Hacker News Reader

Comment by Veratyr | Hacker News Reader

To offer a counterpoint, Southwest also offers the worst boarding procedure, unless travelling alone or with kids. My wife and I were going on vacation and it was impossible to get seats together as we were pretty far back in the assigned line positions and by the time we got on the plane, there were no two vacant seats next to each other.

After landing we discovered that checking in at the right time might get us further ahead in the line but we tried that, checking in within minutes of checkin opening and were still pretty far back in the lines.

We ended up buying an "upgrade" to get us ahead in the line and next to each other. For us to do that for both flights, we'd have been paying ~50% extra for a feature that comes by default with all other airlines.

Also, while interacting with Southwest's famously "better", more "caring" staff, we were met with total disinterest and absolutely no sympathy.

View on HN

> After landing we discovered that checking in at the right time might get us further ahead in the line but we tried that, checking in within minutes of checkin opening and were still pretty far back in the lines.

"Minutes" isn't good enough. I travel Southwest with my wife all the time and we have never failed to get seats next to each other. You need to go the the check-in form 24 hours and 2-3 minutes before your flight, have your confirmation number and other info filled out and click "Check-in" the exact second the clock turns over to 24 hours before your flight. That will probably get you a low-numbered B or a high-numbered A boarding group.

The reason that checking in earlier doesn't get you the first spot in line isn't that the tickets go really fast like concert tickets. It's because customers who are on a connecting flight can check in 24 hours before their first flight and therefore more than 24 hours before their connection, giving them priority. I almost always have a better seat on my second flight than my first on Southwest.

This isn't a bad strategy by them as it tends to give better seats to people on long itineraries who have been waiting around, and since those people fly long distances they are also high-value customers.

I agree 100%. I often hear people talk about how Southwest offers such a great experience. I find the boarding process frustrating (and no more efficient, unfortunately) and the staff no better than my usual airline—either far less friendly, or hokey in a very contrived way.

Canned friendliness is, IMO, worse than brusque professionalism.

Especially on Delta and American, I don't even get brusque professionalism, I get outright rudeness. The longer I've lived in the US, the more I've learned to minimize conversations to flight attendants to "I'll just have water", "thanks" and "have a nice day".

AirTran (now part of Southwest) used to be really nice.

It's always interesting to me how much experiences vary, and how likely it is that our biases also color our perceptions. Almost always when I get on a Delta flight (admittedly I fly them the most), I'll get a friendly hello and what seems like a professional and genuine smile when I get my beverage. My last few experiences on Southwest have been a borderline sneer (if any acknowledgment at all) as I get on the plane, followed by bizarre jokes over the intercom or a round of applause for the plane landing (?).

> My last few experiences on Southwest have been a borderline sneer

I've had the complete opposite experience. I used to frequently fly southwest between Denver and PDX, and the flight crew were chill AF. You can almost guarantee a free drink or two on a southwest flight if you ask nicely -- I can't say the same about any other domestic American airline.

Counter-counter point: Southwest boards faster, by far, than airlines using the standard pre-assigned method. That means less time sitting on the plane, or waiting to board the place. Also means less abuse of selling seat upgrades.

Anecdotally, boarding speed is not my major complaint - failing to secure an aisle seat, however, is.

Exactly!

Fast boarding speeds lowers their cost. That's one of the reasons Southwest can often be much cheaper than other airlines.

Any time I fly I try to get the lowest possible fare by using priceline/kayak/whatever. Southwest never comes up among the lowest prices.

Southwest only sells tickets directly (another way they keep fares low) and they don't share flight data with Kayak/Priceline/etc..

If Southwest covers your route, their fares are almost always going to be competitive with the lowest price. Where Southwest is not good is when you have longer flights (cross country) which will almost always entail stops and or changing planes. But it is great for short stuff like flying between OAK/LAX/SFO/PHX/LAS.

Is Southwest often that much cheaper? I usually only fly them because they're direct where others are not, but it usually doesn't save me money.

I guess our mileage literally does vary, but I almost always find Southwest to be among the cheapest options for short domestic flights.

Or just do it like Ryanair and always use two doors. With a 737 and two doors in use, any aircraft is boarded in less than 5 min.

It also would seem to mean they can either schedule flights closer together or have additional buffer to prevent cascading flight delays, either of which is a win.

