Southwest Airlines has taken a lot of heat for the way it has handled the unexpected grounding of its Boeing 737 MAX fleet. Many customers are angry and argue that Southwest has acted very much out of character. But are such charges really fair?
With an unprecedented number of flight cancellations, many Southwest customers have found themselves stranded. To make matters worse, Southwest has not canceled or consolidated flights as proactively as American or United have. This has led to customer complaints like this:
Southwest spokesman Chris Mainz told USA Today:
The duration is one major factor of what makes this situation highly unusual —especially for our customers. We know it’s been frustrating for our customers, but we have taken several steps to try to minimize the inconvenience and frustration.
One step has been to waive the fare difference charged when customers change their tickets. Southwest already does not charge a change fee, but typically will charge any difference in fare. Refunds have also been offered.
But that has not been the primary problem. Instead, the issue is Southwest’s sometimes-limited schedules and lack of partners. When an American flight is canceled, passengers can be quickly rebooked on United or Delta. When a Southwest flight is canceled, passengers can only be re-booked on a Southwest flight.
That has really hurt many customers. Vacations have been ruined. Family reunions have been canceled. Once-in-a-lifetime trips have had to been cut short. Some of the stories are downright depressing.
In Defense Of Southwest
But while I have great empathy for those who have been negatively affected, I find myself in the rare position of defending Southwest.
When you buy a Southwest ticket, you should know what you are getting yourself into. And I don’t just mean the open seating, free baggage, and folksy flight attendants. Southwest is in a world of its own. It does not partner or interline with other airlines. That means, when something goes wrong, your only option is another Southwest flight.
While that comes across as tough love when a customer is told to either cut their trip short or stay an extra few days, it is what it is. It’s part of the Southwest package.
Customers have also complained about a general lack of empathy from Southwest and a refusal to provide compensation for trips that have been ruined. Here, though, we again must understand that the grounding of the 737 MAX fleet constituted a force majeure event, beyond the control of Southwest. While compensation is always appreciated, I’m not sure why Southwest should be on the hook for a government-mandated grounding of key aircraft in its fleet.
I also understand why Southwest did not more proactively cancel flights. These aircraft, and the pilots who fly them, are sitting idle. The moment the ban is lifted, service can resume. Why cancel weeks in advance when there existed a fair chance (based upon past FAA practice) that the ban might be quickly lifted?
The Mechanics Wild Card
But any analysis of this topic must also include a discussion of Southwest’s recent labor woes. As I covered last month, Southwest and its mechanics have been engaged in open warfare against one another.
Southwest has canceled more than 5,600 flights since February for non-weather reasons. It was only today, April 5th, that Southwest and its mechanics have reached a new agreement. Mechanics will immediately receive a 20% pay increase plus retroactive pay. More details here.
Many of the cancellations have come not due to the 737 MAX grounding, but due to the inability of the two sides to reach a deal (it only took six years and a lawsuit…).
Whether you are pro-union or pro-Southwest, the airline certainly cannot blame many of its cancellations on outside actors. These cancellations preceded the 737 MAX issue, but have now continued simultaneously.
CONCLUSION
Again, I feel very bad for Southwest customers whose trips have been ruined. But I also do not think this represents a crippling indictment against Southwest. Instead, it represents growing pains and a reminder that Southwest is in a league of its own. Often that’s a good thing, but perhaps not in this case…
image: Southwest
Ok, some of that is true… But some is crap.
I NEVER fly Southwest for exactly what you are saying… I know what I am getting myself into.
BUT, Southwest should be giving more than a 3-hour cancelation… PERIOD … If not a cancelation, at least a warning.
If I were booked, I would know what equipment I’m on and I would be proactive… But I’m not 99.999% of the US. Most people don’t pay attention to the aircraft they are booked on… especially Southwest customers.
Southwest might not owe compensation, but they should send out warning or cancelations more than 3 3hours in advanced.
Southwest needs to grow up. Lack of interline was excused because of their historical low fares. Not true anymore. Their customer service has been pretty bad lately. They are often seen as the airline that can do no wrong. They haven’t been giving customers much notice of which flights they will cancel and people are screwed out of very important and often non-refundable expenses.
Southworst has always been trying to shove their Texas attitude in places where in doesn’t belong. And you can see that failure through-and-through : ranking #3 in Chicagoland, #4 in LAX, and #5 in NYC metro, the 3 most populous areas of the nation.
