Southwest Airlines: A Customer Service Report Card

I was excited to travel back from my business meeting in Tennessee last week. I had a direct flight and would be back by 9:30am, giving me plenty of time to recoup from the trip and spend time with my dog who had to be boarded while I was gone. It was all worth getting up at 3:45am to get to the Nashville airport in time to make my 6:40am flight. I always look forward to flying into San Diego and looking over the familiar red tile roofs and the city’s gem, Balboa Park.

Arriving at the airport by 5am, I went to the Southwest Airlines check-in kiosk, typed in my confirmation number, then received a disturbing message:

“Your flight has been canceled.”

Not “delayed” or “changed,” but CANCELED. I was directed to see a flight agent. Naturally, the line was long with other travelers who had experienced the same thing. At least four of the people in line ahead of me were going to San Diego, too, and like me had received NO NOTICE.

By the time I got to the friendly (but slow) agent, most of the flights for the day had been filled. In fact, while she was apologizing for the “mechanical problem,” she kept saying, “Oh....that one just filled, too.” Please Lady....less talking, more booking. My offered alternative was a flight at 2:30pm that would get me into San Diego around 9pm. She assured me that was my only option, and sent me on my way, after letting me know I couldn’t drop my baggage off until 4 hours before my flight and no offer of anything else.

I was in a fog. 9 hours to kill in an airport where I was stuck with my luggage. A nearby agent suggested I call customer service. While on hold, I also walked over to Delta to see if they had any flights. 20 minutes later, customer service informed me I could fill out a complaint online. Delta had even less good news...nothing that would really offer me a significant time savings.

I went to the airport lounge and tried to sleep, but was too annoyed to close my eyes. After about an hour, I went back to the agent line and found one that was much more direct...AND helpful. The offer was a direct flight to San Diego that would get me in 3 hours earlier. The catch: it would touch down in Denver, Albuquerque, and Las Vegas first. I'LL TAKE IT!

I checked my luggage in and went to the gate. Meanwhile, I decided to tweet about my frustration. I quickly received a canned apology from Southwest:



Of course I complied with the request to take this conversation offline to get some form of compensation.



How would I rate Southwest after this experience? I’d give them a B-, which is not awful. Let’s face it, mechanical problems and errors can (and have) happened on every single airline. I understand that. The big error: Southwest canceling my flight WITHOUT notice or rebooking me immediately on another flight. That left me in the lurch with an alternative that cost me an entire day.

On the plus side, they did offer an immediate response to my tweet and with a little prodding, also gave me a $100 voucher. Not the amount I would have wanted, but it would definitely come close to covering a one-way flight at a later date. I was proud of myself for keeping my cool and not losing my s&*t; experience has taught me that you get much further when you express the issues and not the emotion.

Let’s get back to the pretty landing pictures, shall we?







Look at this shot from 2015:



and the matching one from this trip. You can see that the abundance of rain this season has had a marked effect on greening San Diego!



I hope your travels are much more pleasant than this particular one!

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See more photos at my main website.