly focus city to focus city and get these people moving.
They literally need to be pairing off legal Captains with F/Os, finding them 3 F/As, giving them a 73G for the day and handing them a schedule to fly.
No complexity. No splitting crews. No moving from this plane to that plane at PHX. We have a legal crew with a legal plane and they're going to stick together all day.
And they should get on the phone to Atlas and see if they can charter a few 747s. Don't worry about assigned seats. Just fly focus city to focus city and get these people moving.
Dec 27, 2022, 12:29 am
#62
Join Date: Dec 2000
Location: Philadelphia
Posts: 2,506
From their website: "In the event your flight is canceled, you may request a refund of your unused ticket to the original form of payment."
I know they are good with no change fees, but one easy way to help out here would be for them to make all tickets this week fully refundable, regardless of whether the flight operates. This lets those who need to be somewhere to book an alternate flight and if their original flight actually operates, it's one more seat for the hundreds of thousands of stranded pax.
I know they are good with no change fees, but one easy way to help out here would be for them to make all tickets this week fully refundable, regardless of whether the flight operates. This lets those who need to be somewhere to book an alternate flight and if their original flight actually operates, it's one more seat for the hundreds of thousands of stranded pax.
Dec 27, 2022, 12:30 am
#63
Join Date: Dec 2003
Posts: 27
Absolutely brutal.
They literally need to be pairing off legal Captains with F/Os, finding them 3 F/As, giving them a 73G for the day and handing them a schedule to fly.
No complexity. No splitting crews. No moving from this plane to that plane at PHX. We have a legal crew with a legal plane and they're going to stick together all day.
And they should get on the phone to Atlas and see if they can charter a few 747s. Don't worry about assigned seats. Just fly focus city to focus city and get these people moving.
They literally need to be pairing off legal Captains with F/Os, finding them 3 F/As, giving them a 73G for the day and handing them a schedule to fly.
No complexity. No splitting crews. No moving from this plane to that plane at PHX. We have a legal crew with a legal plane and they're going to stick together all day.
And they should get on the phone to Atlas and see if they can charter a few 747s. Don't worry about assigned seats. Just fly focus city to focus city and get these people moving.
Dec 27, 2022, 12:33 am
#64
Join Date: Mar 2011
Location: Window Seat
Programs: National Executive, HHonors Gold, IHG Platinum, Hyatt Visitor
Posts: 2,495
This does appear to be the worst meltdown Southwest has ever had... we will see if the leisure travelers will forgive Southwest.
Don't forget business travel is set to fully recover next year (hopes the travel industry). We will see how the business travelers like meltdowns like this which seem more frequent than they once were and drastically worse than they once were. Back to those teleconferences and Zooms and saving thousands of dollars of company funds, and time, they will go, after seeing these airlines are just nowhere near back to how they were in 2019.
Don't forget business travel is set to fully recover next year (hopes the travel industry). We will see how the business travelers like meltdowns like this which seem more frequent than they once were and drastically worse than they once were. Back to those teleconferences and Zooms and saving thousands of dollars of company funds, and time, they will go, after seeing these airlines are just nowhere near back to how they were in 2019.
Dec 27, 2022, 12:39 am
#65
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Pittsburgh Pennsylvania
Programs: Marriott Platinum, Starwood Platinum
Posts: 373
It's amazing to me, Southwest now has blocked everyone from booking or changing a flight until Fri/Sat at the earliest. Literally every route or flight I have looked into on their website says unavailable!! Every single one.
Southwest should be ashamed!!
Southwest should be ashamed!!
Dec 27, 2022, 12:40 am
#66
Join Date: Mar 2011
Location: Window Seat
Programs: National Executive, HHonors Gold, IHG Platinum, Hyatt Visitor
Posts: 2,495
How do WN road warriors continue to put up with such incompetence? WN had a similar Holiday meltdown, originating in MDW (in 2018?). The pitchforks came out, WN responded with some discounts, aggressive marketing about free bags and snacks, A-List and companion pass promotions, all was quickly forgiven. For anyone who travels for a living, I cannot understand how anyone would choose a carrier that does not have interline agreements with other carriers - full stop.
One would expect disgruntled passengers to be low hanging fruit for other carriers - skimming the higher value frequent flyer cream, leaving WN to drown a sea of low information casual travelers who still believe they are getting a deal.
