Southwest Airlines: Congrats, You Earned Companion Pass- Oops, No You Didn’t!

Southwest Airlines

The last time we flew on Southwest Airlines was at the end of October 2016 for our trip to Portland, Oregon. Lucas and I also took trips to Boise, Idaho and Indianapolis, Indiana over the summer.

These trips were made possible in part thanks to the Southwest Companion Pass. I’ve had the pass two times and Kim has had it once. (My most recent Companion Pass just expired on December 31.)

Yesterday I received a couple of odd e-mails from Southwest Airlines.

The first e-mail (at 11:04 AM) was pretty exciting but surprising.

The subject was “Congrats! You earned Companion Pass.” This was strange considering I earned (from what I recall) no points towards the status in 2016. Regardless, I was happy to have another year to use my remaining Southwest points with the pass.

(For those of you unsure of what the Companion Pass is, when earned it allows the person to choose a friend to bring along when they fly whether on an award or paid flight for free, not including taxes and fees.)

Then the second e-mail arrived (at 7:45 PM) with some info I had a feeling was coming.

The subject was “We’re sorry- Incorrect 2017 status e-mail.”

Here is the message I received:

Southwest Airlines

According to the message, I received the e-mail in the airline’s year-end processing for Companion Pass status. It also mentioned how I did not earn the “status reflected“.  The airline also understands that the e-mail “may have caused confusion and/ or frustration“.

Southwest also “appreciates your understanding when we make a human error like this one.”

It’s hard to get frustrated if you know that you did not earn Companion Status. I know that I didn’t. However, how does the airline make this kind of ridiculous error? Does Southwest not have computers which track who earns Companion Status? I find it hard to believe this was human error! And how do they know that we understand when they make an error???

Regardless, maybe Southwest Airlines should make good on this mistake and offer all of us who received this error a one-time use Companion Pass? I think I’ll keep dreaming…

Did you receive the Companion Pass error e-mail from Southwest Airlines? If so, how do you feel about it?

5 thoughts on “Southwest Airlines: Congrats, You Earned Companion Pass- Oops, No You Didn’t!

  1. I got one too. I was 3 flights short of that required for A-list (22 of 25) so I thought SWA was being kind. Nope, just mean. Here’s what I sent SWA:

    SWA—I love you guys, but this was below the belt. I was only 3 one-way flights short of maintaining A-list status for another year, and I thought the earlier message was a great gesture. I understand the error, but not the response. Not your style. Love you less, Colin

  2. StogieGuy7- Interesting! I didn’t read into it- got the congrats e-mail at work during the day and the correction after dinner.

    I was hoping Southwest would apologize by offering a Companion Pass for one time use. Guess I’ll keep dreaming. 🙂

  3. It wasn’t just Companion Pass status, it was ALL tiers of status on WN – if you failed to attain that tier for 2017. In my case, I got an email congratulating me for earning A-List Preferred status, when I was quite sure that I would only be A-List for this year.

    Various blogs keep identifying this as an issue of those who didn’t earn Companion Pass, but the email snafu was many times larger than that – it involved ALL tiers of status. By the way, I got an apology email from WN last night. It was pretty weak.

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