Throughout the week, our team shares articles they’ve stumbled upon that may interest our readers, even if they might not otherwise merit a full post. Here are some of the posts we found interesting this week: Southwest’s Austin lounge, Southwest’s assigned seating learning curve, Virgin Atlantic’s new app, and a TSA-free flight in the PNW.
Southwest to Make Changes After Customer Complaints Over Boarding and Bin Space
Southwest’s transition to standard, assigned seated boarding processes has been clunky, as Nick discovered with his recent Southwest flight. And Nick isn’t the only one who’s been vocal about the experience – others have taken to social media to complain about slow boarding and limited overhead bin space. Well, Southwest has been listening, and they’re addressing your complaints with a few “enhancements”. They’re going to try to re-balance boarding groups, upgrade cabins with more bin space, and add signage for Extra Legroom designated bin space.
Southwest has been working on creating lounges, starting with an approved lease for a 12,000-square-foot lounge in Honolulu, for example. Now they’ve procured a 40,000 square foot lease in Austin’s new concourse. Officially, this lease is for crew, but Gary Leff is skeptical, suggesting a lounge of this size is unlikely to be used exclusively for that purpose. I enjoyed observing Gary’s sleuthing skills in this post, and I have to say, his view sounds reasonable. Based on the FAA’s estimates for operational space requirements and Southwest’s planned 18 gates, Gary suggests that 10,000 square feet is all that would be needed (or standard) for a crew lounge. In his view, we’re likely to see some kind of customer lounge included in this sizable space. What do you think?
Virgin Atlantic beats British Airways to the launch of a new app
Both British Airways and Virgin Atlantic were supposed to have new apps by now, but anyone who’s worked in tech knows… targets move. As the folks at Head for Points say, “…the award for least-delayed app goes to Virgin Atlantic, which sent a press release out yesterday announcing its arrival.” If you already have Virgin’s original app, forget about it – this is a brand new app which will require a new download onto your iPhone or Android. With the new app, you can expect to handle the basics of tracking points and tier progress as well as book and manage your Virgin Atlantic flights.
TSA-Free Commercial Flights Are Launching Between Spokane and Seattle
Raise your hand if, like me, you had no idea that TSA-free flights existed. You will soon be able to fly a SeaPort flight from Felts Field in Spokane, Washington, to Seattle’s Boeing Field on a teeny tiny little 9-passenger plane. Because the plane is so small, it will be able to operate more like a private charter experience with no standard TSA screening process. Passengers will apparently be advised to check in about 20 minutes before the scheduled flight. The easy breezy experience definitely has appeal, but more interesting to me would be experiencing a flight on a tiny 9-person plane. I almost think it would be worth the $299 just to see what a flight like that is like. This reminded me to check if Stephen’s tiny little 8-passenger flight to Westray was also free of traditional screening processes. Sure enough – it was. In his post about the shortest flight in the world, he wrote:
There was no security screening, so no removing laptops. No removing liquids. No removing belts, shoes or anything else. No waiting in line behind someone who takes ages to put their items in a tray, only for them to get beeped when walking through the scanner because they didn’t realize their cellphone couldn’t come through with them in their pocket.
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Downloaded new Virgin app. Tried to sign in. “Your account is on pause”. Old app works fine. Typical Virgin. Not that BA is better.
I’m not surprised. The Virgin web site is a disaster too.