03-24-2022
02:16 PM
Thanks for your feedback on my post. A couple of comments to clarify:
Yes - i see now that duplicate booking is against SWA rules. I never knew this and in all of my years traveling have never had a reservation cancelled without notice by the airline. On the SWA website - the 45page Contract of Carrier document says they can cancel a duplicate reservation without notice on page 9, section 2.a.2.iii.f.i - so SWA was within their "rights".
I still question - is this the way to treat the customer? If they can write an algorithm to find the duplicate - you would think they could create similar logic to communicate with the customer. I received an email that his reservation had been cancelled at 1:48pm for his 4:55pm flight. He arrived at the airport at 2pm....so he had 12-min "notice". He had a two hour drive in 10" of snow to get to DIA - so that is why he is there 3 hours early....
I will also add that while the 12-17-year old traveler is not a service/program where SWA assumes responsibility - you are not allowed to book these reservations on a mobile device as they require the parent to fill out a form with communication/contact details etc. directly on swa.com. So his reservation was clearly flagged as a minor traveling alone. So - not sure why they force you to go through that step if they aren't going to contact you - but assume it is just a waiver of liability or some other legal detail....
In any case - I have gone out of my way to travel this airline over the years (even forgoing direct flights on competitors) but not sure they are going out of their way for me. Possibly it is just a post-COVID thing with not enough resources, or too much growth, or just an isolated situation.
... View more
