Southwest cancellations...

[DallasGuy75219]

On 12/28/2022 at 7:12 PM, Jim and Monika said:

We are worried about all the Southwest cancellations, we are flying to Miami on Tuesday January 4 for our cruise on Wednesday. We are afraid our flight might get cancelled last minute. We would still have time to drive, but they would have our luggage. Not sure if we should try renting a car to drive down and fly back, or just drive our own car, Not worried about the drive down, just not sure we want to drive back after our cruise.

Southwest is supposed to be largely back on schedule by Friday 12/30.  Folllow the status of their return to service, but unless widespread cancellations continue or there's bad weather predicted in your origin, destination, or layover cities before your travel date, you should be good.  I'm scheduled to fly them January 6 for a Ft. Lauderdale cruise and am not terribly concerned provided I can see they get back on schedule soon.

[parachutes63]

I reserved at pvd, T F Green Airport. Alamo rental company. That price was 120 a day plus fees to come up to $314.

[Drazil65]

Read those annual policies carefully - most of them are for medical incidents only, and most of those that are more comprehensive (trip delay, trip interruption, etc.) have much lower limits for both medical and other claims than a per-trip policy.

 

Agree...educate yourself and choose the coverage best suits your needs (or what you would want for reimbursement if possible).  We dont do the annual policies and typically can choose what we need per trip (cruise, AI, Europe, land/drive to).  We look for things like primary medical coverage (i.e. they will advance money required to admit to hospital as many smaller islands in Caribbean require as much as $10k up front) especially for out of country where our own health insurance does not cover.  If flights are involved we look for that added coverage for the duration as travel insurance can cover the period of time before the actual trip (on the way to the vacation).  Educate yourself...

Edited December 30, 2022 by Drazil65

[Thenagers]

Good news for those with flights this weekend.  My local news channel reporting that ALL southwest flights today are back on schedule!  Raleigh/Durham.

[pmms052999]

21 hours ago, CajunOyster said:

 

Having done it as much as six times a year since 1993, there is no place in Maryland that will take you 24 hours to drive to Miami.  Drive smart, use Waze, and consider alternate routes south (like 81/77/26 to avoid most of 95) and you can reliably get from anywhere in Maryland to Miami in 17-18 hours.  Less if you're in central or southern Maryland.

Seriously, if you're not using Waze, get it.  And I'm not joking about 81 - it eliminates hundreds of I-95 miles including DC, all of Virginia and North Carolina, and half of South Carolina.

We live in Southern Maryland and did this a few years ago.  A blizzard was coming so we made the decision that Thursday to drive (supposed to fly on Saturday for a Sunday cruise).  We rented a car and headed to Miami (cost was $50 and no one-way fee!).  

OP - if you decide to drive and get a one-way rental, check each specific car rental's site...sometimes they won't charge you the one-way fee.  

[mz-s]

7 hours ago, DallasGuy75219 said:

They've been around for 50+ years.  Yes this last week is going to cost them some customers lost for a long time (if not forever), lost goodwill, DOT fines, refunds for cancelled flights, reimbursement for interim customer expenses and alternate travel, goodwill vouchers for affected customers, payments to crews for guaranteed minimums because they couldn't work their scheduled flights, and reimbursement to crews for hotel costs they incurred themselves (and probably meal costs while they were stuck out-of-base in the middle of a trip sequence), all the while they were making relatively little revenue by flying their planned schedule. 

 

Yes it will impact Q4 earninngs but with their financial resources this is not remotely big enough to put them in bankruptcy or out of business.

 

Oh I don't think they'll be out of business by the end of the month or anything like that. But I think it's possible that they'll be gone in due time and people will point back to this event as what started their demise.

[Lee Cruiser]

We've used SW numerous times without any problems, including our most recent cruise back at the end of September into October.  Hopefully they will be able to make the upgrades they need to make and continue to be a great option for so many.  Time will tell.  Apparently this is the failure of the past CEO and the new leadership is working to make things better.  I read this interesting post from a SW pilot, Larry Lonero:

 

What happened to Southwest Airlines?

I’ve been a pilot for Southwest Airlines for over 35 years. I’ve given my heart and soul to Southwest Airlines during those years. And quite honestly Southwest Airlines has given its heart and soul to me and my family.

 

Many of you have asked what caused this epic meltdown. Unfortunately, the frontline employees have been watching this meltdown coming like a slow motion train wreck for sometime. And we’ve been begging our leadership to make much needed changes in order to avoid it. What happened yesterday started two decades ago.