One big difference: like the rest of corporate America, carriers worldwide, there is still a significant labor shortage; how long will WN staff put up with disgruntled passengers when the grass is clearly greener at the competition.
One would expect disgruntled passengers to be low hanging fruit for other carriers - skimming the higher value frequent flyer cream, leaving WN to drown a sea of low information casual travelers who still believe they are getting a deal.
One big difference: like the rest of corporate America, carriers worldwide, there is still a significant labor shortage; how long will WN staff put up with disgruntled passengers when the grass is clearly greener at the competition.
I do not think road warriors are going to tolerate this out of Southwest forever. The problem is for many people Southwest is the airline with the most direct flights to the most destinations from wherever they are based. When someone is based at an airport where Southwest has 50%+ marketshare, there is little other option really. When your options are one of 4-5 direct Southwest flights to XYZ destination or one daily Delta/AA/Alaska flight to that destination with a layover at the wrong time of day, what are you going to do...? This is the scenario many Southwest loyalists face. The option is to roll with Southwest, or just not fly at all. Or move to a place with better coverage of other airlines, I guess, would also be an option.
I also think at this point Southwest probably needs to make interline agreements with other carriers. As Southwest is no longer able to adequately reschedule folks within Southwest on the same day, which was one of the previous excuses for their cheapness on not doing interline agreements, (as demonstrated by past and current meltdowns), and also the new (not so new anymore) ticketing system aligns with other airlines, now it is time to interline. The problem is the sheer volume of Southwest passengers would overwhelm the other carriers; they do not have capacity to absorb this huge mass of displaced customers. So interline would help some customers but many many would still be impacted negatively.
Dec 27, 2022, 12:47 am
#67
Join Date: Dec 2003
Posts: 27
Absolutely brutal.
They literally need to be pairing off legal Captains with F/Os, finding them 3 F/As, giving them a 73G for the day and handing them a schedule to fly.
No complexity. No splitting crews. No moving from this plane to that plane at PHX. We have a legal crew with a legal plane and they're going to stick together all day.
And they should get on the phone to Atlas and see if they can charter a few 747s. Don't worry about assigned seats. Just fly focus city to focus city and get these people moving.
They literally need to be pairing off legal Captains with F/Os, finding them 3 F/As, giving them a 73G for the day and handing them a schedule to fly.
No complexity. No splitting crews. No moving from this plane to that plane at PHX. We have a legal crew with a legal plane and they're going to stick together all day.
And they should get on the phone to Atlas and see if they can charter a few 747s. Don't worry about assigned seats. Just fly focus city to focus city and get these people moving.
Dec 27, 2022, 1:17 am
#68
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: BUR/LAX
Programs: AS MVP
Posts: 300
Except pilots and flight attendants have different contracts and different legalities. So if they flew from point A to B to C and now one group goes illegal, that ends the day for both groups in city C. And say city C is not a city in which that the airline has a hotel contract. Crews layover in specific cities where hotel contracts have been negotiated. It can take hours for hotel rooms to be approved in a city without a hotel contract. And if city C is not a base for pilots and/or flight attendants, then that airplane is now stuck until both groups get hotels authorized, transportation set up, legal crew rest and are available to fly again. And there could be a further problem that some of the crew were only legal for one day and are stuck overnight in city C. Or are only legal for 2 days and must return to city A. And I can come up with multiple other problems with your solution. This is why crew schedulers exist. They track crew legalities. And why crews contact crew scheduling with any irregular operation.
Don't over think it.
Fly them to the rules of the most constrained crew member.
There are very few cities to which WN flies that they do not have crew hotel contracts negotiated.
The objective is to get the most planes moving with the most passengers moving through the system, at a time in which almost no passengers are doing so. This is how you do it. Delta had a similar meltdown a few years ago although with a hub network they managed to isolate the issues a bit - and management was literally walking through crew rooms at the hubs assembling crews this way and calling them into crew scheduling for verification.
I have a lot of experience in operations management and scheduling, though not at an airline. The principles are the same but the constraints are different (though all industries have constraints that must be accounted for). In this case, the only way out of this is to break it down to it's most basic and get some operations moving again.
Dec 27, 2022, 2:07 am
#69
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Pittsburgh Pennsylvania
Programs: Marriott Platinum, Starwood Platinum
Posts: 373
Historically the meltdowns have not been this significant. It seems like every meltdown is more intense. This is not the same Southwest of 10 years ago, it is not as reliable as it used to be. Something has changed. Yes they have more destinations than ever but it seems like they are stretched too thin. Bigger is not always better.
