What if the air Line changes your flight?

[papopup]

OK, thanks to the heads up I got from you folks, I scored a great air fare from SW. We will be flying down the beginning of June and I was wondering if the flight would change between now and then will SW notify me about the change or do I have to keep track of it myself.
Thanks so much to the DIS, I can't drive down as cheap as we are flying.

 

[Pinnie]

You can rest assured that SWA will NOT change your flight. Once SWA posts a schedule, they stick to it. Only changes that occur are due to weather/mechanical problems. That is just one of the reasons I fly SWA!

pinnie

 

[safetymom]

Southwest may be great but it never hurts to keep an eye on your flights. That way you can catch any problems when there is still time to do something about it.

 

[CarolA]

It doesn't hurt, but one of the things I like about SW is that they are very good about keeping to the schedule unless weather interferes. This is the upside of the wait for schedules. When they release them they really intened to fly them as opposed to the other airlines that release a year in advance but could have NUMEROUS schedule changes.

 

[tedhowe]

I'm sure every airline's policies differ, but for Airtran customers, here is what just happened to me in the last 24 hours.

We got home from work yesterday and had a phone message from AirTran stating that our flight from PHL to TPA in April had had a "significant" change in time.

When I checked the website, the flight had moved back over 5 hours (a 2 PM arrival was now about 7:15PM) - that would put us in WDW after 9PM. Traveling with three little ones, that is NOT a good thing.

So I called AirTran to find out what our options were, and found that the only other non-stop left Philly at 6AM that day - also not good. The flights with stops all had significant layovers in Atlanta - none arriving before 5PM now.

Since there wasn't really anything else acceptable, AirTran offered me the option of cancelling reservation and getting a full refund.

A few minutes of searching found great times and fares for NonStop flights on USAirways from Philly to Orlando.

Our return flight is still Southwest out of Tampa, but I also found it cheaper to rent the cars from National in Orlando and drop them off in Tampa than a round-trip rental at either MCO or TPA.

Long story short (too late)

Because AirTran changed their flight, I was able to get better timing for the flight into Orlando - it will get us to the resort about 60 minutes earlier than we would have, and we saved $380.00 on airfare and about $60 on the car rental.

I feel VERY lucky, but just wanted to point out that there are times when a change by the airline can run in your favor.

Ted