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Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

nutsoverSWA
Explorer A

I do miss the "Your Trip is right around the corner" reminders that SWA used to send out.

 

No shows nabbed me 4x in 2018.  Unfortunatley it grabs and destroys your whole routing (RT) so double whammy if you happen to book overlapping trips to same destination.   (And leaves you stranded... (Never book a RT, just have 10+ pages of single trips booked.  (don't forget to cancel them!) if you happen to need to change / no-show.)

 

Yes, it would be SO simple for SWA to resurrect "Your Trip is right around the Corner", they have the data... 

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

chgoflyer
Aviator A

@nutsoverSWA wrote:

I do miss the "Your Trip is right around the corner" reminders that SWA used to send out.

 

No shows nabbed me 4x in 2018.  Unfortunatley it grabs and destroys your whole routing (RT) so double whammy if you happen to book overlapping trips to same destination.   (And leaves you stranded... (Never book a RT, just have 10+ pages of single trips booked.  (don't forget to cancel them!) if you happen to need to change / no-show.)

 

Yes, it would be SO simple for SWA to resurrect "Your Trip is right around the Corner", they have the data... 


 

Southwest has retired that subject line (and I for one am happy they did, since, to me, 30 days later is not "right around the corner") but they do still send multiple emails between booking and departure date, all which reference the specifics of a particular flight.

 

If you're not receiving these emails, you should 1) check your account preferences to make sure you haven't opted out of them, and 2) check your spam folder to make sure they're not being filtered out.

 

Your advice about always booking one-ways on Southwest remains solid. For a number of reasons, that's been the "best practice" for years now.

 

I'm slightly confused though about your comment regarding overlapping reservations. Be aware that those can generate automatic cancellations due to the multiple bookings policy, not the no-show one. The primary and very important difference being that cancellations due to multiple bookings will generate travel funds good towards future travel, while the no-show policy triggers forfeit of funds.

 

 

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

DancingDavidE
Aviator A

Did @nutsoverSWA mean nested RT flights? That could be allowed as long as none of the bookings were mutually exclusive.

 

However for ease of maintaining the flight schedule, I concur...book one-ways anyway. 

 

I do get reminder emails, although if you are looking for an additional reminder, I'd suggest:

 

  1. On your app allow notifications and enable the capacibility for the automatic check-in if you are A-list - then you'd know 24 hours in advance to cancel.
  2. App in the Air is my favorite of the third-party travel apps for Southwest. Enter the ticket info when you buy it to keep a reminder in the app for 24-hour notice as well as other day-of features that may be beneficial. https://www.appintheair.mobi/
  3. Trip-it would also perform this function, but I had difficulty in how they integrated with Southwest's email system and every email about the same flight got added as additional flights, they didn't account for changes, etc.

 

 

 

 

Home airport MDW, frequent visitor to MCO to see the mouse.

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

mcmdkdd
Adventurer C

I am curious as to why you recommend booking one way flight? Why are 2 one way flight more advantageous than one round trip?

 

j know there must be a good reason but I don’t understand it.  Thank you for helping me understand it. 

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

mcmdkdd
Adventurer C

I am curious as to why you recommend booking one way flight? Why are 2 one way flight more advantageous than one round trip?

 

j know there must be a good reason but I don’t understand it.  Thank you for helping me understand it. 

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

DancingDavidE
Aviator A

@mcmdkdd wrote:

I am curious as to why you recommend booking one way flight? Why are 2 one way flight more advantageous than one round trip?

 

j know there must be a good reason but I don’t understand it.  Thank you for helping me understand it. 


It doesn't cost any more than booking round trip on Southwest, so to start off there isn't a cost penalty to do it that way. 

 

Then you gain flexibilty in changing and canceling each leg individually, inlcuding after you've already flown the earlier leg of a trip. The OP was talking about several trips nested together where the RT tickets overlap, for instance flying to a destination the fist of the month and back on the last of the month, and then a separate reversed RT back to home on the 7th and returning to the destination on the 23rd for example - in practice when he misses the flight on the 7th, the one on the 23rd is also canceled and has to rebook.

 

You also gain flexibility in booking half of a trip with points vs cash. Also methods of payment which aren't unlimited quantity but on two one-way tickets could be different from each other if you were trying to use up a wide combination of payment methods.