The seat upgrade procedure is pretty nice. $20 for priority boarding on southwest vs. multiple times that for a "economy deluxe" seat on other airlines? Sign me up.

I listened to a radio interview many years ago with a physicist who had done simulations to find the optimal boarding strategy. Once he explained it it was totally obvious. The biggest time waster is waiting for people in front of you to finish putting up their luggage so that they step out of the ail and you can get to your seat. The boarding strategy most airlines employ of boarding people at the same time who sit in the same part of the plane minimizes opportunities for passengers to put their luggage away in parallel. So it's actually a actively negative boarding strategy. Boarding in random order would be better. Ideally you would space people out from different sections if the airplane and within reach group someone from the back of the plane would board first. They'd all arrive at their seats in parallel and start putting their luggage up at the same time and then the next group repeats the procedure. I think what Southwest does is interesting because it leaves the process in essence to the passengers. I've seen it go both ways where someone takes the first free seat and starts putting up their luggage, blocking everyone else from making progress. Sometimes people are great and walk by available seats top the middle and now people can start putting their stuff away in parallel.

Ever since I listened to that I cannot stop thinking about it when boarding is slow and get upset about the airline making things actively inefficient. A friend made the good point though that a likely reason for the process being chosen despite actively wasting time is that it feels intuitively efficient to most passengers and keeps them happy.

Mythbusters also did a segment on boarding efficiency. Their conclusion that "back to front" boarding was the slowest, and "no assigned seats" was the fastest, but that passengers hated boarding with no assigned seats. Window-middle-aisle boarding was second-fastest.

My experience is that American passengers are just terrible. Planes here in Japan board so quickly in comparison, with a standard back-to-front boarding.

Is it accurate to say that Japanese are just used to orderly boarding in general? I haven't visited yet but just watching the amount of order and efficiency at train stations on YouTube is crazy compared to the US.

In my limited experience from boosting Japan I'd say that Japanese public life is generally much more organized than in the US.

At the train station there are markings indicating were the doors of the train are gonna be and people line up at the markings. It makes it really easy to pick a good spot to wait for the train and makes boarding so much less stressful. At least for me. In SF train stops I'd always be strategizing where to position myself and keep repositioning as more waiting passengers are bunching up in certain areas. I'm crazy that way. So Japan was very relaxing for me.

My proposal is that southwest allow people traveling in pairs to board before the C group, and require that they sit next to each other.

On my last flight, I was traveling with a four year old, but my first flight arrived late, so we were the last ones on the connection. There were only middle seats left (and the flight attendant was rude about it). A woman and her husband were sitting in A & C seats, and one of them moved for us. But they could have sat together if everyone had just sat more efficiently.

Selling the right to sit next to your travel companions seems much sleazier to me than selling other airplane perks, like more luggage or snacks or specific seats.

If you check in as soon as you can (within about 5 mins or so), you get either the end of A or the very beginning of B. I've always been able to get a row to myself as long as you check in early.

Also, early bird check in is $15. Only one of you would need it (no one will fight you for a center)... So $30 for a round trip if you don't want to have to check in on time.

Thanks for that tip! I'll try that one next time.

Southwest's procedures made more sense when they only did at-gate checkin. You boarded the plane in the same order as arriving at the gate, and your boarding pass was just a reusable plastic card with a number on it.

They had to abandon this when the TSA started requiring a boarding pass to get through security, which made gate-side check in impossible.

Yeah, even when told it's a full flight, watch single passengers sit Aisle, Window, all the way down the plane, leaving groups behind them to be spread across middle seats over several rows.

Would be better just to file people in, next seat, next seat, with exceptions for groups to go to the next row. "First available seat or seat group that will seat your group".

counter point:

i prefer southwest because there's little incentive to fight for position. They give you a complete ordering, so you can wait until the last minute to line up.

(also as others mentioned, it's faster which is great too)

If you care so much about an aisle seat, get early check in, it's $15.

I try to be the last one one the plane even with assigned seating: it gets really hot and unpleasant on the tarmac, and I'd rather spend less time there.

I'm the same, plus my carry on doesn't have wheels and is soft sided. I go when they make the final call.

> worst boarding procedure

Their boarding procedure is selected because it's scientifically proven to be the fastest (out of the acceptable options). There are more exotic procedures that are even faster but people wont put up with them. Ideally you want back-to-front, outside-in, staggered sides, staggered rows to make it as parallel as possible.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com