Popular Southwest Big on Bumping - Getting the Boot
           By Christopher Elliott - Special to ABCNEWS.com
     Dennis Keith discovered the dark side of Southwest Airlines'
 "freedom" on a trip from Los Angeles to Baltimore two weeks ago.
     The Newport Beach, Calif., consultant had paid $306 for a two-
 stop flight that took him through Phoenix and Nashville. His itin-
 erary started in the early afternoon and ended at about 10:30 p.m.
 - a long day on the road, but enough time to get to his meeting the
 next morning.
     But Keith's journey ended unexpectedly in Phoenix. "Southwest
 oversold the flight, and I got bumped," he remembers. "I had to pay
 $800 one-way for a United Airlines red-eye that got me into Washing-
 ton at 8:30 the next morning. And I had one hour to get to my
 meeting."
     When Southwest's marketers dubbed the carrier the "Symbol of
 Freedom," they were thinking about the airline's low fares and few
 restrictions. It's probably the same freedom Money magazine's readers
 had in mind when they ranked Southwest No. 1 for baggage handling,
 customer service, on-time performance, price and safety.
                       What Price, Freedom?
     But freedom comes at a price, particularly as the busy summer
 season approaches. Southwest overbooks its planes to such an extent
 that it's forced to kick confirmed passengers off flights more than
 almost any other major airline, according to the U.S. Department of
 Transportation.
     Last year, Southwest bumped 12,074 unwilling passengers, or
 about 2.16 customers per 10,000. (Another 72,142 were bumped
 voluntarily). The previous year, it booted 13,230 fliers, and the
 year before that, it knocked 17,177 passengers from its flights.
 That's more than three customers per 10,000.
     In contrast, Continental tossed only 360 confirmed passengers
 off its flights last year, or about 0.10 passengers per 10,000.
 United's ratio was a scant 0.49 customers per 10,000 in 1997.
                             Bad Rap?
     Southwest Airlines claims its "involuntary denied boardings"
 record is misleading. "Those numbers don't reflect overbooking,"
 says Susan Yancey, manager of corporate information at Southwest.
 "About half of our 'denied boardings' come from passengers that
 arrive at the last minute and try to get on the plane."
     I'm not sure that's a valid excuse; other airlines have the
 same problem and they manage to deal with it. With everything else
 going its way, I think Southwest is just shrugging off the only
 significant blight on its record. Too bad, because with tourist
 season around the corner - and more corporate travelers than ever
 tempted to try Southwest - the uneasy mix of screaming babies and
 stranded road warriors trapped in the same terminal could test any
 traveler's patience.
     To understand why Southwest overbooks its flights, you have to
 understand how it books its flights. The Dallas carrier uses an
 antiquated reservations system developed by Braniff airlines. The
 old computers aren't sophisticated enough to project how many seats
 to fill on a given flight, according to technology consultant
 Richard Eastman, who is chairman-elect of the Washington, D.C.-based
 Travel Technology Association.
     "Southwest is using a somewhat inferior system," he says.
                    Philosophical Differences
     Patricia Coates, editor of the Travel Distribution Report, a
 newsletter that tracks airline reservations systems, thinks the
 Southwest problem runs deeper. She points out that the airline han-
 dles its seat inventory differently from its competitors. It only
 participates in one reservation system and prefers to sell most of
 its tickets directly to customers over the phone or Internet.
     "What we're talking about here, probably, is an intentional
 Southwest directive," she says. "It looks like overbooking is South-
 west's policy."
     You could blame the computers or the distribution, says Nick
 Bredimus, a Coppell, Texas, airline consultant . But ultimately,
 Southwest is the way it is because of its business philosophy.
                   Not Your Average Airline
     "Southwest is a unique airline," he says. It goes beyond the
 peanuts and soda served to passengers, the first-come, first-served
 boarding, or the crew's irreverent attitude, inspired by Southwest's
 legendary chief executive, Herb Kelleher.
     Southwest's high-frequency schedule means passengers can be
 bumped from a flight and rebooked an hour or two later without much
 inconvenience, he observes. Unless they're corporate travelers.
     "Business travelers often have strict schedules to which they
 must adhere. They can't take the chance of being bumped from
 flights," says Darrin Deany, a spokesman for corporate travel agency
 BTI Americas in Northbrook, Ill.
     "The next flight out just may not get them to their destination
 on time."
     Bottom line: if you're traveling on business, better ignore the
 media hype and go with a major carrier.
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