So just how much cheaper is it, actually, to fly Southwest?

[Globaliser]

In 2007 clever SW saved 727 MILLION dollars on their fuel! The secret is called hedging and its almost Enron like! Of course it starts about being efficient and having cash to spend/bet in the first place.

"Bet" is certainly the right word! Like any gamble, it can go wrong. Ryanair lost a shedload of money a couple of years back by hedging fuel at a bad rate. However, if you are making enough money to spare some of it on a bet, you can probably stand the loss when it goes wrong.

 

What I did find interesting, though, was what WN's figures would have looked like if they had paid the same amount for their fuel as everyone else. Their profits numbers would have been disastrous - of those whose figures I looked at, only United would have made a bigger loss, and WN would not have been far behind.

[chipmaster]

"Bet" is certainly the right word! Like any gamble, it can go wrong. Ryanair lost a shedload of money a couple of years back by hedging fuel at a bad rate. However, if you are making enough money to spare some of it on a bet, you can probably stand the loss when it goes wrong.

 

What I did find interesting, though, was what WN's figures would have looked like if they had paid the same amount for their fuel as everyone else. Their profits numbers would have been disastrous - of those whose figures I looked at, only United would have made a bigger loss, and WN would not have been far behind.

 

And that is why its called hedging, this isn't supposed to be about making bets ( guessing ) to try and make a buck. For that activity we have the professional hedge managers, also known as professional gamblers, poker players or what ever.

 

Like you noted the reason SW can and does play is because it actually has a good cash flow and thus can hedge future swings. If they bet wrong consider it simply as paying a premium for their gas, they still make money. With the current prices the way they are it gurantees that they still make a profit. In the end it starts out with a sound and competitive business plan.

 

THe other airlines who think they can merger their way to profits are deluded. The only way to get back in the green is to increase efficiency by trimming planes annd routes, reduce employee salary and lasty raising fares. Why you need to do this and do the merger thing is just more smoke and mirrors intead of doing the hard stuff up front

[Globaliser]

Like you noted the reason SW can and does play is because it actually has a good cash flow and thus can hedge future swings. If they bet wrong consider it simply as paying a premium for their gas, they still make money. With the current prices the way they are it gurantees that they still make a profit. In the end it starts out with a sound and competitive business plan.

If they bet sufficiently wrong, their effective fuel price could end up wiping out the profits that they would have made if they had been unhedged, or even pushing them into a loss. That's why it's still a bet. Hedging is not a guaranteed route to making money, no more than any other form of derivative trading is guaranteed to make money.

[RVRoadie]

Until you actually lose money on an airlines non-refundable ticket, it is hard to appreciate Southwest's refund polices. It is near impossible to lose money. You have 12 months to use the full credit, in anybody's name, and if that fails, you can sell it on eBay.

 

All other things considered, I will take my chances with SW.

[UpstateCruizer]

We just returned from our most recent cruise on Sunday. We flew Southwest despite my once saying "never again". When they changed their boarding system and FLL became our destination I decided to look into their flights again. We had to board their planes on 3 different segments (luckily we had one with just a stop but we stayed on the plane while others boarded). Each time the boarding proceedures were followed completely and it was announced that we were to wait until we were called by letter to line up. No one was allowed to line up until that time. Once we were called to line up the numbers were checked as we proceeded to board. Those that thought they didn't apply to them or didn't understand the process were sent off to the side. I was happy to see this. Ironically we had an A on all 3 boardings and sat in the second row back each time. What I found interesting this time was that as people boarded they headed to the back of the plane instead of slipping into the first available seats. There were several seats empty in the front until the last of the passengers boarded! I was starting to think that maybe there was a reason no one wanted to sit in the front area but we enjoyed our flights. Our experience with Southwest for these flights was the best we've had while flying. No messing around with our flight schedules, our flights left on time and all but one arrived earlier than scheduled. I do prefer the actual assigned seat but even then I'm not guaranteed a good seat unless I book early enough to have options to chose AND the airline doesn't change my flight every other week. The other plus for me with Southwest and open seating is that if I see a family with young children sitting in an area I can keep walking til I find seats that have adults around them :) That may be one of the best perks to the open seating :)

[KLLund]

I havve now seen it all .. rofl. we were flying SWA sunday from Sacramento. And suddenly we realized that people were making a line on the periphery .. to get in line .. finally a gate agent went and spoke to them to explain the new procedure .. a wife turned to her husband and at a high decible setting announced that " I TOLD YOU WE DIDIN"T HAVE TO STAND IN LINE ANYMORE YOU DUMB S***" The entire boarding area cracked up!!

