Good morning, I am writing to share my experience on a recent flight. Flight 4151 from MCO to ATL. Gate 128.
It’s two days later, and I am still in shock that this happened. About an hour before our flight we received notification that it was boarding. We were in the food court eating. We quickly gathered our stuff and headed to the gate (128). Upon arrival at the gate no one was lined up so we walked up to the desk to ask what was going on. There were two Southwest employees there talking. I said excuse me is the flight boarding? We just received notification that it was. Very rudely she looked at me, and then slowly looked at the gate where no one was lined up, rolled her eyes and said “no.” I said, “OK, thank you.” I was taken aback by the rudest but unfortunately, today that’s a part of travel. We fly every week and have encountered this many times, but as we were walking away to find seats, the woman I spoke with made an announcement over the loudspeaker she said “for the last time the flight is not boarding, tell your cousins, your mother, your friends, it’s not boarding, please stop coming up here and bothering us.“ The people in the gate area started laughing. It was very uncomfortable. We had no idea that they had been previous announcements as we were in the food court. Feeling very embarrassed, we went and sat down for a moment, and as I sat there, I thought about how we were just treated and decided it was not OK and I was going to email Southwest. I walked back up to the desk to take a picture of the board to show that it said the flight was now boarding even though it was an hour before our flight. I sat back down at my seat, which was at gate 129 a significant distance from the desk. A few minutes later, the woman, the Southwest employee that had been so rude to me, walked up to me and said very aggressively “Did you just take my picture? I can sue you if you post my picture on social media.” I was shocked that an employee would confront me in such a way. Not only that but to seek me out, in my seat at the next gate and speak so rudely to me. I replied that “no I had not taken her picture. I took a picture of the board for the information.” She then demanded to see my phone. I could not believe it. Obviously I refused, and then I asked to speak to her supervisor, because what she was doing was outrageous, and her response was. “I don’t need no supervisor- I supervise myself. You don’t need to speak to no one and you need to show me that phone!” I was shocked and I felt threatened as she continued to demand to see my phone. I looked around for security, but didn’t see anyone so I walked up to the desk, and I asked one of her coworkers if they could get a supervisor. Their response was “did you take our picture?” I was completely shocked by the lack of professionalism shown by these agents. One of the agents said “what’s the problem” and I explained that she was not only rude when I asked a question, she was now confronting me very aggressively and I would like to discuss it with someone. And she responded with “We’re allowed to tell jokes, Southwest wants us to tell jokes.” And I explained that I appreciate that however, humor is subjective and rudeness and aggression are never OK. In addition, at no point should a Southwest employee threaten me, a customer. The entire time that I was talking to the other agents at the desk the woman (later I found out her name was Anita) who had confronted me was standing 5 feet away talking to other customers seated by the gate, saying, “do you believe the bull**** I deal with every day.” I could not believe it. We have flown Southwest for decades. It has always been our favorite airline. I understand the challenges right now hiring competent people. I know that just getting people to show up for work is basically all we can expect right now, but this has really gone too far. I have never been afraid of an employee before boarding an airplane and on this day I was. I can’t believe my experience and I’m not sure what I could do.
And while I would like to say going forward, I’m just going to choose another airline. I can’t really do that as I have 400,000 miles and a free companion pass. I have to fly every week for work so if I were to choose another airline all the time and moneyI spent building up these miles and companion Pass will have been a waste.
