![]() ![]() I have sung the praises of Southwest Airlines Early Bird far and wide to anyone who will listen. Then Southwest added the Early Bird ticketing option. However, I continued to fly with them years later when I began traveling for work, and flights with them as a single person were always problem free. That three hour plus flight with my baby was the worst flight of my life and I vowed to never take my family on Southwest again. The flight attendants said they were not allowed to request that people move so that families can sit together, so they did nothing to help us. Apparently there’s no airline seat selection karma. In fact, I’ve often been asked to do the same, even giving up seats I paid extra to snag, and I always say yes because I’d want that kindness extended to me if I were in their shoes. Would it have been a kind thing to do for a scared, new mom of a sick child? I think so. We asked many, many people if they would give up a seat so that we could all three sit together, and no one would move. We did find two seats so I could sit with my daughter, but the closest we could find for my husband was back a few rows. My husband and I boarded the flight with our daughter only to find that there were not three seats anywhere near each other. The people who boarded the first legs of the flight have their seats…and they’re not giving them up for anything. If you fly Southwest and your flight is continuing, your A, B, and C group passes actually become D, E, and F. You are not getting on the second, third, fourth leg of a flight and joining the people who have already boarded. An originating flight means that when you get on that plane, you are the first group of people to be on that plane for that trip. If you do not know the difference between a continuing flight and an originating flight, here’s a crash course, and please don’t ever forget this information. Did I mention it was a continuing flight? What happened instead was that we were allowed to board after the sixty people in the A group. We booked our flights with Southwest and assumed – never assume – that we would pre-board with our daughter just like we would had we flown any other airline in the world. Travel with any infant is difficult, but add in the complications of frozen breast milk, medications, and a nervous mom and things get a little tricky. She was born two months early and had a myriad of health problems from gross motor skill delays to a hole in her heart. to Texas with our ten month old daughter, I was nervous. However, when it came time to fly from D.C. Over that time we became very used to air travel, and I personally came to enjoy everything from the peaceful time to grade papers to the French bread pizza on the Friday evening direct flight from Dulles to Austin. My husband and I dated long distance – like 1600 miles long distance – for the first two years of our relationship. If I’m going to give you the good, then you deserve to hear the bad.īut first we need to get in the way back machine… In fact, just this morning when this all began I tweeted the following: Why do I need to tell you this? Because over the last couple of years I have sent messages to tens of thousands of people supporting Southwest Airlines only to realize now that I may have led people astray. Instead I am writing to say why I will never fly Southwest Airlines again with children, and why you as a consumer should be aware of the issues you may face if you do. ![]() I’m not writing this to say that you should not fly Southwest Airlines, although many of you may have made that decision based on the other problems they’ve faced ( for the record, no one has ever asked me to stop those lingering kisses I give my husband on flights…). But today something happened that was so aggravating to me that I feel compelled to share it with my readers. I’ve re-posted it a couple of times since then and have talked about it while speaking at conferences. Now want to know why it’s only a great airline sans the kiddos? Carry on for the long version…Ī year and a half ago I wrote about why bloggers should never write a complaint post. I fly the airline frequently as a business traveler and will continue to do so. I believe that Southwest is not a family friendly airline, particularly if you’re traveling with small children. UPDATE: Did Google send you here? God bless Google. ![]()
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