WHACKMASTER

Sorry. I hope to hell they go to assigned seating at some point in the future. It'd make things a little more civilized.

full of luv

I don't know Whack.. I think the non-assigned seating and no food has been part of the highly touted customer service of SWA over the years by placing the onus of food and seat selection on the passenger rather than the company.

In only flying a fleet that has 33% of it's seats as middle seats, that's a lot of potential for disappointment. Right now, if a pax finds themselves in 33B, and hungry on Delta they think "darn airline sucks as there is no food to buy and this is the best seat I could get"

On as SWA flight the pax thinks "Man I screwed up, I should have woken up a 4am to checkin for an A card and I should have packed a lunch for the flight."

Black Coffee

It's complicated because this corporation has a total lack of respect for pilots. It trickles down to ground ops, and it doesn't help when the captain doesn't know how to be a captain. He was probably standing there looking stupid with his flag tie.

SWAPA has told us countless times to start acting like a union. We have pilots sleeping in the crew room because scheduling told them there are no rooms available for purchase. He is probably one of them.

e6bpilot

Didn't know what the rule is?! AYFKM? Let me guess, flag or airplane tie?
Jumpseaters preboard after the wheelchair passengers. It's in the ground ops manual. This is done so that they can make their introductions and get the f out of the way. The flight deck jumpseater is a crew member and the business select passengers have no bearing on when they board. The above comment about ground ops having disdain for pilots is spot on. I had an ops agent dress me down in front of customers in San Diego when I handed her my boarding pass stamped "deadhead" during preboards. She made it clear to me that she owns the jetway and that I don't decide when I board. I was actually embarrassed for her so I just deescalated and went about my day.
Always, even if the flight is oversold, ask the captain if it is ok if you just grab a seat. 9/10 times there is someone who doesn't show or the ops agent is keeping a secret and the flight is actually not oversold. I usually go 4 or 5 rows back and grab an aisle seat if I know it is going to be questionable, that way I can quickly make my escape up front if they need the seat and I don't have to play Tetris with the person standing in front of me who wants my seat when I need to go in front of him while he is just standing there.
The "rule" about nonrevs sitting aft of the exit row is dumb IMO. It creates headaches when the jumpseater actually has to take the jumpseat and if someone has to open that emergency exit, I would rather it be a crewmember who actually has training in doing it. Sorry if that hurts someone's feelings. A flight attendant should be overjoyed if a crewmember sits there.
When you actually nonrev it isn't an issue because you board last.
This isn't hard. Ground ops in some stations are on some sort of a power trip and I really don't get it. Most of the older and or smaller stations they are awesome.

WHACKMASTER

Indeed. There definitely seems to be a culture of "this is my airplane" when it comes to Ops agents. A good example is when they get on THE CAPTAIN'S airplane and start making PAs. *** is that all about? At least coordinate with the front end crew.

At the end of the day it's the guy or gal in the left seat who controls the parking brake and signs the log book. Hey, at least they give us crew meals on nine hour international turns.

tr4a

Non-rev and DH's would be in those middle seats.

WHACKMASTER

Not if it's put in our contract that we are not allowed to DH in a middle seat.