Southwest CEO: 'I'd rather have a customer than a bag fee'

[General Lee]

What he 'meant' was that all those AT employees will be coming up to SWA payscales...what he wonders, is if he made the right decision.

Made the right decision? You mean about paying for a 737 type rating to try to get an interview? Didn't have to do that, and I made the right decision. I see the world and enjoy my job at the same time. It is fantastic.


Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[Tejas-Jet]

Nothing says one has to "buy" a type rating to get hired at SWA.

 

[seerickyfly]

SWA is not the norm again. Internal goal to have 20% of domestic market. Well we will see.

 

[desolo]

what i meant to say is that eventually everybody will be paid equally, not to keep the operation separately. That does not increase southwest costs.

 

[redflyer65]

That is correct Rod, that is what I was trying to say. Airtran cost SWA $1.4 billion, and will cost them more when Southwest has to increase the pay for each Airtran employee to match their counterparts at Southwest. That Low Cost Operation won't be so low cost soon. Add higher oil prices, and I see extra fees sneaking in to Southwest's game plan, and a bunch of one time charges in the future.



Bye Bye---General Lee

It's not that bad General, especially when you own most of the planes and don't have NINE fleet types.

 

[Captzaahlie]

Nicely put....

but I believe the stupid LBB overnight comments will start in 5,4,3,2,1.....

THEN

the equally stupid paid for your job comments.

(cave man dude plz note I'm signing my comment)

captZ.

Thanks for not letting me down General.....

 

[GuppyWN]

SWA is not the norm again. Internal goal to have 20% of domestic market. Well we will see.

Dude we've already got that. The goal is 40%!

Gup

 

[Captzaahlie]

Dude we've already got that. The goal is 40%!

Gup

:beer:


Now plz get "Luv mission control" to start interviewing again

so I can be of help with that!​

 

[Stifler's Mom]

I've noticed that the "Bag Fee" commercials aren't on TV lately, replaced with the "Change Fee" ones now. I'm wondering if a move to bag fees may be on the horizon, and attack the competitors with their change fees.

 

[StopNTSing]

That is correct Rod, that is what I was trying to say. Airtran cost SWA $1.4 billion, and will cost them more when Southwest has to increase the pay for each Airtran employee to match their counterparts at Southwest. That Low Cost Operation won't be so low cost soon. Add higher oil prices, and I see extra fees sneaking in to Southwest's game plan, and a bunch of one time charges in the future.



Bye Bye---General Lee

Yet another pilot who can't seem to grasp the relationship between labor rates and labor productivity. If you look at the two airlines' flight ops cost per available seat mile, they're already pretty close. But how can this be? Because SWA's scheduling & utilization of aircraft and crews is much more efficient than AAI's. When the AAI aircraft & pilots are completely folded into the mix we will actually be short crews. This is also why we didn't have to accept pay cuts for our current contract, despite already having the highest rates in the industry. Even with the new raises our costs are still competitive within the industry. <cue sound of several legacy pilot heads exploding>

Sorry, is that being too cocky for you, General?.

 

[vikesfanIV]

I've noticed that the "Bag Fee" commercials aren't on TV lately, replaced with the "Change Fee" ones now. I'm wondering if a move to bag fees may be on the horizon, and attack the competitors with their change fees.

Nope. Gary stated in the conference call they feel they pretty well saturated the market with the "no bag fee" campaign. Now they are moving on to another one to educate everyone about our no change fee policy. This whole conversation reminds me of a few years ago when everyone talked about how "doomed" SWA was once we lost the advantage of all our fuel hedges. Now here we are talking about how doomed we are for not charging for bags. And yet we just posted a $500million+ profit for 2010. Seems to me we are doing fairly well.

 

[Max Powers]

Nothing says one has to "buy" a type rating to get hired at SWA.

No but to get the interview you virtually have to.

 

[StopNTSing]

No but to get the interview you virtually have to.

As has been pointed out here ad nauseam, you don't have to buy the type to be competitive, you just have to have the type. It can be obtained in many ways other than buying, and they all count the same in the People Dept's eyes.

But you don't have to worry about that anymore, Max.

 

[BlueandWhite]

No but to get the interview you virtually have to.

Nobody told me that. I got the interview and got "the call" without a type. So did about half of my new hire class.

Hiring requirements have not changed. Having a type helps, but is not required to get an interview.

 

[johnsonrod]

Nobody told me that. I got the interview and got "the call" without a type. So did about half of my new hire class.

Hiring requirements have not changed. Having a type helps, but is not required to get an interview.

The problem is if you do get the interview without the type, and do well, you then have to buy it if you don't already have it. That is paying for your own training. Do you disagree with that assessment?