Another Reason I Fly Southwest
If it’s not evident by now, I pretty hate every domestic airline, with the sole exception of Southwest. American is charging you $50 to redeem miles (each way), and of course, there’s the nonsense about checking bags. I know they’re having financial problems, but what they don’t realize is they’re making those problems worse with all these terrible policies. They’re making travel more painful, when they need to make it painless.
They are driving customers like me away. Straight into the waiting arms of Southwest.
I just booked my Thanksgiving flight through Southwest.
In this case, I don’t even know if they were the cheapest. Maybe they were, maybe they weren’t. I didn’t even check the other airlines.
Why? Well, I’ll be starting a new job, so I’m only about 80% sure of travel dates. I might have to move things a day or so, but I wanted to buy my ticket before Thanksgiving gets any closer, and prices go up even more.
If I do that on Southwest, they’ll let me change my flight as many times as I want. If the new flight costs more, they’ll only charge me the difference. No additional fees. In fact, if the new flight is cheaper, Southwest will even give me a credit.
More or less, over the last 10 years, they’ve built a lot of trust with me. Trust they’ll be reasonable & do the right thing. Yes, they are a corporation & they exist to make a profit. But they realize a key element is to build a loyal customer base, make it clear what you’ll offer, and stick to the expectations you set.
On any other airline, a change in flight would be the difference in fare, plus an additional $50-$100 for the flight change, potentially for each leg.
October 12th, 2008 at 12:17 pm
You forgot to mention that you’ve already made use of this ability, because you initially booked the ticket in the wrong directions.