KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Southwest Airlines is working to make amends with its customers after thousands of its flights were canceled or delayed over the holidays.
The airline’s CEO, Bob Jordan, sent a mass email on Tuesday apologizing for the poor customer experience and offered 25,000 frequent flyer points to each qualifying customer. The points are worth about $300 in value.
For Payton Garcia and her husband, their flight cancellation meant missing out on Christmas in California. They tried rebooking with United Airlines, but even those flights got canceled due to staffing issues.
“They didn’t have any other flight, obviously, and we were trying to make it out there for Christmas to be with my family,” said Garcia. “This morning or last night, I got an email from Southwest (and) the CEO, and they said they were compensating us.”
Southwest Airlines announced on Tuesday it will offer flyer points in addition to other reimbursements and refunds.
“If they are giving people what they need based off of their experience, then I think that’d be great, but I don’t think $300 a person is nearly enough for what some people have been going through,” said Garcia.
And for Kara Hackney, who traveled back to Kansas City in a rental car from Houston, Texas, she has mostly been frustrated with the lack of communication.
“I’m sure they are just swamped, but I kind of just felt like when you see our bags and have our information, that they would be reaching out to us instead of us having to reach out to them,” said Hackney.
She has filed for refunds and reimbursement on the Southwest Airlines website and hopes to get back the additional $700 to $800 they spent on a rental car.
“We’ll probably give them another chance, but probably not for a little while,” said Hackney.
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