[NCTribeFan]

Our flight is at 6:45 am tomorrow. So, thanks to the info from you folks, I was online this morning at 6:48, printed out A24 & A25 boarding passes.

 

I'll let you know what I think of them when we return.

[kelmac]

Our flight is at 6:45 am tomorrow. So, thanks to the info from you folks, I was online this morning at 6:48, printed out A24 & A25 boarding passes.

 

I'll let you know what I think of them when we return.

 

NC -- Way to go getting the "A" boarding pass; I prefer the first flight of the day and would think things should be like clock work!:)

 

Enjoy!

Kel

[KLLund]

NC .. last weekend we had A 21 and A22 .. they were equivalant to A 6 and A 7 .. there were NO business class passengers .. I do wonder how long that will work out for them.

[Sue (mom of 3 boys!)]

My mom just flew SW this past week, and the boading procedures were not followed. The agents let everyone with A passes line up at once, it didn't matter if you were #25 or #50. This only happened in Las Vegas for the flight home, she said it was better in Manchester NH, where they boarded in small groups.

I wonder if it depends on the airport/agents??

[greatam]

My mom just flew SW this past week, and the boading procedures were not followed. The agents let everyone with A passes line up at once, it didn't matter if you were #25 or #50. This only happened in Las Vegas for the flight home, she said it was better in Manchester NH, where they boarded in small groups.

I wonder if it depends on the airport/agents??

 

It depends HEAVILY on the gate agents. Business associate flew LAX/MCI early Monday for a meeting at our Missouri office. Evidently, LAX (terminal 1-SW and US Air) was a total zoo. Security was over an hour. Gate agents trying to get toooo many flights out at approximately the same time allowed everyone with A's to board his flight. Lots of pushing into line, yelling about who had what number.

 

I am still in Asia, but my ops manager reported that the guy was so stressed after his flight that he postponed the meeting until Tuesday.

 

Give me an assigned seat, any seat (well, maybe that is overdoing it!!!!)

[kelmac]

My mom just flew SW this past week, and the boading procedures were not followed. The agents let everyone with A passes line up at once, it didn't matter if you were #25 or #50. This only happened in Las Vegas for the flight home, she said it was better in Manchester NH, where they boarded in small groups.

I wonder if it depends on the airport/agents??

 

 

Sue,

 

Sometimes it looks like everyone is just all lining up at once, but they are standing in their groups and boarding in one continuous line.

Fellow passengers are pretty good at redirecting people if they are in the wrong boarding group. If 12 people are trying to jam into boarding area A-15 -- A-20, the people behind them will question what they are doing -- believe me.

Of course, coming out of Las Vegas..............,:rolleyes: ;) :)

 

Enjoy!

Kel

[Sue (mom of 3 boys!)]

Sue,

 

Sometimes it looks like everyone is just all lining up at once, but they are standing in their groups and boarding in one continuous line.

Fellow passengers are pretty good at redirecting people if they are in the wrong boarding group. If 12 people are trying to jam into boarding area A-15 -- A-20, the people behind them will question what they are doing -- believe me.

Of course, coming out of Las Vegas..............,:rolleyes: ;) :)

 

Enjoy!

Kel

 

That's what I said to my mom, but she said no, people with all #s in A groups boarded together in the groups. Many folks pushing to the front, irregardless of numbers (yes, she looked). She'd never flown SW before, so she has no comparison to the "cattle calls" of before, but she won't fly SW again without an assigned seat.

[NCMtnBoys]

That's what I said to my mom, but she said no, people with all #s in A groups boarded together in the groups. Many folks pushing to the front, irregardless of numbers (yes, she looked). She'd never flown SW before, so she has no comparison to the "cattle calls" of before, but she won't fly SW again without an assigned seat.

 

I'm wondering if the flight was significantly delayed and they opted to just get the people on as fast as they could instead of boarding by the sub-groups.

 

Sorry she had such a bad first impression - it's normally not like that. As with someone who goes on their first cruise and doesn't like it, sometimes it's hard to judge future experiences on the initial experience. I prefer to fly SW, but won't be for my three flights I know are upcoming within the next year (1st flight in July because SW doesn't serve the city - or anywhere within several hundred miles - where my brother lives; only NW does. 2nd flight because for our September cruise this time we decided to go out of the closer airport instead of driving the additional 1.5 hours each way just to get SW. 3rd flight because we're embarking in Venice, Italy on our April cruise, so SW isn't even an option).

[nho9504]

I believe a lot depends on where you live. For us, SW is NEVER cheaper than the legacy airlines we can fly, with either non-stop, or 1-stop, for the frequent coast to coast flights we make.

