Southwest Airlines is preparing to make further changes to its boarding process on Wednesday in an attempt to solve ongoing dramas with overhead bin space at the front of the plane filling up too quickly, leaving passengers frustrated and angry, and resulting in a lot of congestion in the jetbridge.
Here’s what the changes mean for your next flight:
On January 27, Southwest Airlines made one of the biggest changes in the Dallas-based company’s 58-year history: it abandoned its iconic open seating policy for assigned seating, and with it, introduced a new boarding process that was meant to make getting everyone on board as quick and painless as possible.
Despite having months to prepare for the change, it’s fair to say that Southwest has been dealing with a fair number of teething issues, and passengers are growing increasingly irritated with the situation.
Southwest is dealing with a flood of complaints from once loyal customers about the new boarding process and the lack of space in the overhead bins for their hand luggage, and the airline is all too keen to sort out the situation as quickly as possible.
The airline has introduced a group boarding strategy, which works like this:
| Priority and pre-board | Customers with disabilities Active duty US military Customers who have purchased Priority Boarding |
| Groups 1 & 2 | A-List Preferred Choice Extra fares Extra legroom seats |
| Groups 3 – 5 | A-List Choice Preferred |
| Group 5 | Rapid Rewards credit card holders |
| Groups 6 – 8 | Choice fare Basic fare |
As you can see, Southwest deliberately built some flexibility into the exact boarding groups in which some passengers will actually board the plane. For example, A-List Preferred members could be asked to board in Group 1 or in Group 2.
And A-List members could either board as early as Group 3 or as late as Group 5.
In an attempt to alleviate some issues with overhead bin space filling up early on in the boarding process, Southwest decided to move all extra legroom seat passengers into Group 1, but that hasn’t had the desired effect the airline was hoping for.
In fact, it’s had the opposite effect, and now, Southwest is making yet another change.
From February 18, only passengers sitting in the first three rows and self-help emergency exit rows will be included in Group 1, while Group 2 will now consist of A-List Preferred passengers, Choice Extra fare passengers, and all the other extra legroom seat passengers.
In an internal memo, the airline explained: “This is being done to help solve congestion in the jet bridge and bin space issues we saw this past week.”
What some passengers are finding so frustrating is that they simply don’t know which boarding group they are going to be in on the day, and now customers who had booked extra legroom seats outside of rows 1-3 are now scrabbling to reassign their seats so they are amongst the first on board.
Of course, this race to get on the plane first isn’t just about escaping the gate as quickly as possible but rather about securing limited space in the overhead bins for hand luggage.
What Southwest may have learned from all the other airlines that it has copied is that this is a similar tale the world over when passengers are encouraged through the effect of checked luggage fees to bring all their belongings on the plane.
Late last week, it also emerged that Southwest was making other on-board changes to alleviate hand baggage woes, by moving a reserved bin for flight attendants’ luggage from the front of the plane to the back.
That decision did not land well with the TWU 556 flight attendant union, which blamed the avalanche of complaints that Southwest is facing on its own “poor planning.”
Everyone and their mother-in-law saw a problem with Southwest’s boarding process and seating change, but Southwest with their years of a multitude of experience, pilots and stewarts NOT being able to see a potential problem? Easiest solution is to simply allow ppl to check one bag in for free; reassign the recent MBA whose idea it was to charge ppl and piss off loyal customers, and for Southwest to have a “heart” again.
Exactly. Even with free first bag checked, it’s a circus
Loyal Southwest customer and card holder for many years. The new policies removed all of the reasons I flew with only them. Got an Alaska card and started earning points and booking with them instead. No one asked for this except their greedy investors, and I won’t be helping them take advantage of us if I can help it.
Alaska is getting 95% of my business now- SW gets the places they can’t get to
SWA should just admit that they screwed up, & go back to what worked, 2 bags included i your fare cost (nobody ever believed that it was ‘free’) and open seating with the A-B-C boarding groups. As we heard often from the attendants, ‘you’re not picking out new furniture here, you’re just renting a seat for an hour or two. They’re all the same. Pick one and we’ll get going’.
It’s a simple solution, don’t allow carry on
They are changing multiple things, change that and problem solved !!!
If they stop carry-ons altogether they might lose even more customers!
Definitely NOT the solution. Let people check a bag for free. That’s a step in the right direction. Maybe a stipulation to put your bag in the bin directly over your seat. The assigned seating arrangement has not created this problem. Charging for checked bags has created this problem.
This is the reoccurring theme in the comments!
Since Southwest is a huge pro-trump company, you will never have to worry about seeing me oflights. n one of their
I’m a business traveler, and as I am flying solo my preferences are to not be assigned seated next to the sick girl or 600 lb man . I can afford to be sick or unable to work on a presentation.i didn’t fly swa for the luxuries, I flew them BECAUSE it really didn’t matter if I grabbed the next flight becuase my meeting went long, and I could grab whatever seat worked best for my next stop. If that differentiation isn’t there, then well I probably will fly whatever one is available rather than being loyal to what swa offered.
Unless you’re locked in by a credit card, frequent flyer status or simply schedule… shop around!
Amen! Southwest took a successful business and scuttled it. Now they’re just like every other mediocre airline.
You know, what also might help the overhead bin situation is for everybody to actually put their smaller items underneath the seat directly in front of them instead of in the overhead bin.
How bone-headed to punish premium customers buying extra pitch and early boarding by blocking their ability to stow their carry-ons nearby by reserving space for staff. Of course, those same individuals are the less price sensitive business travelers who are on short trips with carry-on and will make other arrangements or, like me, bemoan the loss of a North Star for Southwest.