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Purchased Extra Seat For ESA - A little Confusion at Airport.

PonyVillalobos
Explorer C

I recently flew with my ESA and wanted to thank Southwest for being ever so excellent!!

I have one comment.  I find when purchasing my tickets over the telephone not every agent is aware of the policy-- that if someon's ESA is too large to fit under the seat the customer has the option of purchasing an extra seat to ensure enough room for their ESA, and will be able to receive a refund for this seat after they've completed travel.  
No biggy though, the agents in the end always accommodates when I explain, it just takes a little bit longer and there seems to be some confusion with how they actually book the extra seat.

For example, when I bought an extra ticket for my ESA for my last flight the agent clearly knew the extra ticket was for my ESA.  She said it was noted and added to the ticket and obviously I paid for it. but when I got to the airport the friendly agent didn't understand that I had an extra ticket for my ESA.  She didn't understand I needed the extra boarding pass that says "reserved" on it to place on my ESA's seat.  She finally found the extra ticket but something was wrong with how the original agent booked the extra ticket for my ESA. The agent at the airport said it added a soul to the count of passengers on the plane...something like that.


Here is my question-
When booking tickets for myself and my ESA, besides telling the agent the extra seat is for my ESA is there anything else I should be telling the agent about the category of the extra ticket to avoid confusion at the airport?  

Thanks so much for always having excellent customer service, Southwest! 

1 REPLY 1

Re: Purchased Extra Seat For ESA - A little Confusion at Airport.

Mobius
Explorer C

I'm a big guy at 6' tall and 360 pounds.  I always purchase an extra seat for myself using the Fat Customer...um... Customer of Size policy.  

 

It might just be easier to tell them that the extra seat is for you.  I always book online and it's pretty simple... you just list yourself twice, with the 2nd "you" having a middle name of XS.  Instructions are at the link below:

 

https://www.southwest.com/html/generated/help/faqs/extra_seat_policy_faq.html 

 

Good luck!