 

The cattle-call type of boarding aside, flying SW would not earn us the miles we can use to fly internetional - that automatically eliminates SW from our short list.

 

The $200ish AA Transcon flights we took, with maximum 1-stop at either DFW or ORD, added nicely to our mileage banks. In January we redeemed 2 business class partner awards for our Transatlantic cruise in April and again in Sept. We just flew the first part, BCN/MAD/ZRH stopover, then ZRH/JFK/MIA. In Sept we will fly MIA/YYZ stopover, then YYZ/BCN, if we take the Westbound Transatlantic from Barcelona. Or, we may change the tickets to go to FCO (Rome) or VCE (Venice), depends on which cruise we will pick. :D

 

I dont know about others. To us, the award tickets are not difficult to book, and we always use the full benefit - that is, use the stopover / openjaw, and often change the dates, sometimes the itineraries ($100 fee). It is like 2 trips in one ticket.

 

Not only SW would not have any of the international award travel, nor the stopover benefit, SW is, in many cases I looked at, not any cheaper than flying AA or UA, but involved 2 or more stops for our routes.

 

For us, we honestly dont understand why people are so crazy about flying SW.

[chrisbd1]

I believe a lot depends on where you live. For us, SW is NEVER cheaper than the legacy airlines we can fly, with either non-stop, or 1-stop, for the frequent coast to coast flights we make.

 

The cattle-call type of boarding aside, flying SW would not earn us the miles we can use to fly internetional - that automatically eliminates SW from our short list.

 

The $200ish AA Transcon flights we took, with maximum 1-stop at either DFW or ORD, added nicely to our mileage banks. In January we redeemed 2 business class partner awards for our Transatlantic cruise in April and again in Sept. We just flew the first part, BCN/MAD/ZRH stopover, then ZRH/JFK/MIA. In Sept we will fly MIA/YYZ stopover, then YYZ/BCN, if we take the Westbound Transatlantic from Barcelona. Or, we may change the tickets to go to FCO (Rome) or VCE (Venice), depends on which cruise we will pick. :D

 

I dont know about others. To us, the award tickets are not difficult to book, and we always use the full benefit - that is, use the stopover / openjaw, and often change the dates, sometimes the itineraries ($100 fee). It is like 2 trips in one ticket.

 

Not only SW would not have any of the international award travel, nor the stopover benefit, SW is, in many cases I looked at, not any cheaper than flying AA or UA, but involved 2 or more stops for our routes.

 

For us, we honestly dont understand why people are so crazy about flying SW.

 

It really does depend on where you live and how likely one is to fly overseas. From Dallas, Southwest can offer me the airport I prefer and a price I love. Southwet isn't a grat dea in some markets and they don't fly to all 50 states, so that is an issue for many people.

 

As long as the dollar is weak versus the Euro, a return cruise to the Med is unlikely for a while.

[SelectSys]

I believe a lot depends on where you live ...For us, we honestly dont understand why people are so crazy about flying SW.

 

Not just where you live but where you want to fly. If I need to make a day trip to Sacramento or Oakland from San Diego for the day they are the only game in town. They also never make me feel like I am getting like I am getting ripped off with super high last minute fares which can happen on the legacies (less so these days).

 

Also, WN makes no apologies for not trying to be all things to all people. One of the keys in business is to have a well thought out, differentiated business plan. WN has certainly done this.

 

The US legacies for the most part have failed to create a differentiated product offering in their home market and chased each other in a downward spiral. The only areas where the US legacies have any sort of relative strength is in their international service (e.g., AA to Latin America or NW to Asia).

 

It really does depend on where you live and how likely one is to fly overseas. From Dallas, Southwest can offer me the airport I prefer and a price I love. Southwet isn't a grat dea in some markets and they don't fly to all 50 states, so that is an issue for many people.

 

Agreed!

[SelectSys]

It depends HEAVILY on the gate agents. Business associate flew LAX/MCI early Monday for a meeting at our Missouri office. Evidently, LAX (terminal 1-SW and US Air) was a total zoo. Security was over an hour. Gate agents trying to get toooo many flights out at approximately the same time allowed everyone with A's to board his flight. Lots of pushing into line, yelling about who had what number.

... my ops manager reported that the guy was so stressed after his flight that he postponed the meeting until Tuesday.

 

Give me an assigned seat, any seat (well, maybe that is overdoing it!!!!)

 

It seems that at least he had the opportunity to make the meeting! You don't indicate whether his flight was actually late into Kansas City or if your employee was just stressed out.

 

What if your employee had been flying when AA was cancelling all its mad dog flights? How about when B6 left passengers on planes for hours in the snow.