I do not think road warriors are going to tolerate this out of Southwest forever. The problem is for many people Southwest is the airline with the most direct flights to the most destinations from wherever they are based. When someone is based at an airport where Southwest has 50%+ marketshare, there is little other option really. When your options are one of 4-5 direct Southwest flights to XYZ destination or one daily Delta/AA/Alaska flight to that destination with a layover at the wrong time of day, what are you going to do...? This is the scenario many Southwest loyalists face. The option is to roll with Southwest, or just not fly at all. Or move to a place with better coverage of other airlines, I guess, would also be an option.
I also think at this point Southwest probably needs to make interline agreements with other carriers. As Southwest is no longer able to adequately reschedule folks within Southwest on the same day, which was one of the previous excuses for their cheapness on not doing interline agreements, (as demonstrated by past and current meltdowns), and also the new (not so new anymore) ticketing system aligns with other airlines, now it is time to interline. The problem is the sheer volume of Southwest passengers would overwhelm the other carriers; they do not have capacity to absorb this huge mass of displaced customers. So interline would help some customers but many many would still be impacted negatively.
I do not think road warriors are going to tolerate this out of Southwest forever. The problem is for many people Southwest is the airline with the most direct flights to the most destinations from wherever they are based. When someone is based at an airport where Southwest has 50%+ marketshare, there is little other option really. When your options are one of 4-5 direct Southwest flights to XYZ destination or one daily Delta/AA/Alaska flight to that destination with a layover at the wrong time of day, what are you going to do...? This is the scenario many Southwest loyalists face. The option is to roll with Southwest, or just not fly at all. Or move to a place with better coverage of other airlines, I guess, would also be an option.
I also think at this point Southwest probably needs to make interline agreements with other carriers. As Southwest is no longer able to adequately reschedule folks within Southwest on the same day, which was one of the previous excuses for their cheapness on not doing interline agreements, (as demonstrated by past and current meltdowns), and also the new (not so new anymore) ticketing system aligns with other airlines, now it is time to interline. The problem is the sheer volume of Southwest passengers would overwhelm the other carriers; they do not have capacity to absorb this huge mass of displaced customers. So interline would help some customers but many many would still be impacted negatively.
Good post. All these approved airline mergers a few years ago has really hurt us customers. Less and less competition means higher and higher prices and less and less carriers to choose from. As you stated, passengers are pretty much forced to take SW as they offer the most flights in certain markets. In normal times(no storms or problems) it's just not economically feasible as well as adding extra hours for layovers to take another carrier with little presence in a particular airport. We can thank the airline lobbyists who get paid millions of dollars for our airline experiences getting worse and worse.
Dec 27, 2022, 4:14 am
#70
Join Date: Feb 2020
Location: USA
Programs: MB Ambassador, WOH Globalist, HH Diamond (Aspire), AA Gold, UA (*G) Gold
Posts: 5,084
I posted this in one of the other threads, but count me amongst the customers who won't forgive them lightly. I have so much empathy for those who are stuck - especially those who were on their once-in-a-year flight to see relatives and don't have the financial resources to settle down in a hotel. My aunt is stuck in AUS for a week - luckily, she has plenty of family there to stay with. I was scheduled to fly on WN to LAX on the 6th before heading to Tokyo on SQ but after hearing about all of this mess, I have booked a cheaper flight on American for the same day as a backup. What a mess - I will second-guess before booking on WN again.
Dec 27, 2022, 4:21 am
#71
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 50
Update:
The expected Southwest cancellation notice came in overnight. Thankfully my sister had already booked on United, because prices are now through the roof.
My sister and her family are in Colorado after driving there from Indy following multiple cancellations on Thursday and Friday. They were told about midnight on Thursday/Friday (after sitting on the tarmac for 2 hours) that Southwest had no way to get them there, and their daughter who lives elsewhere was already there.
Their plan was to fly home using their original flights, but I texted my sister and let her know what was going on and she got them all booked on United. She said she’ll deal with Southwest later…doesn’t want another 16+ hour drive.
I feel terrible for them. This was their last family vacation for a while. My youngest nephew is graduating from the Naval Academy in May and my sister thought it would be fun to make memories before they have to work around more complicated schedules.
The expected Southwest cancellation notice came in overnight. Thankfully my sister had already booked on United, because prices are now through the roof.
