It’s a polite thing to do to ask for permission before touching a bag, but when there are 100+ people behind you who are trying to get seated it may not be possible. The only time I got upset was when a man pulled out our bag that was in the bin in order to put his bag, but then our bag looked like it didn’t fit in the bin. My son-in-law was so mad that he put our bag in and then forcibly shoved the other guy’s bag in. I wouldn’t be surprised if the other guy’s bag was damaged some how.
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However that happens all the time, even on airlines with designated seats. I was on a flight from SFO to London before the pandemic and Buzz Aldrin was on my flight (in business class). He arrived at the gate in a wheelchair (he was in his late 80s at the time) but by the time we got to London he was restless and decided to walk to passport control (which is a long way from the C gates at T5!). He did have a minder with him to point him in the right direction.
I’ve contemplated using the wheelchair service for my similarly elderly mother if she’s flying on her own, mostly to stop her from getting lost/failing to go to the gate on time. I can certainly see her deciding she doesn’t need a wheelchair to get off the plane (or just forgetting about it!).
I think the complaints at Southwest are that you can just go to the ticket counter and ask for pre-boarding and if you answer the questions correctly, they’ll give it to you without any wheelchair. There are never 30 wheelchairs for a single flight.
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The point is not the wheelchairs or even the pre-boarding.
The issue is because there are no designated seats on SW, people are using the pre-board process to get the best seats.
On planes with assigned seating, this doesnt happen.
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My mother was in her 80s and walked most of the time, pushed the lawn mower, went grocery shopping, but at an airport used a wheelchair to get to the gate. She sometimes used them to get off, but getting off she could take her time and ‘hail a chair’ if she needed one, even if half way back to the terminal. Walking to a gate is a little different than whether someone needs a wheelchair in everyday life. My mother also used trekking poles on her daily walks and those aren’t allowed as carryon.
My brother gets preboarding as he has an artificial leg. He rarely uses a wheelchair to get to a gate but does use preboarding because he can only sit in certain seats because of the artificial leg. If he gets a good boarding number, he’ll board at that number because he really likes the exit row.
SW and other airlines use preboarding as a ‘thank you’ too. Service members get to board early and they are certainly able bodied.
But you want to know when the priority is awful? Flying out of Orlando when they let families with ‘young children’ board between the A and B groups. I’ve seen 40 or more get on in this group, some with a 4 or 5 year old and 5 other family members (teens, grandparents, others). Of course they all have strollers and car seats and bags and bags of crap with them. SW has cut down on this and said only 1 parent with 1 child but they don’t enforce that very well.
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I feel sad that my dad probably won’t travel to see us again because he refuses to use a wheelchair in the airport. 
I think he could make it fine if he would use one.
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@twoinanddone I have seen people do that priority thing too.
I recommend getting a wheel chair for anyone older/mobility impaired at Dulles Airport (outside DC). The walks can be long.
These stories make me kinda glad SW only has a couple of routes from my airport to cities I don’t travel to.
Whenever I travel back & forth from the various FL airports (particularly toward the end of snowbird season) I always notice a line of wheelchair passengers at the gates. They almost need traffic control 
If we are voting on which airline to dislike, I vote United. I’m had many fine experiences on SW, but given I don’t fly United often, they have a pretty miserable track record for me.
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Yep, same here. They’ve bumped us more than once when we had reservations. Now I’m leery when they won’t let me select seats.
I use a wheelchair for us when we fly because we never know if H’s knee with be acting up and I don’t want to use up all my batteries on my portable O2 machine because they are needed on the plane.
Pre-assigned seats probably makes boarding slower, because a boarding passenger will likely take longer to get to the specific seat than sit in any acceptable seat. This would be a problem for Southwest’s business model, which is to turn aircraft quickly to get as many flights per day out of each aircraft.
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People like different airlines for different reasons:
American has the most domestic routes and a ton of hubs - which makes it easier to find flights.
United has the Star Alliance which many people believe is much better than One World or SkyTeam but they dont offer as many domestic flights. A lot of international fliers like United for this reason.
Delta has the best run airline and many people love them but their frequent flier program redemption is considered the worst and least valuable.
If I was a casual traveler not in an exclusive hub, I’d probably fly Delta.
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They seem to be rethinking that policy.
Of course, whichever airline has a hub at your local airport typically offers a greater selection of non-stop flights than other airlines, where you commonly have to have a stop at the airline’s hub if the other end of your flight is not the airline’s hub.
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Yes but the majority of Americans don’t live in a hub city.
Overall, American offers the most flights.
| Airline* | Avg. daily domestic flights**: March | Domestic share |
|---|---|---|
| American | 5,010 | 23.1% |
| Delta | 4,061 | 18.8% |
| Southwest | 4,041 | 18.7% |
| United | 3,566 | 16.5% |
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They could fix that by going back to the good old “board by row numbers, starting from the back” process.
But of course, they won’t because the current tiered (grouping) system brings them more revenue.
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“Executives said Southwest is studying changes in boarding and seating to determine how customers will respond and how much money that could raise. They declined to give details until an investor day in September, but Chief Commercial Officer Ryan Green said bag fees and a curtained-off premium cabin are not being considered. Southwest, alone among major U.S. airlines, doesn’t charge extra for one or two checked bags.”
If they aren’t adding a premium cabin, then what changes to the seating/boarding process could raise revenue?
I assume it’s to allow people who pay for A1-15 to pick an actual seat and not let the fakers get ahead of them.
Back to front block boarding is actually relatively slow. WILMA (window, middle, aisle) or outside-in boarding is considerably faster. Southwest-style boarding is a bit faster than WILMA boarding. However, something called Steffen boarding may be even faster, although it requires both assigned seats and a precise order of passengers.
https://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/fastest-best-way-to-board-a-plane-18445576.php
We used to fly Southwest because we flew out of Midway and could get non stops almost everywhere we wanted to go. Then we moved to San Diego, son ended up in Seattle. And Southwest stopped non stops between the cities. So we trialed Alaska and now it’s our airline of choice. We fly so seldom that we pay for first class.
After everything I’m hearing, I doubt I’ll ever want to fly Southwest again.
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Alaska Airlines is considered by many to be the very best airlines. I’d fly it if I could.
Consider yourself lucky.
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