Southwest Airlines Cancelled Flights During the July Fourth of July Holiday Throat, Explaining the Problems with Staff Reassignment

A Southwest Airlines spokesman said that the recent winter storm was to blame for thousands of flight cancellation Monday and Tuesday.

An e-mail to a passenger scheduled to fly Southwest on Friday read: “While we have recently experienced operational challenges, we expect to resume a full schedule of flights with minimal disruptions on your day of travel.”

Other issues that have exacerbated the airline’s struggle to accommodate the holiday rush include problems with “connecting flight crews to their schedules,” Perry said. It has made it hard for employees to get reassigns because of that issue.

“First things first, travelers who are still waiting on Southwest should try to book a flight at another airline as soon as possible, because you never know when you might be able to get somewhere,” Kyle Potter, executive editor at the travel advice website, wrote to CNN Travel late Tuesday.

“When they have cancellations in one area, it really ripples through, because they don’t necessarily have their crews and their pilots in the right positions,” said Jeff Windau, senior equity analyst of equity research for Edward Jones. “They just kind of build on from city to city to city, and when that gets disrupted, it’s very difficult to get the operations flowing smoothly again.”

From Houston to Florida to Cleveland to Colorado, passengers are posting pictures and videos of themselves at the baggage claim and reservation counter. Colorado Public Radio reported that Southwest’s customer service phone line hold times ranged between two and four hours.

Southwest spokesperson Jay McVay said in a news conference at Houston’s William P. Hobby Airport on Monday night the airline will do everything possible to right the challenges passengers have experienced, including “hotels, ride assistance, vans … rental cars to try and make sure these folks get home as quickly as possible.”

Thousands of Delta pilots picketed at major airports this summer, calling for higher pay and highlighting staff concerns as passengers faced flight cancellations during the Fourth of July holiday rush. Last month, Delta pilots voted to authorize a strike after negotiations for a new contract were paused.

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Relief is still a few days away for passengers booked with Southwest Airlines this week, as the beleaguered airline continues to grapple with what US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has referred to as a complete meltdown of the system.

Airports most affected by the Tuesday cancellations are Denver International, followed by Chicago Midway International, Baltimore/Washington International, Nashville International, Dallas Love Field and Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas.

Watterson said Southwest should have more than sufficient crew resources to handle that amount of activity.

We had a tough day today. Jordan told WSJ.com that they would have another difficult day tomorrow as they worked their way out of the situation.

Several people at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport spoke to CNN’s Nick Valencia on Thursday about their travel experiences with Southwest this holiday season.

Calls made Monday afternoon by CNN to Southwest’s customer service did not go through, so customers couldn’t even get in the queue to speak to a representative. Southwest told CNN it is “fully staffed to answer calls.”

If you’ve been stuck in the middle of nowhere and don’t know where to turn, the founder of Scott’s Cheap Flights suggests you try an international number.

“The main hotline for US airlines will be clogged with other passengers getting rebooked. To get through to an agent quickly, call any one of the airline’s dozens of international offices,” Scott Keyes said.

“As the storm continued to sweep across the country it continued to impact many of our larger stations and so the cancellations just compiled one after another to 100 to 150 to 1,000,” Jay McVay said in a press conference at Houston’s William P. Hobby Airport on Monday night.

The normal hub of the other major airlines is not available for us. We have a point-to-point network which puts our crews in the wrong places.

McVay said that the company’s first priority right now is safety. “We want to make sure that we operate these flights safely and that we have the flight crews that have legal and sufficient time to operate these flights,” he stated.

“We will do everything that we need to do to right the challenges that we’ve had right now,” he said, including “hotels, ride assistance, vans … rental cars to try and make sure these folks get home as quickly as possible.”

If you’ve already left take care of yourself and keep your receipts, said McVay. “We will make sure they are taken care of, that is not a question.”

Southwest Airlines Inadequacies due to the Chicago Winter Weather During the Decay of Windy Buffalo, New York, and Syracuse

An announcement made in the terminal apologized to customers and said that the next available seats were on December 31st and later. The agent assured the customers that they would have enough rooms in the hotels that Southwest would provide buses to.

The Department of Transportation warned Southwest Airlines that it will face consequences if it fails to do right by stranded and inconvenient passengers.

In a phone call with CNN, the president of Southwest Airlines Pilots Association said the problems the airline is experiencing are a long time in the making.

He stated that the issues have been going on for the last 20 months. “We’ve seen these sorts of meltdowns occur on a much more regular basis and it really just has to do with outdated processes and outdated IT.”