 

Herb Kelleher was the brilliant CEO of SWA until 2004. He was a very operationally oriented leader. Herb spent lots of time on the front line. He always had his pulse on the day to day operation and the people who ran it. That philosophy flowed down through the ranks of leadership to the front line managers. We were a tight operation from top to bottom. We had tools, leadership and employee buy in. Everything that was needed to run a first class operation. When Herb retired in 2004 Gary Kelly became the new CEO.

 

Gary was an accountant by education and his style leading Southwest Airlines became more focused on finances and less on operations. He did not spend much time on the front lines. He didn’t engage front line employees much. When the CEO doesn’t get out in the trenches the neither do the lower levels of leadership. Gary named another accountant to be Chief Operating Officer (the person responsible for day to day operations). The new COO had little or no operational background. This trickled down through the lower levels of leadership, as well. They all disengaged the operation, disengaged the employees and focused more on Return on Investment, stock buybacks and Wall Street. This approach worked for Gary’s first 8 years because we were still riding the strong wave that Herb had built.

 

But as time went on the operation began to deteriorate. There was little investment in upgrading technology (after all, how do you measure the return on investing in infrastructure?) or the tools we needed to operate efficiently and consistently. As the frontline employees began to see the deterioration in our operation we began to warn our leadership. We educated them, we informed them and we made suggestions to them. But to no avail. The focus was on finances not operations. As we saw more and more deterioration in our operation our asks turned to pleas. Our pleas turned to dire warnings. But they went unheeded. After all, the stock price was up so what could be wrong?

We were a motivated, willing and proud employee group wanting to serve our customers and uphold the tradition of our beloved airline, the airline we built and the airline that the traveling public grew to cheer for and luv. But we were watching in frustration and disbelief as our once amazing airline was becoming a house of cards.

 

A half dozen small scale meltdowns occurred during the mid to late 2010’s. With each mini meltdown Leadership continued to ignore the pleas and warnings of the employees in the trenches. We were still operating with 1990’s technology. We didn’t have the tools we needed on the line to operate the sophisticated and large airline we had become. We could see that the wheels were about ready to fall off the bus. But no one in leadership would heed our pleas.

 

When COVID happened SWA scaled back considerably (as did all of the airlines) for about two years. This helped conceal the serious problems in technology, infrastructure and staffing that were occurring and being ignored. But as we ramped back up the lack of attention to the operation was waiting to show its ugly head.

 

Gary Kelly retired as CEO in early 2022. Bob Jordan was named CEO. He was a more operationally oriented leader. He replaced our Chief Operating Officer with a very smart man and they announced their priority would be to upgrade our airline’s technology and provide the frontline employees the operational tools we needed to care for our customers and employees. Finally, someone acknowledged the elephant in the room.

 

But two decades of neglect takes several years to overcome. And, unfortunately to our horror, our house of cards came tumbling down this week as a routine winter storm broke our 1990’s operating system. The frontline employees were ready and on station. We were properly staffed. We were at the airports. Hell, we were ON the airplanes. But our antiquated software systems failed coupled with a decades old system of having to manage 20,000 frontline employees by phone calls. No automation had been developed to run this sophisticated machine.

 

We had a routine winter storm across the Midwest last Thursday. A larger than normal number flights were cancelled as a result. But what should have been one minor inconvenient day of travel turned into this nightmare. After all, American, United, Delta and the other airlines operated with only minor flight disruptions.

 

The two decades of neglect by SWA leadership caused the airline to lose track of all its crews. ALL of us. We were there. With our customers. At the jet. Ready to go. But there was no way to assign us. To confirm us. To release us to fly the flight. And we watched as our customers got stranded without their luggage missing their Christmas holiday.

 

I believe that our new CEO Bob Jordan inherited a MESS. This meltdown was not his failure but the failure of those before him. I believe he has the right priorities. But it will take time to right this ship. A few years at a minimum. Old leaders need to be replaced. Operationally oriented managers need to be brought in. I hope and pray Bob can execute on his promises to fix our once proud airline. Time will tell.

It’s been a punch in the gut for us frontline employees. We care for the traveling public. We have spent our entire careers serving you. Safely. Efficiently. With luv and pride. We are horrified. We are sorry. We are sorry for the chaos, inconvenience and frustration our airline caused you. We are angry. We are embarrassed. We are sad. Like you, the traveling public, we have been let down by our own leaders.

Herb once said the the biggest threat to Southwest Airlines will come from within. Not from other airlines. What a visionary he was. I miss Herb now more than ever.

