Assigned Seating At Swa?

[FM2436]

This past summer, my family and I (wive and 3 kids, ages 10, 8, and 5) had the opportunity to fly Southwest from BWI to MDW. Great flight with no problems, but my wife insisted that we arrive at the GATE 2-hours prior to departure for fear if we arrived later, our family of 5 would have been split up and scattered in different seats all over the cabin.

Make a long story short, we arrived early enough to be included in the first group of 30 boardings and had no problems sitting together.

Point is, I'd be willing to pay an extra $5-$10 per ticket for assigned seating. I've heard that Southwest is considered assigned seating. Will that happen?

BTW: We were told pre-boarding of families were limited to families with a child of age 4 and younger.

 

[SWAFA30]

Doubtful. A few months back, while speaking at a conference our CTO was quoted as saying that SWA now had the technology in place to implement assigned seating. The industry press got a hold of that quote and ran with it. Rumors flew both inside the company and out that assigned seating was in the works. In a matter of days senior management released a statement to employees clarifying their position on assigned seating. The upshot was that while the technology had changed, SWA's core belief in the efficacy of open seating had not and was not likely to do so anytime in the near future. Right or wrong, true or false management believes that open seating reduces workload on Customer Service staff and gets aircraft off the gate faster. It is important to understand something about how SWA operates. Any change to the model is carefully reviewed under a cost/benefit analysis. Until the cost of NOT assigning seats becomes too high, open seating will remain standard operating procedure.

As a flight attendant I just want to point that I can and will move passengers around in the cabin to accomodate families when necessary. A simple PA requesting that passengers help out is usually sufficient to get folks to switch. Glad to hear your flight was enjoyable. Come back and see us again.

 

[BoeingBoy]

Excuse my butting in but I agree that you folks should keep doing what you're doing as long as it effective.

A short story to illustrate...

Back in the olden days before everything was computerized, our gate agents had a sheet of paper for the flight. On that sheet was an outline of the cabin with stickers in each seat position. Each sticker had that seat number on it. When a pax checked in at the podium the seat assignment was accomplished by taking a sticker from the sheet and putting it on the passenger's boarding card. Simple and effective - if a given seat didn't have a sticker on it, that seat had already been assigned.

Fast forward to today. Everything is computerized (they don't make mistakes, do they?) and folks can select their seat and get boarding passes ahead of time. But it's amazing how often two people end up claiming the same seat. A F/A has to contact the agent to see who's supposed to be sitting in that seat and which seat the "loser" is supposed to be in. Result, extra time & effort.

Jim

 

[Tanker]

There is some talk that SWA may have to go to assigned seating because it will be mandated by TSA. From what we are hearing it seems that TSA wants to know where every pax on a flight is sitting. The only way to do that is by assigned seating. SWA is still trying to convience TSA that unassigned seating is safer as a potential highjacker won't know where his seat will be & therefore can't arrange for someone to leave a weapon at his seat. So the bottom line is don't plan on SWA having assigned seating unless it is mandated by TSA.

 

[KCFlyer]

There is some talk that SWA may have to go to assigned seating because it will be mandated by TSA. From what we are hearing it seems that TSA wants to know where every pax on a flight is sitting. The only way to do that is by assigned seating. SWA is still trying to convience TSA that unassigned seating is safer as a potential highjacker won't know where his seat will be & therefore can't arrange for someone to leave a weapon at his seat. So the bottom line is don't plan on SWA having assigned seating unless it is mandated by TSA.

So...what's to stop a person from taking a seat other than the one that is assigned? I used to do it all the time.

I agree with SWA that assigned seating accomplishes nothing in the name of security, other than allowing an FA on a phone to tell someone what seats the hijackers were in when they got up to attack the crew. But that's a day late and a dollar short. In fact, it seems that the hijackers on AA11 were ASSIGNED the most convenient seats in the plane for accessing the cockpit...Row 1. Odds are pretty good that they selected those seats themselves when they booked the flight. I wonder if some of the outcomes might have been different if the hijackers had to pick some seat that was slightly less convenient.

 

[AirwAr]

http://www.woai.com/news/local/story.aspx?...67-30A8D7B3F7E9

Does this mean WN now has pre-reserved seats?

 

[diverboy]

My only concern is all the thru flights..

for example, LAX-RNO-BOI-GEG
BDL-BWI-BHM-HOU-AUS

Talk about a nightmare assigning seating..

 

[diverboy]

http://www.woai.com/news/local/story.aspx?...67-30A8D7B3F7E9

Does this mean WN now has pre-reserved seats?

No, it means you print your A, B, or C from home.

 

[JS]

This past summer, my family and I (wive and 3 kids, ages 10, 8, and 5) had the opportunity to fly Southwest from BWI to MDW. Great flight with no problems, but my wife insisted that we arrive at the GATE 2-hours prior to departure for fear if we arrived later, our family of 5 would have been split up and scattered in different seats all over the cabin.

Make a long story short, we arrived early enough to be included in the first group of 30 boardings and had no problems sitting together.

Point is, I'd be willing to pay an extra $5-$10 per ticket for assigned seating. I've heard that Southwest is considered assigned seating. Will that happen?

BTW: We were told pre-boarding of families were limited to families with a child of age 4 and younger.

Two hours early? What a waste of time!

Flying with a family that is just barely too old to meet the pre-boarding rules is one instance where open seating on Southwest will SAVE you time rather than waste it.

Board at the last minute, and if you don't see five seats together, just stand there and wait for the flight attendants to orchestrate a game of musical chairs.

If enough families do this, Southwest will either add families to the list of people eligible for pre-boarding, or they will have to assign seats (at least to groups traveling together) in order to leave the gate on time.

