of paranoia and pocketbooks...

[kuangning]

Southwest Airlines Fares (Q14NR)

Advance Purchase Fare:

• One-way fare.
  
• Seats are limited.
  
• 14-day advance purchase.
  
• Ticket must be purchased within one day of reservation.
  
• Fares do not include airport-assessed passenger facility charges (PFC) of up to $9 and government-imposed September 11th Security Fee of up to $5 one-way.
  
• Fares do not include a federal excise tax of up to $3.00 that will be imposed for each flight segment of your itinerary. A flight segment is defined as a takeoff and a landing.
  
• Fares are nonrefundable, but (except for tickets purchased through our Group Tickets Program) may be applied toward future travel on Southwest Airlines.
  
• Any change to this reservation (flights, dates, cities, and/or names of passengers) may result in a fare increase.
  
• Ticketless Travel may be purchased online using either a credit card or by utilizing funds from previously unused or cancelled Ticketless Travel reservation(s). Funds from up to four cancelled or unused Ticketless Travel reservation records can be combined to purchase a new Ticketless Travel reservation record.
  
• Southwest Airlines' travel vouchers, gift certificates, and discount coupons may not be used as forms of payment for Ticketless Travel.
  
• Ticketless Travel funds from previously unused reservations on Southwest Airlines are valid for 12 months from the original purchase date and may not be extended.
  
• Standby travel requires an upgrade to the full unrestricted fare.
  

To Whom it May Concern:

While I do appreciate that some people were understandably shaken up in the wake of 9/11, some of us understand that flight travel is no more dangerous today than it was when we went to bed on September 10th, 2001. Since that time, those of us who have flown, as I have, have noted the presence of armed men in our airports, endured searches and interminable delays, shaken our heads over footage of a lone man, concerned about losing his camera bag, bringing air traffic to a halt in several airports across the country. And we have hoped for a return to sanity, along with an implementation of rational security measures. I understand that that will take time. However, while I am waiting, I must object to being charged for the dubious privilege of having guns all but trained on me simply because I chose to support the country's airlines and not avoid air travel, as so many have. May I respectfully suggest that that $5 security fee is a poor gain when compared to a $100 fare that was lost because someone (such as myself) regretfully declined to fund the violation of his or her privacy?

Cordially,
A Greyhound Customer for the Immediate Future.

Comments

[targaff.livejournal.com]

I know if I were a terrorist planning to viciously attack a public monument of some sort that a $5 surcharge for buying a one-way ticket would be a great discouragement.

Re:

[kuangning]

A huge one, I'm sure. :P It's not intended, of course, to discourage terrorists. It's intended to pass the costs of keeping armed MP's in the airports off onto the passengers. :P

Since Sept. 11, I have flown exactly once

[baxil.livejournal.com]

... and when they snapped the one-inch, non-sharpened file off of my fingernail clippers under threat of not letting me fly at all, they lost my business.

The extra security that that $5 "surcharge" buys will have, by the end of this May, cost them at least three round-trip tickets; I visited my parents in California earlier this year, am leaving again in several days for a hiking trip two states away, and will be going to BayCon in a month. That's at least $600 worth of plane tickets.

How many $5 surcharges are they going to have to charge to make up for that loss?

And how many more are they going to lose before they realize that it's not too little security that I'm concerned about?

... In sum: What you said.