Old Drink Coupons

[enjinok]

I just found 4 drink coupons with no expiration date on them!

They may be at least 8 years old! Will they still be excepted?

Thank you!

[franktravel]

Sorry but no. The only ones you can use now have an expiration date.

[aaustin21]

I don't understand if you are given a nice gift from Southwest with a drink coupon, why you would not honor them? We used to fly SW all the time and received the coupons. Tried to use them today and the flight attendant said "We don't take them anymore" No explanation. If there isn't an expiration date on a coupon that says "Free drink", SW should still honor them without discussion.

[chgoflyer]

I agree.

However, back in 2011 Southwest began no longer accepting any of their drink coupons that had been issued without an expiration date.

Southwest had -- perhaps short-sightedly -- issued many, many drink coupons for many, many years that, without an expiration date, had to be carried as a liability on their financials. Their answer was to blanket expire them all on a set date, thus recovering that value.

Had they not been an air carrier and the coupons part of a frequent flyer program -- which meant that many consumer protections didn't apply -- they wouldn't have been able to get away with it.

Many customers were, as you'd expect, angry about this. It marked, for many, the beginning of a new era for the company, one where customer-friendly policies -- the very thing that made Southwest a success in the first place -- were over time being replaced with harsher policies and more focus on the bottom line.

The accountants are now running the show.

A class-action lawsuit was considered, but eventually, once deemed non-actionable (due to limitations in the laws that govern US air carriers), it morphed into a different case concerning only the drink coupons given with Business Select tickets. That resulted in a $29 million settlement, with replacement coupons recently being distributed to affected customers.

Hope this helps explain what happened.

[DancingDavidE]

That's a lot of business select coupons! Did we have to opt-in to that one, I don't remember seeing it.

My bigger issue with the BS coupons is that sometimes I'm flying in the morning and would rather save it for a flight later in the evening.

[chgoflyer]

If you flew on a BS flight during the time covered by the suit, you were a member of the class and should have received replacement coupons automatically as part of the settlement.

The suit was about the coupons not initially specifying that they could only be used on the original flight. As part of the suit, Southwest agreed to allow use anytime on the same day, and to note those terms on the coupon.

You can use a BS coupon from a morning flight on a flight later on that same day.

I often find unused coupons available for the taking on the no-bags check-in kiosks. 😉