My sister and her family are in Colorado after driving there from Indy following multiple cancellations on Thursday and Friday. They were told about midnight on Thursday/Friday (after sitting on the tarmac for 2 hours) that Southwest had no way to get them there, and their daughter who lives elsewhere was already there.
Their plan was to fly home using their original flights, but I texted my sister and let her know what was going on and she got them all booked on United. She said she’ll deal with Southwest later…doesn’t want another 16+ hour drive.
I feel terrible for them. This was their last family vacation for a while. My youngest nephew is graduating from the Naval Academy in May and my sister thought it would be fun to make memories before they have to work around more complicated schedules.
Last edited by AggieTexan; Dec 27, 2022 at 12:59 pm Reason: Update Post
Dec 27, 2022, 5:20 am
#72
Join Date: Oct 2019
Programs: Flying Blue, Hilton Honors, Amtrak Guest Rewards
Posts: 2,389
Keep it simple: switch to hub and spoke to clear the backlog and to the extent possible schedule crews for out and back. Once you have part of the system moving, start focusing on moving folks to the part that's moving.
I'd think most would prefer a double-or-more-connect to being stranded.
I'd think most would prefer a double-or-more-connect to being stranded.
Dec 27, 2022, 5:31 am
#73
Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: BNE/OOL temporarily-permanently at CAK/PIT
Programs: UA*1K & UA Club, National Ex. Elite, Hertz Pres. Circ., Amex Plat., CLEAR
Posts: 1,703
Two things I don’t understand:
#1. A relative was flying BNA-LAS-SMF. The LAS-SMF segment got cancelled. Her baggage made it to SMF.
How does baggage arrive at a destination when the flight to get there never operated?
#2. A large part of this problem was that the crew scheduling office broke down and crews could not phone in and get their assignments.
The crew scheduling system was working the rest of the year (not to mention for decades before that). Why did this system suddenly stop working?
#1. A relative was flying BNA-LAS-SMF. The LAS-SMF segment got cancelled. Her baggage made it to SMF.
How does baggage arrive at a destination when the flight to get there never operated?
#2. A large part of this problem was that the crew scheduling office broke down and crews could not phone in and get their assignments.
The crew scheduling system was working the rest of the year (not to mention for decades before that). Why did this system suddenly stop working?
Dec 27, 2022, 5:31 am
#74
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: Bainbridge Island, WA
Posts: 8,953
Does anybody have a good sense of why this is so bad for SWA? I mean beyond the obvious of 'planes out of position; crew out of position, blah blah'.
The overall national airspace system, the airports, the aircraft, the various vendors (fuel delivery, catering, etc.) are all working. (Yes a few minor exceptions but nothing widespread). The planes clearly didn't all go mech at the same time. They originally had enough crew scheduled to operate a full schedule yesterday, today and tomorrow, so there should be people there to operate the ramp, the planes, ops, etc. From what I can tell reading the WSJ article it is something with crew scheduling -- the planes are there and the crew may be there, but they're not able to match people to positions quickly enough, so pilots, FAs, GAs etc. are just sitting around waiting to be given an assignment, which never comes, and the eventually run out of hours.
But curious if anybody has more detailed context...?
The overall national airspace system, the airports, the aircraft, the various vendors (fuel delivery, catering, etc.) are all working. (Yes a few minor exceptions but nothing widespread). The planes clearly didn't all go mech at the same time. They originally had enough crew scheduled to operate a full schedule yesterday, today and tomorrow, so there should be people there to operate the ramp, the planes, ops, etc. From what I can tell reading the WSJ article it is something with crew scheduling -- the planes are there and the crew may be there, but they're not able to match people to positions quickly enough, so pilots, FAs, GAs etc. are just sitting around waiting to be given an assignment, which never comes, and the eventually run out of hours.
But curious if anybody has more detailed context...?
Dec 27, 2022, 6:14 am
#75
Join Date: Feb 2020
Location: USA
Programs: MB Ambassador, WOH Globalist, HH Diamond (Aspire), AA Gold, UA (*G) Gold
Posts: 5,084
They could solve things long-term or at least help things by being less stubborn and getting interline agreements that will help everyone in the long run as we should be pooling all excess US seat capacity when issues on airlines come up. Everyone else has signed on, but Southwest continues to absorb capacity while not giving back to the system. It screws their passengers the most.