He said that the problem lies in the programs used to connect us to airplanes, and it is a systemic problem throughout the airline.

The airport in Buffalo, New York will not be able to resume passenger flights until after 11 a.m. on Wednesday because of the weather.

Greyhound, the largest provider of bus service in the US, issued a service alert on Monday saying many of its scheduled services in the upper Northeast will be canceled or disrupted because of winter weather. Buffalo, Cleveland and Syracuse are affected.

Travelers had been pushing numbers back towards normal levels due to the winter storm that swept across the US.

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“The phone system the company uses is just not working,” Lyn Montgomery, President of TWU Local 556, told CNN’s Pamela Brown. The scheduling changes to flight attendants that they aren’t manned with enough manpower is causing chaos throughout the nation.

Southwest CEO Bob Jordan, in a message to employees obtained by CNN, acknowledged many of Murray’s concerns, and promised the company will invest in better systems.

“Part of what we’re suffering is a lack of tools,” Jordan told employees. “We’ve talked an awful lot about modernizing the operation, and the need to do that.”

Gary Kelly told Wall Street analysts in a call that the company had made adjustments to prevent a similar crisis in the future.

“We have reined in our capacity plans to adjust to the current staffing environment, and our ontime performance has improved, accordingly,” said Kelly on October 21. “We are aggressively hiring to a goal of approximately 5,000 new employees by the end of this year, and we are currently more than halfway toward that goal.”

The airline said in a statement Monday that it will fly about one-third of its schedule for the next several days as it continues to recover its operations.

Analysts say Southwest’s problems are the result of a confluence of events — not just the severe weather, but staff shortages caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as employees out sick with influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Most important is an outdated computer system for crew scheduling that turned what would have been simply a challenging storm into a full-scale meltdown.

That failure has attracted the attention of Congress. On Tuesday, the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation said they would look into the causes of these disruptions and their impact on customers.

Chang and her boyfriend were heading to Los Angeles on a Southwest flight on Christmas day with a connection in Houston. They arrived in Houston hours late, only to learn their flight to LA had been canceled. They were given instructions to get their bags and try to book again.

McClain’s return to Utah has been even more harrowing. He was due to leave Chicago on Monday. It was canceled. Now, the soonest he’s been able to reschedule is for Thursday night.

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At least, he’s with his parents, but he will burn a number of days of vacation and pay an extra four days of fees for the dog he can’t get back to.

Helane Becker, an aviation analyst with Cowen, an investment bank and financial services company, says Southwest needs to bring those tools, in the form of internal software systems, up to date.

The union officials representing the workers at Southwest say the company did not keep up with technology changes and grew from a three plane airline into a one plane airline. And they say they’ve been raising concerns for years.

Another factor is Southwest’s reliance on point-to-point flights instead of a hub and spoke model. In fair weather, it’s a system that has worked well for them. In bad weather, it can cause problems, says a former airline pilot.

Southwest’s pilots take off in the morning from one city and then go to other cities. There’s a flight crew change, they fly a few more legs across the country, and then spend the night in there.

As a result, you have all sorts of pilots and flight attendants that need to go somewhere because they aren’t based at the same place anymore. “So when there’s bad weather, everything tends to get out of position.”

There’s a passenger with his wife and two young children in Denver. His daughter’s birthday and a wedding anniversary were celebrated in New York City by the family.

The family left for home on Christmas Eve, but flew out on the 21st. Before they left for the airport, Lenz made sure everything was ok with his phone app.

It wasn’t very good. The flight was canceled. He was on the phone but couldn’t reach the agent. So, he used an app on his phone to rebook — for Dec. 28. He finally reached an agent on Monday. Do you think this will be resolved before we leave?

The agent reassured him, and even moved the flight to the 27th. “Then everything got canceled and I was on a Tuesday flight,” he says.

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The family Rented a car and traveled back to Denver in 26 hours. “There’s a place about halfway through in Illinois that’s 13 hours from here and 13 hours from from Denver. So our goal is to take a quick breather at the hotel and then pick it up again so we can be there Thursday night,” Lenz says.

Southwest has had its share of problems, but the company has owned up to them. She says that they’re in front from a PR perspective. They are buying food for people and putting them up in hotel rooms. They’re doing their best to get you where you need to go. They’re reimbursing you. They are buying tickets on other airlines.

