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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous] What do you think everyone is doing while they slowly get on the plane? They are waiting for them. 10 mins is 10 mins whether on the front end or the backend. Now your parents can reserve the first few seats on the plane and everyone can get on more efficiently and fairly.[/quote]

Although I understand how you arrived at your conclusion, it is a very narrow view of who preboards and why. It will be interesting to see how this shapes seating for some travelers and their experience.  [/quote]

Because clearly for some it’s about getting the first few seats without paying extra, checking in 24 hours early, or any of the other hassles. They may still get preboarding but will be directed to their back of the plane seat if they failed to pay to preselect a seat. Which will make preboarding a lot less attractive to many since there isn’t much upside. If people truly need and value it, they will pay for it. [/quote]

I get why this annoys people -- I also don't love the idea of people lying to pre-board.

However as someone who doesn't fake a disability or pretend to have a small child or pay for early check in for one person and then save seats for other people I prefer Southwest because it allows us to fairly easily get seats together with our kid (who is too old for family preboard). We log in 24 hours in advance and generally wind up in the B group which pretty much always enables us to find at least 2 seats together in the back of the plane (usually 3 together but at a minimum 2). We travel a lot so we really appreciate this flexibility and not having to pay an extra $50 per leg just to make sure a 9 year old can sit next to a parent. She'd be okay sitting nearby it's just not ideal. Southwest allows us to do this without paying extra so we default to Southwest for domestic travel. Combined with no change fees and free checked bags this makes Southwest the most economical option for family travel even when the actual ticket price is higher. I also really like the transparency of their pricing and that pulls me their way more often -- I know if I see a price on Southwest that's the all in price and I won't have to pay extra for any reason later. It makes travel planning a lot easier.

If Southwest starts charging to select seats I just view it as the beginning of the end. I'd rather they just charged more for the tickets! Same with bags. Just bake this into the cost. This is the primary differentiator and if you get rid of it there's just no real reason to pick Southwest unless they have the cheapest ticket which often they don't.

I think they are ruining the best thing about the airline.[/quote]

I could have written this exact post.  We almost never pay for early bird (unless we know we won't be able to access a phone at exactly 24 hours) and we never have trouble at leaste getting B something.  And a B will let you have two seats together, even on Orlando flights with a ton of family boarding.  So much better than having to pay extra to make sure we have seats together on other airlines.[/quote]

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