While the Dallas-based carrier says operations are getting back to normal, leaders say their teams will be reaching out to passengers with “a tailored gesture of goodwill and another heartfelt apology.”
Southwest Offers 25,000-Point “Gesture of Goodwill” While Processing Refunds
After Winter Storm Elliott dropped inches of snow on the East Coast, all airlines were affected by cancellations and delays while it passed through. However, Southwest and their point-to-point network were uniquely affected, leading to the carrier stranding thousands of passengers, and cancelling over 6,000 flights.
After a week of playing catch-up, the airline says their New Year holiday weekend operations returned to normal with a system completion rate of 99.1%. However, there are still serious issues the airline is dealing with – most notably frustrated passengers who still do not have their checked luggage or refunds for “reasonable expenses.”
“I’m waiting to hear from Southwest regarding reimbursement for tickets on United I purchased to get home during the meltdown,” writes FlyerTalker krzymieloweicz on the forums. “I’m sure I’m way in the back of the line now, but has anyone received their reimbursements yet?” Other FlyerTalkers have reported mixed results.
In the meantime, the carrier says they are working to return lost luggage, process refund requests and paying back incidental expenses incurred by flyers. CNN reports travelers are receiving up to 25,000 Southwest Rapid Rewards points as an apology while the airline wades through their challenges. Yet, some flyers say that the “gesture of goodwill” does not fix Southwest’s bigger problems.
“I haven’t noticed this discussed, but [Southwest] doesn’t have interline agreements with outer carriers … with other carriers, the ticketed airline can offload you to other carriers [during irregular operations],” FlyerTalker Exec_Plat writes on the forums. “People are forced to wait for southwest to fix themselves then process the human backlog using only their own capacity.”
“Sure would be nice if [Southwest] had online baggage tracking, like, oh, pretty much every other airline,” opines FlyerTalker Gregory Nelson.
Are you still waiting for Southwest to process your claims? Share your experience on the FlyerTalk Forums.
Source: frugal travel guy