[kelkel2]

It appears based on FlightAware’s website that there’s only 41 cancelled flights across the country with Southwest today. Seems like thing may be back in the normal zone today. 
We really enjoy Southwest Airlines, although Delta is our preferred airline. We go back and forth between the 2. Southwest wins out more often due to nonstop flights and free checked bags, especially since we’re now a family of 4. Saving money where we can is important to us, as it is with other families too I’m sure. It’s what keeps us able to go on cruises. Living in Illinois it makes it difficult to cruise and NOT fly. This is the first time Ive been booked with southwest and a little nervous. But we don’t fly until 1/20 so I think we’ll be ok. Southwest isn’t going to go out of business over this. There’s a lot of people who are looking to save money which is what keeps spirit, allegiant, frontier etc in business. I do however think they have a lot of work to do to gain their customer’s trust back and it could take years for them to build their customer base back. And they HAVE to get their technology updated. 

[KKB]

DS got to PHX this AM no problems.

OMA shows NO SWA cancellations today, as of this moment.

They said they would be essentially 100% today & it appears that they may well be so across the nation.

Doesn't fix what happened, but it is step 1 in getting things right. 

I'm confident this will light a fire under them to get their IT updated ASAP.

 

[KKB]

20 minutes ago, Lee Cruiser said:

 I read this interesting post from a SW pilot, Larry Lonero:

 

What happened to Southwest Airlines?

I’ve been a pilot for Southwest Airlines for over 35 years. I’ve given my heart and soul to Southwest Airlines during those years. And quite honestly Southwest Airlines has given its heart and soul to me and my family.

 

Many of you have asked what caused this epic meltdown. Unfortunately, the frontline employees have been watching this meltdown coming like a slow motion train wreck for sometime. And we’ve been begging our leadership to make much needed changes in order to avoid it. What happened yesterday started two decades ago.

 

Herb Kelleher was the brilliant CEO of SWA until 2004. He was a very operationally oriented leader. Herb spent lots of time on the front line. He always had his pulse on the day to day operation and the people who ran it. That philosophy flowed down through the ranks of leadership to the front line managers. We were a tight operation from top to bottom. We had tools, leadership and employee buy in. Everything that was needed to run a first class operation. When Herb retired in 2004 Gary Kelly became the new CEO.

 

Gary was an accountant by education and his style leading Southwest Airlines became more focused on finances and less on operations. He did not spend much time on the front lines. He didn’t engage front line employees much. When the CEO doesn’t get out in the trenches the neither do the lower levels of leadership. Gary named another accountant to be Chief Operating Officer (the person responsible for day to day operations). The new COO had little or no operational background. This trickled down through the lower levels of leadership, as well. They all disengaged the operation, disengaged the employees and focused more on Return on Investment, stock buybacks and Wall Street. This approach worked for Gary’s first 8 years because we were still riding the strong wave that Herb had built.

 

But as time went on the operation began to deteriorate. There was little investment in upgrading technology (after all, how do you measure the return on investing in infrastructure?) or the tools we needed to operate efficiently and consistently. As the frontline employees began to see the deterioration in our operation we began to warn our leadership. We educated them, we informed them and we made suggestions to them. But to no avail. The focus was on finances not operations. As we saw more and more deterioration in our operation our asks turned to pleas. Our pleas turned to dire warnings. But they went unheeded. After all, the stock price was up so what could be wrong?

We were a motivated, willing and proud employee group wanting to serve our customers and uphold the tradition of our beloved airline, the airline we built and the airline that the traveling public grew to cheer for and luv. But we were watching in frustration and disbelief as our once amazing airline was becoming a house of cards.

 

A half dozen small scale meltdowns occurred during the mid to late 2010’s. With each mini meltdown Leadership continued to ignore the pleas and warnings of the employees in the trenches. We were still operating with 1990’s technology. We didn’t have the tools we needed on the line to operate the sophisticated and large airline we had become. We could see that the wheels were about ready to fall off the bus. But no one in leadership would heed our pleas.

 

When COVID happened SWA scaled back considerably (as did all of the airlines) for about two years. This helped conceal the serious problems in technology, infrastructure and staffing that were occurring and being ignored. But as we ramped back up the lack of attention to the operation was waiting to show its ugly head.

 

Gary Kelly retired as CEO in early 2022. Bob Jordan was named CEO. He was a more operationally oriented leader. He replaced our Chief Operating Officer with a very smart man and they announced their priority would be to upgrade our airline’s technology and provide the frontline employees the operational tools we needed to care for our customers and employees. Finally, someone acknowledged the elephant in the room.

