Canceling the return flight of a round trip points booking

[dottiedeer]

The second leg of my flight today departs at 2:25 pm.  My flight tomorrow departs at 1:25 pm.  I cannot checkin for tomorrows flight because todays flights are not complete.  There are many things I like about Southwest, but this limitation has the likliehood of assuring I get a rear middle seat on a full plane.  It doesn't seem like a major software programming challenge to separate the different days flights and provide for independent check in. This doesn't require any change to the 24 hour rule or any other check-in rules that I'm aware of.   Have others experienced this as an issue. 

[TheMiddleSeat]

That is a very inconvenient "feature", I will add it to my long list of reasons it's almost always better to book one way flights versus round trip. If the outbound and inbound flights are booked separately you can check in at T-24 for each reservation. You could call and ask that the reservation be split into 2 PNRs, that should remove the limitation. Purchasing EarlyBird Check-In would also work.

[bec102896]

The best way to handle this would be to book flights as one way reservations that way you can change or cancel a leg without issue and you can be checked in for the outbound and return if it is a same day reservation. If you don't want to book 2 one way reservations I would recommend buying the EB check in for the return so you will be checked in even though you can't get the boarding pass 

I have not had the issue of not being able to check in for 2 different days flights only if I had the outbound and return on the same day but I learned to either book one ways or the EB 

hope this answers your question 

blake 

[chgoflyer]

Buying one-way flights, while good advice in general for Southwest flyers, won't help in this situation.

Southwest's systems don't allow any passenger to hold more than two boarding passes at any given time. So, if you have a connecting flight today and a return less than 24 hours away, you won't be able to get a BP for the return until after you complete the first leg of the outbound.

Yes, this is dumb.

It's an old IT system limitation that one hopes will be addressed by Southwest at some point. But having been this way for years, one isn't particularly optimistic.

[bec102896]

I know they got a new system back last year I have had success with 2 one ways getting boarding passes at the same time. Either way that's also why I recommend EB check in which will help you avoid the C group unless a ton of others on the flight buy EB as well 

[chgoflyer]

Unfortunately, the new system (which actually caused more issues than it fixed -- see non-refundable "refundable" fares) didn't fix the limitation on no more than three boarding passes. 😞

Two boarding passes at one time have never been a problem.

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@bec102896wrote:

I know they got a new system back last year I have had success with 2 one ways getting boarding passes at the same time. Either way that's also why I recommend EB check in which will help you avoid the C group unless a ton of others on the flight buy EB as well 

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