 

Any frequent flier has plenty of stories to tell regarding crazy service and flights. My experience is that WN does as well or better than most US domestic carriers in terms of getting people where they want to go on time. Unless I am way down in the "C" group, I have never had a problem getting an OK seat.

[greatam]

It seems that at least he had the opportunity to make the meeting! You don't indicate whether his flight was actually late into Kansas City or if your employee was just stressed out.

 

What if your employee had been flying when AA was cancelling all its mad dog flights? How about when B6 left passengers on planes for hours in the snow.

 

Any frequent flier has plenty of stories to tell regarding crazy service and flights. My experience is that WN does as well or better than most US domestic carriers in terms of getting people where they want to go on time. Unless I am way down in the "C" group, I have never had a problem getting an OK seat.

 

Not my employee-a business associate that wants to use our warehouse space in Arizona and needs logistics services to move stuff from Asia.

 

Terminal 1, LAX is stressful, no matter when you fly. Just too many short haul flights with too many people in the terminal. But there are times when all h**** breaks loose. And the day he flew to MCI was one of those days.

 

IF he would have been flying AA when they had the massive cancellations, we would have shuttled him on to another carrier or postponed the trip. The alternative carrier may have even been WN. But the entire point of my post-even though WN has a new boarding procedure, it is NOT being followed in some of the airports. My EMPLOYEE found this out at MCI. My business associated found this out at LAX. And someone else posted their mother found out at LAS. Inconsistency may be the norm at larger, more congested airports. Why not just go back to the plastic cards???

[nho9504]

Not just where you live but where you want to fly. ....

 

Also, WN makes no apologies for not trying to be all things to all people. One of the keys in business is to have a well thought out, differentiated business plan. WN has certainly done this.

 

 

Exactly. A short-haul flight from SAN to SMF/OAK type of flights definitely does not fit in our travel pattern. The shortest domestic flights we have would be at least MidCon, with the majority being Transcon. It is about 40% domestic and 60% international flights annually. Incidentally, I think UA has better Asia services than NW. On top of that, with code-sharing, you can have an AA flight on CX or JL metal which can bring you anywhere in Asia... When talking about international coverage, Star Alliance has the best network, imo.

 

If WM is doing so much more superior than the legacies, I would like to see its stock reflects that... I dont see how it differentiated itself from B6 or AirTran or even Spirit - all are self-proclaimed low-cost airlines but not necessarily low-cost accross the board. The point I made is - even when their fares are lower, the amount is so minimal, it is not worth to me when the FF programs of the legacies worth hundreds times more than the few bucks I would save flying SW and such. The 2 business class AA partner awards we redeemed are $9800 x 2 for the identical itinerary. I dont know how many cheaper SW flights we need to subtitute in order to scrap up that value. ;)

 

I took SW once on a business trip a few years ago and that remained my one and the only SW flight. The airline is definitely not for us. :D

[SelectSys]

... Why not just go back to the plastic cards???

 

Three reasons that I can think of:

 

1) federal security requirements to only allow checked in passengers in the gate area (side note - I used to hate the people jamming the jet bridge doors blocking people trying to exit their flight)

 

2) cost of staff associated with handing out cards

 

3) improved service from on-line check

 

Exactly...

 

Glad to see that you understand why people choose WN.

 

If WM is doing so much more superior than the legacies, I would like to see its stock reflects that...

 

Compare AA versus WN. I can only compare AA to WN because all of the other major carriers (UA, CO, NW, DL, US, ...) have gone chapter 11 one or more times wiping out all shareholder value. Since 1980 LUV is up about 8000%. In the same period AMR is only up about 1000%. In the last year LUV is down 8%, CAL (CO) is down 50% and AMR is down 65%. I would say that WN's market performance is stellar compared to other US airlines.

 

I dont see how it differentiated itself from B6 or AirTran or even Spirit ...

I only know about B6 (started incidentally by David Neelman a former WN executive). B6 focussed on transcons right from the start and built its number one base in a major airport like JFK. They focussed more on service than frequency. They bought airbus A320's versus boeing 737's (BTW - these A320's tend to make technical stops for fuel going west in the winter due to range limitations). They also bought E-190's which broke the WN one aircraft type rule.

 

... not worth to me when the FF programs of the legacies worth hundreds times more than the few bucks I would save flying SW and such.

 

I agree that FF programs are valuable and that the global alliances of the legacies make them much better than that provided by WN. The point is that these programs are pretty much all the same and don't really differentiate UA, AA, DL, and CO all that much in terms of business models.