The message cannot be clearer – when it comes to actually competing at the most important cities (you know, where businesses are actually located and where business travelers fly to and from), they’ve shown to be far down the list.
Idiots keep proclaiming how 2 free bags is so amazing. There are times my Star status and cabin combined gives 3 free bags, and i don’t even bother to check a single 1, and those losers think 2 is a selling point.
I think there are two critical factors not being considered in your analysis of the situation:
1. WN’s refusal to voluntarily ground the planes provided a terrible optic to the flying public. Same for AA and UA. Whether it was necessary prior to FAA’s ruling is immaterial at the point as the court of public opinion had spoken. We can go further down the rabbit hole of politics and lobbying and such, but I’ll abstain. Either way, WN looked like a bunch of dicks for conceivablly putting profits over pax safety. This has undoubtedly tainted their reputation, so they have an uphill battle to fight already, and they’re losing it with this recent spate of nonsense.
2. What you know about the ins and outs of flying is not common knowledge among the vast majority of the flying public, especially those that choose WN based on the presumption of lower fares – which we know to be bogus for many of their routes. While ignorance is never an excuse, the presumption that vacations for those who travel rarely would be planned with a full accounting of potential WN failures is a slippery slope of blaming the victim. The “folksiness” of WN leads a lot of the flying public to believe they won’t be screwed by the airline itself, which seems to be happening with greater frequency in light of the grounding. WN is becoming a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
I can appreciate your desire to play devil’s advocate, though.
I think canceling 3 to 7 days out would be a happy medium. Canceling the day of is just cruel to those who are counting on the airline to get them to their business, personal, and leisure destination.
Southwest today is so different from Southwest 10 years ago. The loss of “LUV” didn’t happen suddenly this year but has been a slow decline that was exacerbated by the merger with AirTran. Today’s Southwest is far removed from the one that served small airports and markets well and didn’t try to change itself to compete in large airports.
Thankfully, this issue hasn’t affected me personally. I haven, though, been impacted and frustrated by Southwest’s growing pains over the last few years, especially as more flights are connecting vs point to point back and forth. Their operations have really been hit, with delays now my built-in expectation and cancellation not a shock to me. Come a very long way from when I always counted on them to be rock solid reliable and on time vs UA!
I’ll echo what AdamR said. The issue is that the average Southwest customer just isn’t going to aware of the intricate ins and outs of airline operations, and the implications of Southwest being an island upon itself so to speak. Sure, I know what I’m getting into, but I wouldn’t expect the average family flying to Tampa for their beach vacation to understand all that.
And while I don’t disagree that the MAX grounding is a force majeure event, I really don’t think canceling the day of due to a MAX substitution (or lack thereof) is an acceptable outcome. 3 days or so in advance? Sure – that at least gives affected customers a realistic possibility of either re-routing on Southwest, or taking a refund and booking with someone else (albeit at a likely higher cost). But sending a cancellation notice at 7:30 am for an 11 am departure in many cases leaves you with no suitable alternative.
Both of my SWA MAX flights weren’t cancelled until 4 days before departure. The only problem I had with that was when I proactively called a week earlier to ask about one of the flights, they told me “Everything is fine. This flight will fly.”
The issue you are referring to represents the larger problem of the complexity of legalese being above the average citizen’s ability for comprehension.
I’m not sure 737 grounding classifies as force majeur. Its pending investigation. Should any intention of unlawful act proven, it will falls under criminal law. Should its not proven, it still falls under administrative decree.
You studied law, you should’ve known better.
Canceling MAX flights close to departure, when alternate flights are sold out, leaves passengers with very few viable alternatives. Does WN have to do anything? No, they are not ‘obligated’, but then WN should not be surprised at a lack of loyalty (aka sense of obligation) in return.
Southwest thinks they are very special, but if they treat customers are replaceable, as it appears in the USAToday article, then the reciprocal is coming from at least some of us. We do have other airline choices.
It’s funny. Southwest has consistently been 4th, among the big 4 in the US, in on time and reliability. Hardly a peep out of the media. The media biased towards southwest is obnoxious. If any of the other big three would have been the first to kill a passenger in 10 years and was last in all the metrics, you guys would be all over them. Instead here’s an article supporting them while they are messing up.
My advice to everyone, is to stay away from Southwest; the quality of their ground personnel (ticket and gate agents) have definitely declined in recent years. Their seats are very uncomfortable, and their rest rooms are not the cleanest. I agree with the individual who stated that the Southwest of today, is not the one that it was years ago.