But industry analyst Potter says the airlines’ failures mean customers end up paying the price. As long as the carriers are allowed to keep running razor thin margins, mass delays andcancels will continue.

Travelers are unable to get on new flights because of the mass cancellation and will be waiting in line for two or more hours to rebook. A lot of passengers have not been given new flights by the end of the week or after the New Year, forcing them to sleep on the floors at the airport.

When thousands of flights were canceled due to staffing shortages in June, Buttigieg met with the CEOs of major domestic airlines and asked them to detail how they’d fix operations in writing.

I made clear that our department will hold them accountable for their responsibilities to customers, and make sure that this doesn’t happen again, to get them through this situation.

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A passenger told CNN that she and her partner were in Atlanta for five days trying to get back to Kansas after disembarking from a cruise.

We were fortunate because we were in Fort Lauderdale and our family lives in the bay area of Florida so we were able to rent a car and go see them. “We’ve seen a lot of families who are sleeping on the floor, and it just breaks my heart.”

If Southwest doesn’t follow through on its promises, the DOT will take action against the airline according to a letter from Pete Buttigieg to Southwest CEO Bob Jordan. The department has the ability to levy fines as a penalty.

“It would be an unfair and deceptive practice not to fulfill this commitment to passengers,” Buttigieg wrote, specifically referring to alternative travel reimbursements. “The Department will use the fullest extent of its investigative and enforcement powers to hold Southwest accountable if it fails to adhere to the promises made to reimburse passengers for costs incurred for alternate transportation.”

“While all of the other parts of the aviation system are getting better each day, it’s been moving the opposite direction with this airline,” said Buttigieg.

Jordan apologized for the company’s response to the mass cancellation, but a statement suggested that he had not predicted massive changes to Southwest procedures.

The tools that we use to recover from disruption are almost always used, but we need to double-down on our already-existing plans to upgrade systems so that we never again face what’s happening right now,” said Jordan.

On Cancellation and Refund Policies for Airline Flights in the Presence of a “Volatile Traveller’s Warfare”, according to CNN

“Every airline in the country is jam-packed right now, so your odds of even finding a seat — let alone at an even halfway decent price — get smaller by the hour,” Potter said.

If travellers are in the thick of this, they need to save their receipts for other flights, nights at the hotel, and meals.

The price caps vary by location in areas affected by cancellation, according to an American Airlines spokesman. Southwest did not respond to CNN’s request for comment.

One traveler posted a screenshot showing flights from San Diego to Orlando with American, Delta and United fares that cost more than $2,000. The passenger was looking to rebook a canceled Southwest flight.

“We continue to get people to their destinations as safely and quickly as possible this busy holiday season and our latest effort includes capping fares in select cities to make sure our flights are available to as many customers as possible,” Freed told CNN.

Southwest doesn’t rebook passengers on competitors flights, unlike legacy airlines like Delta Air Lines and American Airlines, which do.

If a flight is delayed or canceled overnight, American Airlines will provide hotel vouchers for the passenger in order to get them on another flight. If there is a delay of at least three hours, American Airlines will provide meal vouchers.

Under current DOT rules, any passenger who saw their flight canceled is entitled to a prompt cash refund for the full cost, plus any extra purchases such as bag fees or a seat assignment.

Cancellation policies differ among airlines and can depend on a number of factors. The travel credit can be used in the future instead ofcash, and some airlines will offer it.

The requests for reasonable reimbursements related to the travel disruptions will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. It was not clear how long the reimbursements would take to process.

“After days of trying to operate as much of our full schedule across the busy holiday weekend, we reached a decision point to significantly reduce our flying to catch up,” he said.

Repatriation and Refund Policy in the Airline Industry: A Commentary by Buttigieg on Alternative Travel Reimbursements

“It would be an unfair and deceptive practice not to fulfill this commitment to passengers,” Buttigieg wrote, specifically referring to alternative travel reimbursements.

“We’re going to expect them to go beyond the letter of the law in terms of how they treat passengers, making sure they pay for things like hotels, ground travel expenses, meals and of course, refunds,” Buttigieg said.

“Employees were left to their own devices. […] They weren’t given the tools to do their jobs, nor were they given the leadership to answer questions and be able to provide solutions,” he told NPR’s Morning Edition.

The airline industry believes that regulations ultimately make the customer pay more for their services. And Murray agrees that Southwest is better suited than, say, the DOT, to decide what needs to change.

Congress is also watching whether the airline will compensate customers. The Senate Commerce Committee will launch an investigation, its chair said on Tuesday.