When you show up two hours early, you are wasting an hour and a half in order to save Southwest five minutes. That makes no sense.

 

[SWAFA30]

Two hours early? What a waste of time!

Flying with a family that is just barely too old to meet the pre-boarding rules is one instance where open seating on Southwest will SAVE you time rather than waste it.

Board at the last minute, and if you don't see five seats together, just stand there and wait for the flight attendants to orchestrate a game of musical chairs.

If enough families do this, Southwest will either add families to the list of people eligible for pre-boarding, or they will have to assign seats (at least to groups traveling together) in order to leave the gate on time.

When you show up two hours early, you are wasting an hour and a half in order to save Southwest five minutes. That makes no sense.

In June of this year, WN will have been operating with Open Seating for 33 years. I think it is safe to say Customer Relations has answered more than their fair share of angry letters from families who were ineligible for the pre-board. I would think that if complaints from families who can't sit together were sufficient cause to switch to assigned seating, it would have happened long before now. Modify the definition of "family" for the sake of preboarding and you are opening a whole othe can of worms. What is the age cap? 6 years old? 7? 8? 15? You allow a couple of families of 4 or 5 whose youngest is 13 or 14 and now you are ticking off your Frequent Fliers who are in the "A" group who are now stuck in 22B and 16E because 50 people just preboarded. You don't want to tick off your FF, he flies every week while the Griswolds only take the kiddos to WallyWorld once a year.

 

[KCFlyer]

JS - being one of those rare people who showed up for a flight at least an hour early, even with the luxury of an assigned seat, can you explain why on two occasions (TWA and Delta) when I was travelling with my wife and then 3 year old daughter, holding the confirmation with the all powerful "assigned seat", when we checked in at the counter we were handed boarding passes in separate rows...even the 3 year old was assigned a seat by herself? If they would have had open seating, I would have been in the "first boarding group" and would have had any seat I wanted.

Of course, with your airline of choice (Delta), you don't have to worry about familes with children preboarding because they don't preboard families with children or senior citizens unless said child or senior is a "medallion" passenger. But you'd better get the kids checked in sooner than 30 minutes prior on Delta, lest your reservation gets cancelled.

 

[JS]

JS - being one of those rare people who showed up for a flight at least an hour early, even with the luxury of an assigned seat, can you explain why on two occasions (TWA and Delta) when I was travelling with my wife and then 3 year old daughter, holding the confirmation with the all powerful "assigned seat", when we checked in at the counter we were handed boarding passes in separate rows...even the 3 year old was assigned a seat by herself? If they would have had open seating, I would have been in the "first boarding group" and would have had any seat I wanted.

Of course, with your airline of choice (Delta), you don't have to worry about familes with children preboarding because they don't preboard families with children or senior citizens unless said child or senior is a "medallion" passenger. But you'd better get the kids checked in sooner than 30 minutes prior on Delta, lest your reservation gets cancelled.

You can still pre-board on Delta. All you have to do is ask. If it's obvious (e.g., in a wheelchair), the gate agent will probably ask you first.

Delta doesn't make a general announcement for pre-boarding, because doing that brings "families" (i.e., people with too much carry-on luggage) out of the woodwork. Better to leave them in the dark, thinking that pre-boarding is history, and pre-board only those who truly need it, which is the disabled.

 

[KCFlyer]

You can still pre-board on Delta. All you have to do is ask. If it's obvious (e.g., in a wheelchair), the gate agent will probably ask you first.

Delta doesn't make a general announcement for pre-boarding, because doing that brings "families" (i.e., people with too much carry-on luggage) out of the woodwork. Better to leave them in the dark, thinking that pre-boarding is history, and pre-board only those who truly need it, which is the disabled.

JS - My sister in law had two kids with her. Her husband was not travelling with her, and she happened to pay full fare for all three tickets. She was lugging two car seats along with two kids. I have never had to "ask" an agent to preboard on any airline. After they called medallions, they began with general boarding. At that point, I asked the gate agent if she could preboard and was told "no". Now, this was before 9/11 when non ticketed passengers could go to the gates. The agent went on to say "You're travelling with them, aren't you?". To which I replied "As a matter of fact, I'm not". But it was made VERY clear to me, asking or not, preboarding for families, even "familes" with two children requiring car seats, was NOT done on Delta Air lines. But....these days, if one followed your recommendation to show up 30 minutes prior...be aware that on Delta, 30 minutes prior means reservation cancelled. Better suggest 35 minutes, or, if you don't want to be a particular jerk, one hour....just like the airlines have ALWAYS recommended.

 

[Tanker]

JS
You no longer have to get to the airport early to get your boarding pass if you are ticketless. You can now get your boarding pass at home from southwest.com on the day you travel. So if you want that prime seat print your boarding pass at home & show up at the gate 30 minutes prior to departure & go down with the "A" group.

 

[Cfm56]

These people who insist that their families have to sit together drive me crazy. My kids are around 10 years of age and sometimes my wife, me, and the kids can't all sit together....big deal. Occasionally my wife will sit with one and I'll sit with another in different parts of the airplane. Other times we have all sat seperatly. It was good for the kids to learn to sit by strangers, chat with them, sometimes meet interesting people, and just learn to be a little independent. Frankly it was good for the whole family to be seperated after being right on top of each other during the vacation....sort of a refreshing break for everyone. I wish more people would think like at it like this. Oh..and if a kid is really young but over the pre-board age and you can't sit together, just go ahead and sit where you can and let the kid cry and scream at the top of his lungs for Mommy and the passenger sitting by him/her will gladly change seats and let Mommmy sit by him/her.