[KLLund]

I am in total agreement that SWA or NW if you must .. is a regional good fit ..I just happen to be in the region that it fits .. so for me it is a good thing.

 

When I need to fly internationally .. it is usually attached to a cruise .. and I find the cheapest exit airport in the US (usually Boston .. but that could be a coincidence) and then we use Swa to get us to that portal. It is not always the most convenient but it is usually the cheapest from here and usually the cheapest by several hundred dollars.

 

Since we fly SWA so often we are accustomed to how the airline works and it is very simple for us .. I can see how it might be confusing if you are used to the other way of airlines doing things.

 

But back to the original thought .. it is regionally a great choice .. not everyone lives in a a region that that is true about. I am just glad that I do .

[NCMtnBoys]

I am in total agreement that SWA or NW if you must .. is a regional good fit ..I just happen to be in the region that it fits .. so for me it is a good thing.

 

When I need to fly internationally .. it is usually attached to a cruise .. and I find the cheapest exit airport in the US (usually Boston .. but that could be a coincidence) and then we use Swa to get us to that portal. It is not always the most convenient but it is usually the cheapest from here and usually the cheapest by several hundred dollars.

 

Since we fly SWA so often we are accustomed to how the airline works and it is very simple for us .. I can see how it might be confusing if you are used to the other way of airlines doing things.

 

But back to the original thought .. it is regionally a great choice .. not everyone lives in a a region that that is true about. I am just glad that I do .

 

WN appears to be a great fit for many people, as evidenced by their 15th consecutive year at the top of the Airline Quality Ratings. I've attached the link below. I knew WN has been at the top for years, but didn't realize just how far behind WN the legacies are, in terms of customer satisfaction.

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080520/ap_on_bi_ge/airlines_customer_satisfaction

[Cuizer2]

As so many CC members anxiously await the next release of Southwest fares as if they were manna from heaven, and it happens to be reporting season at the moment, I thought I'd indulge my curiousity.

 

I looked at the measure of financial performance known as “yield” from some of the recent financial results announcements. This is basically the average price paid by each passenger to fly one mile, and is sometimes called Revenue per Passenger Mile. It’s not the only important measure, because there’s not a lot of point having passengers that have paid a humungous price per mile if 90% of the seats on your aircraft are empty.

 

And, obviously, if you take an average price, there are bound to be individual passengers who have done well because they happen to have got a very low fare.

 

But yield is a reasonably good indicator of what passengers are, on average, actually paying the airline for their tickets.

 

One important thing to remember is that many airlines have business class and first class, for which passengers obviously pay much higher fares per travelled mile. So this will tend to push up their reported number. The yield from the main cabin will be lower. But Southwest does not have this - all their numbers come from the main cabin.

 

Where I’ve been able to, I’ve taken the figures for mainline operations, because regional operations tend to return much higher figures per passenger mile, and Southwest has no regional operations as such.

 

For the first quarter of 2008, in ascending order of cents per passenger mile:

Northwest: 12.71

United: 13.13

Continental: 13.45

American: 13.48

Southwest: 13.72

Delta: 14.54

 

And for comparison, in the first quarter of 2007, in ascending order of cents per passenger mile:

United: 11.74

Continental: 12.55

Northwest: 12.59

American: 12.82

Southwest: 13.11

Delta: 13.71

 

So I wonder: just how much cheaper is it, actually, to fly Southwest? Or is the perception of low fares simply the result of successful marketing gimmicks, as some have alleged?

 

In some cases Southwest is the best deal. In others it is not. When I used to fly from Burbank to Oakland, Southwest was the best deal. When I fly from Burbank or Los Angeles to San Antonio, Southwest is the most expensive, and that includes the non-stops I can get from LAX to SAT on other airlines (Southwest does not offer a non-stop between LAX or BUR to SAT).

[kelmac]

Flying non-stop is also a consideration:

 

Out of ABQ we can fly non-stop with:

 

American Airlines -- to Dallas, or Chicago

 

Cont Airlines -- to Houston, or Newark

 

Delta -- to Atlanta, to Cincinnati, or Salt Lake City

 

NWA -- to Minneapolis/St Paul

 

USAir -- to Phoenix

 

United -- to Denver, to San Francisco, or LAX

 

Southwest -- to Denver, to Tucson, to Pheonix, to Chicago, to Kansas City, to Seattle, to Portland, to San Diego, to LAX, to Dallas, to Houston, to Orlando, to Tampa, to El Paso, to Midland, to Amarillo. to Salt Lake City, to Baltimore, to Oakland, to St Louis, to Lubbock, and to Las Vegas.

This is another factor that gives WN the edge many times.

 

Enjoy!

Kel