Customers can rebook or travel without fees if they do so before Jan. 2, 2023. But for those looking to get a cash payment, the company has opened a special self-service portal for processing.

Travel and Transportation in the Era of the Pandemic: A CNN Analysis of Southwest Airlines’ 2020 Airline Scheduling and Cancellation Data

The crisis, which has frustrated passengers and caught the attention of government regulators, has worsened this week as major airlines recover from the cold and snow that caused havoc over the holiday weekend.

“We are encouraged by the progress we’ve made to realign crew, their schedules and our fleet,” it said. “We know even our deepest apologies — to our customers, to our employees, and to all affected through this disruption — only go so far,” the statement read.

The early months of the Pandemic in 2020 were disrupted by the high cancellation rates among airlines due to weather and other factors.

The bureau has only released data for 2022 through September. To ensure a fair comparison, CNN only analyzed the carrier’s data from January to September in previous years.

United, American and Delta typically fly from smaller markets to hubs, requiring passengers flying between small cities to change planes. The advantage of that model is its ability to quickly bring crews and planes out of the hub to where they are needed.

Watterson noted that manual scheduling left Southwest building an incredibly delicate house of cards that could quickly tumble when the company encountered a problem.

Watterson said that they would make great progress, but then there would be other disruptions that would affect their work. “So, we spent multiple days where we kind of got close to finishing the problem, and then it had to be reset.”

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MichaelQuidort was travelling home from Raleigh, N.C. to Chicago when his Southwest flight was canceled and he had to rebook on United. He said he paid United $295 for his first flight, but it wasn’t until he attempted to submit a claim that the Southwest system crashed. He plans to keep trying, but said he is “not that hopeful” that he’ll get reimbursed. “Everything has just been a mess with them and I don’t have a lot of faith in them turning this around any time soon,” he said.

In a message to customers Thursday morning, a Southwest executive made a promise to do everything they can and to work around the clock to repair their relationship with you.

“We are encouraged by the progress we’ve made to realign crew, their schedules, and our fleet,” it said. With a holiday weekend full of important connections for our valued customers, we are eager to return to normal.

Ryan Green, the airline’s chief commercial officer, offered his regrets for the collapse of services and promised to rebuild customer relations that have sunk to rock bottom.

“My personal apology is the first step of making things right after many plans changed and experiences fell short of your expectations of us,” Green said in a video issued Thursday.

His remarks, which follow earlier apologies from airline CEO Bob Jordan, came as US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg made his own scathing assessment Southwest’s troubles, calling the situation a complete “meltdown.”

He said that it might speak to the improvements that they’re trying to make because there’s not long lines. The efforts to redeem themselves are working.

As extreme winter conditions swept much of the country last week — including important airports in Southwest’s network — Southwest’s plan for “irregular operations” passed the breaking point, according to multiple people familiar with the situation.

They and the airline said that an internal process that requires multiple departments to manually redesign the carrier’s schedule works “the vast majority of the time.”

When something goes wrong, the Southwest software — including the crew scheduling system tool — leaves much of the work of rebuilding that delicate network to be done manually.

The best way to fix a canceled flight is not the same as fixing something else, said Brian Brown, the president of Transport Workers Union Local 550. “It takes a lot more intervention from people and also a lot of brainpower to deal with so much.”

Brown said airline officials don’t know where their crews are or where their planes are. Crew schedulers in another department are manually checking which pilots and flight attendants meet strict federal rules on work hours — rules meant to keep inflight safety professionals from excessive fatigue.

Elaine Chao, who served as secretary of transportation during the Trump administration, described the Southwest Airlines breakdown as “a failure of unbelievable proportions.”

It was a perfect storm for everything that has been happening with the company, she said. It will take a long time to rebuild trust with consumers, she said.

She said she was offered a rebooking on a flight on January 2, but it would’ve been too late. She and her family and friends lost money due to the wedding being postponed.

The captain came out and told the passengers their flight was canceled when they got to the airport because our flight was on time.

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“Southwest says, ‘We will honor reasonable requests for reimbursement for meals, hotel and alternate transportation,’” he said. I would avoid expensive hotels and restaurants because Southwest was vague on how much they would reimburse. Use Google Hotels to find nearby hotels near the airport where you are stranded.”

There are a few things to do near me that you can do without using a search engine. I doubt Southwest is going to reimburse tours or other paid activities, so I would not book any expensive excursions that you cannot afford.”