 

But two decades of neglect takes several years to overcome. And, unfortunately to our horror, our house of cards came tumbling down this week as a routine winter storm broke our 1990’s operating system. The frontline employees were ready and on station. We were properly staffed. We were at the airports. Hell, we were ON the airplanes. But our antiquated software systems failed coupled with a decades old system of having to manage 20,000 frontline employees by phone calls. No automation had been developed to run this sophisticated machine.

 

We had a routine winter storm across the Midwest last Thursday. A larger than normal number flights were cancelled as a result. But what should have been one minor inconvenient day of travel turned into this nightmare. After all, American, United, Delta and the other airlines operated with only minor flight disruptions.

 

The two decades of neglect by SWA leadership caused the airline to lose track of all its crews. ALL of us. We were there. With our customers. At the jet. Ready to go. But there was no way to assign us. To confirm us. To release us to fly the flight. And we watched as our customers got stranded without their luggage missing their Christmas holiday.

 

I believe that our new CEO Bob Jordan inherited a MESS. This meltdown was not his failure but the failure of those before him. I believe he has the right priorities. But it will take time to right this ship. A few years at a minimum. Old leaders need to be replaced. Operationally oriented managers need to be brought in. I hope and pray Bob can execute on his promises to fix our once proud airline. Time will tell.

It’s been a punch in the gut for us frontline employees. We care for the traveling public. We have spent our entire careers serving you. Safely. Efficiently. With luv and pride. We are horrified. We are sorry. We are sorry for the chaos, inconvenience and frustration our airline caused you. We are angry. We are embarrassed. We are sad. Like you, the traveling public, we have been let down by our own leaders.

Herb once said the the biggest threat to Southwest Airlines will come from within. Not from other airlines. What a visionary he was. I miss Herb now more than ever.

Yep, I posted this a couple days ago under Cruise Air.

It gives a good inside story about the mess.

[bgrmini]

10 hours ago, icft said:

Where did the OP even hint that anyone should refund the cost of the cruise. Why admonish them for something they never said?

 

My thought is they will have no problem and everything will be back to normal soon. But I can understand their having some concern. This big of a disruption for this long is near unprecedented and due not only to the weather but also to their systems failing. The weather will pass but can their systems be relied upon?

My reply was not directed at the OP. Another thread was merged into here. I was replying to post #38, Oldsweets was the OP before the merge.

[kelkel2]

2 minutes ago, KKB said:

DS got to PHX this AM no problems.

OMA shows NO SWA cancellations today, as of this moment.

They said they would be essentially 100% today & it appears that they may well be so across the nation.

Doesn't fix what happened, but it is step 1 in getting things right. 

I'm confident this will light a fire under them to get their IT updated ASAP.

 

Not to mention this is a PR nightmare for them and likely costing them millions of dollars. It’s in their best interest to make sure it doesn’t happen again and I believe DOT being involved won’t give them a choice. 

[jsglow]

1 hour ago, mz-s said:

 

Oh I don't think they'll be out of business by the end of the month or anything like that. But I think it's possible that they'll be gone in due time and people will point back to this event as what started their demise.

Care to wager? 🙂

[jsglow]

35 minutes ago, KKB said:

DS got to PHX this AM no problems.

OMA shows NO SWA cancellations today, as of this moment.

They said they would be essentially 100% today & it appears that they may well be so across the nation.

Doesn't fix what happened, but it is step 1 in getting things right. 

I'm confident this will light a fire under them to get their IT updated ASAP.

 

I think you're right.  If that 35 year pilot was accurate in his assessment, Jordan and Green might be the guys to get this on track. Next Tuesday there needs to be a meeting where they basically shelve ALL growth plans and get the entire company focused on this crew tracking problem. "There are no new initiatives until that's fixed people. None! We will not get another chance."

[mz-s]

36 minutes ago, jsglow said:

Care to wager? 🙂

 

Does your casino give comps like free drinks while playing or a free balcony room? If not, then no. 😄

[csm5986142]

I'm jealous of those who find Southwest to be a bargain.  They typically are not the lowest price for our location, but many times offer the best schedule.  We don't check bags, so even that is not a benefit to us.  I have been watching their fares recently (was going to try to rebook some of my future flights if there were any deals) but not much luck.  Yes, it was bad for PR and their 4th quarter reporting will take a hit, but for all the people I've seen on the news saying they will never fly Southwest again, their planes are still pretty booked up well into June (at least the flights I'm looking at).  

