As a parent of two kids under 2.5, I have to say that I wish this policy had been announced before we booked tickets to fly from Denver to Houston on Southwest for the Christmas holiday.
We have one lap child, so we won't be able to check in online, and our older daughter will be traveling in her carseat. That will leave us in the unfortunate position of trying to find seats together with the carseat at a window, while being automatically ruled out of the A boarding group because we couldn't check in online.
If Southwest had assigned seating, taking away family preboarding would be a nuisance to me but not a deal-breaker. Sure, it would hold up the boarding process in general to get the carseat and all of us situated, but that would just be like every other airline. Since there is no assigned seating, however, this new system just makes me terrified that the parents and carseat child will have to sit in middle seats scattered about the plane, which of course is an enormous safety hazard with a carseat. Having a two year old sitting apart from her parents is also a huge safety hazard, in addition to being an annoyance to end all annoyances to the de facto babysitters sitting around her.
Please, Southwest -- address these concerns. How are you going to guarantee that my family can sit together, when we can't check in online and therefore won't be part of the A boarding group? For me the pre-boarding isn't about waltzing down the jetway and taking the good seats. It's about my family being able to sit together, which minimizes the stress and irritation for all passengers on the plane.
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