It was a broken computer system that caused the airline’s flight disruptions and experts say it is the worst airline meltdown they have seen.

It was a frigid minus 3 degrees in Denver, but the family had packed their winter coats and had only the warm-weather clothes they’d put on that morning in California. When they got back to Memphis they had to wait in line with others to check their luggage because it turned out that their bags had been in Denver the whole time.

She assumed that due to the chaos she had witnessed, she’d never see her bags again. But on Wednesday night, to her shock, the luggage was delivered to her door.

Southwest apologized and said passengers can apply online for baggage returns, flight refunds and travel expenses from this week’s disruption.

The impact that the company’s outdated scheduling software and communications systems has has been criticized by both passengers and employees.

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“I had to pull him off my plane, when he was trying to go home to see his family, so he could go work another flight just because he was at the airport,” she says.

Randy Barnes, president of the Transport Workers Union’s Local 555, which represents Southwest employees, said in a statement Wednesday that many Southwest ground workers had to work 16- or 18-hour shifts during the holiday season and were getting sick and experiencing frostbite.

One of the most powerful things about social media is that it can take you right into the heart of a situation: A Lizzo concert, a political rally, a Florida emu farm, a picnic where a young man expresses his devotion to corn…

This video was posted by Hillary Chang, 29, a longtime Southwest Airlines devotee. Chang says that she is a very loyal Southwest customer. I use a Southwest credit card. We actually only fly Southwest.”

They hurried to the baggage claim, where the TikTok scene was spread out in front of them. What Chang didn’t mention was that her boyfriend had recently proposed and (while the ring itself was on her finger) the ring box was in her checked bag and she had been hoping to save it as a keepsake.

“This is what the Houston airport looks like,” she says in the TikTok, panning over hundreds of unclaimed suitcases. It’s enough to make any frequent flyer’s blood run cold.

Magnifying the black eye for Southwest is social media. The scope of the failed travel experience has been made worse by the abundance of images and videos on the various social media sites.

Posts like these have millions of views and comments such as “Don’t fly @SouthwestAir folks” and “Southwest is going to get destroyed over this and rightfully so.”

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“They’ve got the best reputation for customer service and management agility,” he says. They’re pretty good at responding to crises and I’m surprised that they’re doing this.

When Chang and her beau were stuck in Houston, they realized they would have to fend for themselves.

They rented a car and drove back to LA. Chang posted a short TikTok of the road trip, which involved driving through the night in order to be back to work on the morning of Dec. 27. The TikTok did yield some fruit — one of Chang’s friends sent her $50 for gas, wishing the couple well on their long drive.

I have 50,000 miles with them, so I’ve been thinking about it. I’m open and not finished with Southwest. I’m open to dating another airline.”

The big question on everyone’s mind: Can Southwest now deliver? The picture will become clearer when air traffic picks up on Friday.

If those planes are in the air again and the luggage is reduced, that would be a relief for both passengers and the company. There is a mark on its back.

It is clear that top US government officials are not happy about how Southwest, the leading US airline, got to this point in the aftermath of a massive winter storm.

Williams is standing near Hister and he said he plans on using the airline in the future. “I like Southwest. I mean, the bags are free,” Williams said.

“It will be a case-by-case basis,” Mr. Mann predicted. Booking an expensive flight might indicate to the airline you had a serious obligation you couldn’t miss, he said. “My advice is to hold onto your receipts, use the Southwest tool, and see how it goes,” he said.

Reimbursing passengers for meals and alternate transportation is one thing, but there is also a human cost to the airline’s meltdown, said Katy Nastro, a travel expert with Scott’s Cheap Flights, which alerts members to airfare deals. She said people don’t get the flexibility of being able to take time off whenever they want. “Your holiday period is one of the only periods you can rely on and plan and save for a trip.”

Ms. Nastro also wondered whether passengers who incurred nonrefundable expenses — including for Airbnbs and all-inclusive hotels — would be covered under Southwest’s vague reimbursement policy. “I don’t know,” she said, “but there are a lot of cases like this.”

The flight from Houston to West Palm Beach was not canceled or delayed. But while the Ph.D. student arrived home on time, her baggage still has not arrived; she ended up wearing her mother’s clothes for the holiday. And, she said, she has spent $500 on clothes, toiletries and a suitcase so she could finish her travels. Ms. Neary said she spoke to Southwest on Monday to report the missing baggage, but she didn’t expect to see it again for weeks. She said in a text message that it was in Baltimore.