 

In some cases, and although it is known that you aren't supposed to book mutually exclusive trips, it may be possible that you have booked two potential depature dates knowing that you'll cancel one when the trip gets closer.

 

Points and credits accumlate in real time with one-ways, if you were to hit status on an outbound leg, you'd have status returning using one-ways but would have to wait for travel to complete for your status with round trips. 

 

It would also be possible to change airports - for instance I one time had a flight from DCA back to Chicago but needed to change to a later flight - it was feasible to change the flight to BWI even accounting for taking the train over there. That would require a phone call if you had booked a round trip, or maybe it isn't allowed without a changing the ticket.

 

I have also heard if you have to call and modify a ticket, you can only call to change it further after that - by having one-way tickets you can make more changes online and protect your ability to keep changing in the app.

 

One that I have heard about, but not experienced myself was that there was (may still be) a limit on how many boarding passes you can have per confirmation number. If you made a same-day RT that had connections, you may not be able to have access to your return boarding passes. As one-ways, you'd have the allowance for each confirmation number. (@bec102896 did you run into this with your epic day long trips?)

 

EDIT: @bec102896 clarifies that current software would still check in A-list and EBCI customers even if you can't access the boarding pass. TBD if others can check in at 24-hours although may not have access to the boarding pass until the earlier segments are completed?

 

I don't endorse it, but you could also use hidden city trips with one-ways - if you missed that connection on a RT ticket the remaining itinerary would be canceled. This may be academic, I've rarely seen any instances where Southwest offered pricing that was conducive to this anyway. And note that you'd not receive tier qualifying status on a flight that you did this. So don't do this, but if you did do it, do it with one-ways booked and not a round trip ticket.

 

Lastly if you have companion pass, it's easy to book the companion for only one of the legs if they would be joining you later or meeting you there. I think this could also be accomplished by phone if you wanted to do it, but another example of keeping things online with self-serve.

 

And to be fair there seems to be one major downside to one-way fares, which is in the event of irregular operations such as weather, you may be offered reaccomodation on one of the legs and not the other. Customer service would probably be able to help with this, but you'd have to call as opposed to using an online link to re-book or refund. Also if you were making a day trip and the first flight was delayed long enough to where it impacted the second flight, I believe Southwest would fix it but would require talking to someone.

 

Also if you end up with travel funds, and they expire, a minor downside is that you'll have two travel funds and pay two fees to re-instate these as vouchers, if it came to that. You should try to get them combined prior to expiration.

 

 

 

 

Home airport MDW, frequent visitor to MCO to see the mouse.

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

mcmdkdd
Adventurer C

Thank you. This is good information. I appreciate your time with tho. 

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

bec102896
Aviator A

@DancingDavidE wrote: 
(@bec102896 did you run into this with your epic day long trips?)

 

 

 

 

 


I have not had any issues with boarding passes with my epic long day trips including the one I did last week (I think everyone here would call me crazy for the route I took to get from MCO to HOU 😂) I believe that's because I'm A List so it automatically checks me in. Also back before I was A List (with the old reservation system) it wouldn't check me in until after I complete one way of the the RT so I ended up with a C pass for the 3rd and 4th segment. I learned the lesson and bought the EB check in and had no issue the next time. I'm not too sure how it would work now with the new system unless I book without A List (sorry I LUV my A boarding too much to test it 😂

 

side note I wouldn't do my crazy type of route unless your an experienced traveler because 1 delay could mess up your whole trip. 

 

However i book One Ways a lot because it's easier in my opinion to manage and it's nice to get the points right after the flight is complete where if you have a RT you have to complete your whole trip to get the points and I can then count confirmation numbers for A List Audits (should there be a system glitch and I not get points or credit) it's easier to just count each confirmation number as 1 trip instead of which confirmation had 2 trips (RT) 

 

Blake 

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

mcmdkdd
Adventurer C

Thank you 

Re: No-show Penalty Got Me - Would Like Texts

DfDrPepper_23
Frequent Flyer C

@nutsoverSWA

 

I agree with your comments. I used to have a emails from SWA shortly before my trip. But nowaday, I goes on another airlines. That is about it.