Today's EBCI experience..

[goofy4tink]

Okay.....I bought our SW tickets on Feb 26, and added EBCI for my dd and myself. My dh is on his own reservation since he is flying home on SW..dd and I are not. So, in the interest of seeing what would happen if I bought EBCI and dh didn't, I did my little experiment.
Checked in today, for dh's 9:35 flight tomorrow morning...Providence to MCO, non-stop..originating in Providence. I hit the checkin button right at 9:35, must have been a second or two early, according to SW time...I was unable to do it..immediatly hit 'checkin' again (that all took about 4 seconds)...he got A39.
So...I printed out dd's and my boarding passes...A16 and A17. Either 22 people got in there, before me, in a space of about 5 secs, or there are a ton of EBCI's on this flight.

 

[MCDomzal]

I just checked-in for a 9:35 flight out of Chicago. I also hit the button as soon as my cell said it was 9:35 and we got B12-15. So, consider yourself lucky, I guess.

 

[phred52]

Wow. Very interesting!

When I check in, I bring up an "official world time clock" on a second screen ..and about 2 seconds before it hits the 24 hour mark, I click back to the SW screen and go from there. I've been lucky so far with only "A's".

 

[DebbieB]

I just checked-in for a 9:35 flight out of Chicago. I also hit the button as soon as my cell said it was 9:35 and we got B12-15. So, consider yourself lucky, I guess.

The problem with Chicago is there are probably people who are connecting who were able to check-in 24 hours from their first flight. For example, if you are flying Minneapolis-Chicago-Orlando, you check-in 24 hours from the Minneapolis time.

 

[MCDomzal]

Well, that stinks!

 

[emmabelle]

We got B26-B30 flying down from PVD with no EBCI, checking in as soon as I could.

Flying home I decided to buy just two EBCI's for the four of us about three days before the flight and got A16 and A17. I then decided about six hours before the 24 hr check-in to do the other two tickets. This time I got A37 and A39. I'm glad I did buy the EBCI because I wonder if I would have ended up with all C's if I had waited untill the 24hr mark to check in.

 

[SDSorority]

That's interesting. In my opinion, if you're in A, you're OK! (lol like the rhyme?!)

 

[BigTigger]

We flew PVD to MCO on the 6:10 pm flight on 7/7 with EBCI and got A18/19/20. I bought EBCI with the tickets in early June. There were no 1-15 people in line and 16 and 17 were A-lists (or at least told me they were). The plane was only 2/3rd's full.

Coming back from MCO to PVD on the 11:40 am flight on 7/13 with EBCI bought with the tix in early June, we got A 17/18/19. There was no A16 in front of us, just two couples in the A 1-15 section who bought Business Select as those were all that was left when they bought the tix two days ahead. The plane was totally full.

 

[Dizzyworld]

Interesting reports. I was wondering how checking in would be effected with summer travel. Plus it is good to hear the experiences of different airports.

 

[goofy4tink]

That's interesting. In my opinion, if you're in A, you're OK! (lol like the rhyme?!)

Hey...it's the Transportation Board rap!!

 

[goofy4tink]

NOt such a happy camper!!!
Get to TF Green, at the 2hr window....as usual. At 8:30, they announce our flight is being bumped up to 11:20, from 9:35....seriously!!?
NOt an auspicious start to our trip.

 

[simzac]

Okay.....I bought our SW tickets on Feb 26, and added EBCI for my dd and myself. My dh is on his own reservation since he is flying home on SW..dd and I are not. So, in the interest of seeing what would happen if I bought EBCI and dh didn't, I did my little experiment.
Checked in today, for dh's 9:35 flight tomorrow morning...Providence to MCO, non-stop..originating in Providence. I hit the checkin button right at 9:35, must have been a second or two early, according to SW time...I was unable to do it..immediatly hit 'checkin' again (that all took about 4 seconds)...he got A39.
So...I printed out dd's and my boarding passes...A16 and A17. Either 22 people got in there, before me, in a space of about 5 secs, or there are a ton of EBCI's on this flight.

Bottom line is you paid $20 to gain 22 spots in line. I still don't see a big advantage in spending the extra money. JMO

 

[Tara]

Bottom line is you paid $20 to gain 22 spots in line. I still don't see a big advantage in spending the extra money. JMO

Not everyone does it for the spot in line, though that's a part of why I do it. Mostly I do it for the convenience of not having to think about it, and that convenience is even more pronounced on the trip home since the last thing I want to be doing on my last full day of vacation is worrying about checking in. (And I have an iPhone, so I can theoretically check in everywhere, but not inside some rides where there's no reception.)

 

[NancyIL]

NOt such a happy camper!!!
Get to TF Green, at the 2hr window....as usual. At 8:30, they announce our flight is being bumped up to 11:20, from 9:35....seriously!!?
NOt an auspicious start to our trip.

I hope your flight was not further delayed, and you're happily enjoying WDW right now!

 

[DebbieB]

I hope your flight was not further delayed, and you're happily enjoying WDW right now!

I just checked on SW's site, it did not leave until 12:30. But it's probably all forgotten by now!

 

[SweetMommy]

ok semi dumb question

We did EBCI for our trip and were wondering do we need to print out our boarding passes at home or can we print them at the Airport.....We are also doing PVD to MCO if that matters

 

[MomRN]

ok semi dumb question

We did EBCI for our trip and were wondering do we need to print out our boarding passes at home or can we print them at the Airport.....We are also doing PVD to MCO if that matters

I was wondering the same thing...

 

[palhockeymomof2]

I was wondering the same thing...

you can havae them printed them at the airport when you check your luggage...if your not checking luggage it would be faster to print them at home and go right to the security checkpoint

 

[goofy4tink]

Bottom line is you paid $20 to gain 22 spots in line. I still don't see a big advantage in spending the extra money. JMO

As noted, not everyone does it to get a first in line spot..it's more of a convenience thing. Would I do it again?? Yep. It's nice to not have to worry about where I am at that 24 hr window.

I just checked on SW's site, it did not leave until 12:30. But it's probably all forgotten by now!

Nope, our flight got off at 11:20...the 12:30 followed closely behind us. We had no further holdups and arrived at MCO around 2:20. All is well.

 

[LWQuestie]

ok semi dumb question

We did EBCI for our trip and were wondering do we need to print out our boarding passes at home or can we print them at the Airport.....We are also doing PVD to MCO if that matters

you can havae them printed them at the airport when you check your luggage...if your not checking luggage it would be faster to print them at home and go right to the security checkpoint

If you are not checking luggage, you can still print the boarding passes at the airport. At least at MCO, there are several terminals at a circular kiosk to the right of the Southwest counters that can be used to print the passes. I used EBCI last year on my return flight and didn't give a thought to printing the boarding passes till I showed up at the airport. I was traveling with a carryon and was so relieved to see that kiosk!