Southwest Airlines
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Shame on you Southwest Airlines!
What is going on with SW?? On a return flight from Puerto Rico to Denver, Southwest canceled the second leg of our flight out of Tampa, while we're IN THE AIR to Tampa, citing "weather". After doing much research and having our local news look into this, it appears that only the SW flights were canceled into Denver, other airlines were arriving as scheduled. The actual statistic for that evening were 47% of SW flights were cancelled into Denver and less than 5% ALL OTHER AIRLINES were cancelled. The FAA did not issue any closures or delays to Denver. I can't imagine why weather would be an excuse when no one else was using it. After talking to the agents, we kept being told that there were no other flights that evening, when in reality, there were... TO DENVER! We just weren't offered those flights. And yes, there was availability according to the website. And..they weren't canceled! We received some of the most unapologetic, uncaring, and disingenuous treatment from Southwest Airlines across the board. From the gate agent to the ticketing agent to the baggage agent to the customer service rep. After leaving the airport (because our flight was changed to a 5AM flight the following day), I called to inquire again if there were better flights, I had to wait ONE to TWO hours just to speak to a live person. Our options to return were an early morning flight or an evening flight for a non-stop flight. There was no way I was going to chance taking a flight with a layover anywhere, Southwest is not to be trusted and I didn’t want to get into a situation where we were then stranded at yet another airport. I don’t know what is going on with Southwest and why their business model is falling apart. SW used to be my “go-to” airline (we even had the credit card but have since retired it due to the airline’s inconsistency with flights). If you read social media and travel sites, their complaint meter has increased substantially. If SW thinks it's ok to strand passengers in random places just to make their “customary playbook” profitable, then they are not focusing on what is important. They might be forcing people to miss weddings, funerals, births, deaths. This is not OKAY. Why would anyone fly them? The local news received a disingenuous reply from a SW rep regarding our situation but also showed some telling facts: "Many of the flights we proactively canceled at the start of today were in anticipation of operational conditions in Denver..." Southwest cancelled our flight IN THE MORNING and we were not notified until we were in the air on our way to Tampa. If we had been notified we would have chosen to stay (at our own expense) in San Juan to spend more time with our family, but we were not given that option. Other airlines always lets us know when a flight is going to be delayed or cancelled and they do this in advance and they let us change our flight to a time that works for us. SW does not offer this. Their system is antiquated and not user-friendly. We are disgusted with the treatment we received. They are losing loyal customers left and right. Why do they keep treating your passengers this way? Shame on you Southwest!