[jsglow]

1 hour ago, csm5986142 said:

I'm jealous of those who find Southwest to be a bargain.  Yes, it was bad for PR and their 4th quarter reporting will take a hit, but for all the people I've seen on the news saying they will never fly Southwest again, their planes are still pretty booked up well into June (at least the flights I'm looking at).  

The people who say they'll never take SWA again are already the subset of folks who don't like them for Point to Point or Open Seating. Now that said, this is a big mess they DO need to clean up and fix.

 

Myself, I am waiting for the 'We're super sorry; we Effed Up sale'. 😆

 

Edited December 30, 2022 by jsglow

[KKB]

SWA used to be the lowest fares. Not always so now.

Then about 10 years ago we got Companion Pass... and have had it since (tho this may be our last year...we would put private college tuition on our SWA credit card, pay off w/ 529...public school tuition ain't cheap, but it doesn't get us as close to 135K points/yr!!)

With Companion Pass its a NO brainer.

We set timers to check in on time & nearly always get A boarding group so we can usually sit where we prefer to.  We have SWA priority credit cards so we each get 4 free upgrades/yr if not.

Yes, free checked bags & free changes/cancellations are huge perks.

We have traveled A LOT in the last 10 years & have had NO issues w/ SWA.

 

Now, with Companion Pass expiring the end of this year, I will look at all airlines when booking. We have a lot of SWA points...and a stash of SWA cards so that will keep us going for a while!

 

[jsglow]

@KKBwhat's your non-stops out of OMA? I'm guessing MDW, DEN, LAS, HOU, BNA and maybe MCO? Not too bad if it's that good or better.

 

We ourselves get to price compare MKE and MDW with the differential and schedule determining if the extra 90+ minutes in the car is worth it.

[KKB]

1 minute ago, jsglow said:

@KKBwhat's your non-stops out of OMA? I'm guessing MDW, DEN, LAS, HOU, BNA and maybe MCO? Not too bad if it's that good or better.

 

We ourselves get to price compare MKE and MDW with the differential and schedule determining if the extra 90+ minutes in the car is worth it.

STL, MCO, DEN, PHX, HOU, LAS

Even occasional directs to FLL.

[CajunOyster]

3 hours ago, mz-s said:

 

Does your casino give comps like free drinks while playing or a free balcony room? If not, then no. 😄

 

Probably not, but I'll bet his casino gives way better odds than the horrible ones given to you by the casino that gives you "free" drinks and rooms.

[jsglow]

40 minutes ago, KKB said:

STL, MCO, DEN, PHX, HOU, LAS

Even occasional directs to FLL.

Cool. Certainly MDW too (as I've stopped there). Yeah, we're truly blessed being so close to MKE, MDW and ORD. The first two for all our domestic needs, usually non-stop, the latter for world class international.  We're headed to a Pride B2B out of Dover next August.  Totally solid tix out of ORD on SAS and Iceland.  And better yet, we got a 24 day parksleepfly for under $150. Jumped on that instantly.

[Illbcruzn4life]

4 hours ago, csm5986142 said:

I'm jealous of those who find Southwest to be a bargain.  They typically are not the lowest price for our location, but many times offer the best schedule.  We don't check bags, so even that is not a benefit to us.  I have been watching their fares recently (was going to try to rebook some of my future flights if there were any deals) but not much luck.  Yes, it was bad for PR and their 4th quarter reporting will take a hit, but for all the people I've seen on the news saying they will never fly Southwest again, their planes are still pretty booked up well into June (at least the flights I'm looking at).  

we used to fly SW almost exclusively. Since they bought Airtran and now have Atlanta as a hub it's hard to almost impossible to get a direct flight to any of the cruise ports in Florida.

 

We now use AA although we did find one direct flight to FLL for our cruise in April on SW. Like a needle in a haystack.

[notscb]

3 hours ago, jsglow said:

The people who say they'll never take SWA again are already the subset of folks who don't like them for Point to Point or Open Seating.

 

That might be an oversimplification given the sheer amount of flights that were cancelled during the busiest travel time of the entire year.

[bguppies]

On 12/28/2022 at 9:03 PM, CajunOyster said:

 

Nah, if it were Spirit or Frontier I'd agree with you.  But I think Southwest is TBTF.

 

I'm sure those of us old enough to remember, thought that exact same thing in the 70's and 80's about Pan-Am and TWA