Schedule Changes drive me Nutz!

[waterbug123]

18 hours ago, Hlitner said:

Somehow Southwest is able to make a nice profit and keep ticket prices down while also not charging fees for checking luggage or changing their schedules every week. 

 

Well, first of all they don't always keep prices down. I rarely find them to be particularly competitive in my market.   They don't open their booking schedule as far in advance as the legacy airlines so there is less chance of schedule changes after booking. 

 

 

15 hours ago, Hlitner said:

 SWA does not charge penalties and they issue a full credit for canceled reservations. 

 

There is no free cancellation on their Wanna Get Away fares.   You can change them, but you can't cancel and get a refund.

 

 

5 hours ago, sumiandkage said:

The secret to getting good treatment from an airline, even if you're on a cheap ticket and have no status often comes down to: Proactive, Persistent, Polite, and Pleasant*. If there's a big delay on your travel day and you're going to misconnect or there is other weirdness, the time to get rebooked is five minutes ago. I'm very good at out-hustling the high status folks and getting my new seats as they hesitate. (Gate Agents and Customer Service reps are under huge pressure to fix as many problems as quickly as possible during what the airlines call IRROPS or irregular operations.

 

I absolutely agree with your 4 P's!  I employ them myself regularly with good results. 

I'm not sure how you know you're "out-hustling the high status folks" though.  They may not be visible talking to the gate agent because they already had a club rep take care of them, or they called the special phone line (with little to no hold time) for high status folks and were already re-accommodated that way, etc. 

 

[sumiandkage]

4 hours ago, waterbug123 said:

 

I absolutely agree with your 4 P's!  I employ them myself regularly with good results. 

I'm not sure how you know you're "out-hustling the high status folks" though.  They may not be visible talking to the gate agent because they already had a club rep take care of them, or they called the special phone line (with little to no hold time) for high status folks and were already re-accommodated that way, etc. 

 

 

I monitor flight status like a hawk once we're within a 3 hour before departure window, and have been known to refresh the Delta app multiple, multiple times once I start to get a whiff of a misconnect scenario in order to get the 'You may not make your original connection. Do you want to rebook?'  screen to appear. For simple rebookings, it works quite well with no phone or rebooking desks queue. At my last likely misconnect situation, I literally snuck my phone off airplane mode while we were on the ground waiting for takeoff clearance for the VPS-ATL ground, had the best rebooking option get sniped out from under me as I typed, and then managed to snare what had become the only other seat available to my destination that night on an alternate routing while waiting for the pilot's next  'Well folks..." update. 

 

So for infrequent flyers, do get the airline's app and have your ticket info all entered in it- it can seriously save your bacon during weather delay situations. 

 

One of the reasons why I've become loyal to Delta over the years is that I seem to be a magnet for IRROPS and other general flight weirdness and they seem to have the best ways of getting me back on track to make it to my destination in the best way possible.  

[waterbug123]

19 hours ago, sumiandkage said:

So for infrequent flyers, do get the airline's app and have your ticket info all entered in it- it can seriously save your bacon during weather delay situations. 

 

One of the reasons why I've become loyal to Delta over the years...

 

I can really only speak to Delta's app, as it's the only one I use regularly, but additional reasons to have the app handy while traveling:

-track your bags

-just after touchdown (of if you have wifi in flight) check to see where your departing gate is if connecting

-after check-in, check to see where you are on the standby list or upgrade list if applicable

-check the status of someone else's flight if you are meeting them but arriving on different flights

-find location within airport of a Sky Club (if you have access to same)

-enter a parking reminder to recall where you parked when you get back from your trip

[iancal]

We had occasion to change our flights in order to return home early from SE Asia.  Same departure city both times, different airlines- Delta and United.  

 

We always practice the 4P's.

 

Delta made the change so very easy and so very fast.  Fifteen minutes from call time to new flight times.  Excellent service.  We had no issue with paying the change fee. Two years later on United.  A complete disaster.  Took us two days before we could finally get it done and confirmed. 

 

So guess how we are flying to SE Asia this winter?  Delta.   Won't even consider United.  We continue to be impressed with Delta's customer service (we have been groomed to expect the worst by so many organizations) and much less so by United.  The Continental service has been wrung out since the merger.