Southwest=Disappointment

[maxiesmom]

So I just got home from work, and I was all excited to check Southwest's fares for October. Can I say BOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

From my home airport, Grand Rapids MI, there are only 2 flights a day. Neither of which is non-stop. Both of which don't get into MCO until after 4:30 pm.An the lowest rate is $155 one way.

Delta has more flights, and is actually cheaper. Plus I could get to Orlando as early as 10:20 am.

Southwest, today I am not a fan. You have let me down.

 

[bumbershoot]

Delta has more flights, and is actually cheaper.

Are you factoring in checked luggage costs, if you don't get free luggage and are checking luggage?

 

[maxiesmom]

Are you factoring in checked luggage costs, if you don't get free luggage and are checking luggage?

Yep and EBCI.

So for now I am going to just wait and see. I can be pretty flexible with times and even play with the departure day a little. Just sad that I am not getting tickets today.

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

In addition allowing two free checked bags per passenger, Southwest allows you to change nonrefundable tickets without a change fee. Delta charges $200 per passenger to change nonrefundable tickets.

 

[DebbieB]

So I just got home from work, and I was all excited to check Southwest's fares for October. Can I say BOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

From my home airport, Grand Rapids MI, there are only 2 flights a day. Neither of which is non-stop. Both of which don't get into MCO until after 4:30 pm.An the lowest rate is $155 one way.

Delta has more flights, and is actually cheaper. Plus I could get to Orlando as early as 10:20 am.

Southwest, today I am not a fan. You have let me down.

With the AirTran merger, SW has cancelled flights from alot of smaller cities, it's hard to make money on them with a small number of departures.

Delta is non-stop from GRR? Or are you going to Detroit?

 

[nifferearly]

Not sure what side of GR you're on, but SW has non-stops still out of Flint. I'm in E Lansing so I can do either city, based on the times and price. Good departure at 6:50am leaving. Return time was okay - in the afternoon. I'd prefer a later flight, but I'll take that. It was $222 round trip. FYI - in case Flint isn't too far for you to drive, I have found that SW out of Flint is $25-$75 cheaper each way than GRR on every flight I've taken (4-5 per year to Orlando).

 

[wiigirl]

In addition allowing two free checked bags per passenger, Southwest allows you to change nonrefundable tickets without a change fee. Delta charges $200 per passenger to change nonrefundable tickets.

 

[maxiesmom]

Not sure what side of GR you're on, but SW has non-stops still out of Flint. I'm in E Lansing so I can do either city, based on the times and price. Good departure at 6:50am leaving. Return time was okay - in the afternoon. I'd prefer a later flight, but I'll take that. It was $222 round trip. FYI - in case Flint isn't too far for you to drive, I have found that SW out of Flint is $25-$75 cheaper each way than GRR on every flight I've taken (4-5 per year to Orlando).

I just saw that too! It isn't that far of a drive for me, maybe 90 minutes. It would more have to do with convincing my 20 something nephew and his friends to get up really early in the morning to make the flight. They could probably just stay up all night and sleep on the plane, lol!

 

[maxiesmom]

So the first 3 dates I check for flights from Orlando to Flint already have the non stops sold out.

 

[greenclan67]

Did u check into Tamp from Flint or GRR? We flew xmas Fnt to tpa for $102 each way. I just booked my niece from Grr to tpa march 25 return april 1 yesterday non stop $114 each way.

 

[EllieMaie]

We have had the same problem booking flights out of GRR and ended up switching to Delta because it was better time, nonstop, and cheaper even considering luggage fees. The other thing we have done is book one way fare on one airline and book the second way on Allegiant. I am not a fan of Allegiant but last time we did that, we saved around $100 per person. Their limited flights makes it hard.

 

[supergoofy]

I booked weeks ago on another carrier and just looked at Southwest for fun and the rates are much cheaper than what I paid.

On one hand the savings would be nice.

But on the other hand the flight would hit the ground at 6pm. Then we add in the time to get our car, travel to offsite hotel, check in and eat dinner and then go grocery shopping for groceries for our week.

The time difference is only a couple of hours but it makes an 8 hour day into a 12 hour one.


And lastly the flights home are way to early and same price we paid for a late flight out.

 

[hsmamato2]

like all good deals, this is likely the result of the popularity of the RR program+free/easypoints&miles+lots of dis-based interest= altering routes and availability to use those extremely popular (and free) points..... it always happens when a deal gets too popular,and though I too will suffer from these changes on my future trips, I think SWA has to alter their model if they're going to make money/stay in business......I look at the new schedules(not needed for myself) and could see a big difference already in structure of pricing and schedules....

 

[monagh10]

We are flying on SWA out of GRR to MCO this month on a nonstop flight. That is disappointing to hear that the nonstop is going away

 

[Leslieloody]

I just booked two flights one out of Louisville and coming back into Nashville, for October. Both were non-stop. Disney here we come!

 

[maxiesmom]

We are flying on SWA out of GRR to MCO this month on a nonstop flight. That is disappointing to hear that the nonstop is going away

Yeah. We flew non-stop this past December going to Orlando, and it was sooo nice!

It wasn't so long ago they were making such a big deal about Southwest coming to Grand Rapids, and how cheap the flights would be. Boo on them.

 

[HaViet]

SW and JB just won airlines of the year, according to JD Power and Associates.

 

[CharityLynn]

We too are so frustrated by this. We had settled on the Flint flights (non-stops) but we are still waiting for our RR points. (Won't get til March 22nd) and the return flights are sold out.

So frustrated.

 

[DVC-Don]

Just booked my return to Florida for mid October today and the price was good (7802 points) for our area so I took it. But, I did notice the non-stops have dropped to one per day as opposed to two or three a day that we have now.

 

[kristenrice]

We live 10 minutes from the Grand Rapids airport and we were so excited to have AT/SWA come in so that we didn't have to drive to Detroit any more to get non-stop, cheaper flights.

Well...scratch that. We are going October 19-24 with my sister's family. We are all flying on points and the rates out of GRR were unacceptable and the lack of a non-stop option pushed me to look elsewhere. Well, no non-stops out of DTW either, so I checked MDW. They have plenty of non-stops, but the times weren't all that great. So, just when I was ready to call the whole thing off...I remembered Flint! I checked those fares and snagged R/T tickets for my family of 4 for under 45,000 points. Unfortunately, my sister wasn't quick enough and the return is sold out. There are still at least 4 seats left for the trip down so I told her that she better jump on them before they disappear.

I am not thrilled with SWA anymore either. There was so much hype about them coming to GRR, bringing non-stop flights to Orlando at affordable, discount rates. Well that was fun while it lasted. I made one trip in 2011 (on AirTran) and one in 2013 and that was it. Now, we're back to driving over to the thumb to get decent airfare.