Why Southwest Sucks

I've flown hundreds of times. I just want to lay the groundwork here for what I am about to talk about. I am not a new flier, an internet enabled bargain flier, or a every-once-in-awhile flier. I am a business and personal traveller, I typically fly a lot. Being currently based in Pittsburgh, that has meant that most of my flying over the last twelve years has been on USAir. Sometimes United, JetBlue, Continental, and other airlines. I haven't really had the chance to fly Southwest much and the last time was several years ago. The tickets I used to fly to San Francisco were Southwest tickets, that couldn't be avoided. The original tickets (vouchers really) were part of an auction I bought in support of the MDA at last year's Muscle Team event at PNC Park. If I didn't use the vouchers soon, they would expire. Groundwork now laid, I proceed with the rant.

Southwest, for those of you lucky enough to be unfamiliar with them, uses an "Open Seating" approach to your seating in the plane. In other words, you do not have a seat assignment, but are categorized into A, B and C groups that are each numbered 1 thru 60. You line up next to numbered poles and proceed onto the plane where, theoretically, you can sit anywhere you want. They really play this up around the airport and in their PA speaking, "The Freedom to Choose", blah blah blah. In reality this system gives freedom to exactly ONE person, the first person on the plane! After that, no one really has any freedom at all. Because people are people, and the flying public are not people but neanderthals, the first groups onto the plane sit in the aisle or by the window. This process leaves ONLY middle seats for the later groups to choose from. (In a minute I'll tell you the process that leads to determining what group you are in, that's fun!) So the old freedom starts to loose its luster if you are in the B or C group. It is even worse if you happen to be traveling with someone, which I was. So on the four hour plus leg from San Francisco to Chicago, we ended up sitting eight rows apart, crammed into middle seats. I had asked the Priest sitting next to Elizabeth if he wouldn't mind us sitting together, but he refused. Of course. He wanted to sit in an aisle seat! Well, pardon me padre, but who doesn't? Because he was a Priest I didn't attempt asking if he would accept $20 to move, but in hindsight I probably should have.

During the course of four flights I saw families, husbands and wives, children, all separated from their loved ones in the pursuit of "Freedom". Sad huh?

Oh, it gets worse. So how do they determine who gets to be in the A, B, and C (Sometimes even a D!) groups? Do you pay more? Do they have a random lottery? Nope. It is all based simply on when you got your boarding pass, the sooner you get that the higher up the charts you get to be. Now, in my case, my ticket vouchers were purchased a YEAR ago! But, and this is the fun part, since they were vouchers they wouldn't issue an electronic ticket and hence a boarding pass, until we checked in at the counter. Which is typically an hour before the flight. And typically way after almost everyone else. Hence a lower group. Nice huh? So even though I made my reservations over a month in advance, had paid for the tickets in full a year earlier, paid top-line for them (cause it was for charity) I was shuffled into the C group. Or, as we came to call it, the cattle group.

One of the things that has kept my sanity all these years of travel has been the knowledge that no matter how awful people get, how nasty, petty, pushy, bullying, scrambling for the slightest advantage, knocking over others, cheating, lying, extra bag bringing, huge ski-board duffle bag carrying, poke you in the eye evil they can be, one thing remains constant. I have a seat. Somewhere on that plane, when the dust of the cavemen finally settles, I have a seat all to myself. If I'm traveling with someone, they have a seat next to me. Ahhh. That simple knowledge has preserved my sanity more time than I can count. But not when you fly Southwest, the "Freedom" airline. Oh no, they treat you like cattle, line you up based on an arbitrary system, under numbered poles, all for the benefit of what exactly? See, that's the thing. I can't for the life of me figure out what the purpose is here? Anyone? The freedom they proclaim isn't a freedom at all, except for that very first person. It separates couples, families, and traveling companions. It degrades everything it touches! Is it really worth it?

Not for me. I will avoid flying Southwest for as long as I can. I am not a cow. Don't treat me like one.

PS: I apologize for using the word "Sucks" in this post, it isn't like me at all. But I felt it appropriate, and far less offensive than some of the other choice words I could have easily used. Needless to say, the Southwest logo used in this post is the sole property of Southwest Airlines and I'm sure all Rights are Reserved.