Southwest Airlines
Introducing group ticket linking to empower passengers to rebook independently and confidently, while reducing the burden on customer service agents.
Role
Product Designer
UX Researcher
Timeline
Jan - March 2025
Team
May Phan
Riley Nicholson
Zhiyu Ren
When a flight is cancelled, the airport gate becomes a pressure cooker. Hundreds of anxious travelers rush to rebook, forming long lines that test everyone’s patience. Meanwhile, overwhelmed gate agents try to calm tempers while juggling complex logistics.
The result is a chaotic, inefficient experience that leaves customers feeling stranded and staff stretched thin—threatening Southwest’s reputation for care and reliability.
Solution
A quick walkthrough to start Linking with confidence
A quick onboarding moment explaining the linking feature and setting expectations of how it helps during disruptions.
Flexible linking, flexible group control
Travelers can link tickets ahead of time with an invite link or link in person at the gate, while the trip organizer can invite others, remove members, or transfer leadership to keep the group flexible.
Auto join after booking
When a traveler books through the invite, they are automatically connected to the trip, so everyone shares the same itinerary.
Rebook together or split up
During delays or cancellations, linked travelers can rebook everyone at once or choose separate options without coordinating in line.
Research
Investigating unmet needs at Midway Airport
We conducted field research at Chicago’s Midway Airport to understand how travelers experience disruptions. While on site, a flight was unexpectedly canceled, drawing nearly 100 passengers to the gate with only two agents available.
Observing this moment showed how people seek information, coordinate decisions, and cope under pressure.
Data Synthesis
User Archetypes
As we analyzed interviews and on-site observations, clear behavioral patterns began to emerge.
Travelers approached disruptions with different levels of involvement, urgency, and decision-making responsibility. We condensed these patterns into two archetypes that shaped how we framed the problem and guided our design decisions.
Commander
Takes charge when plans change. This traveler coordinates logistics for the group and looks for options that preserve flexibility and control. During disruptions, they actively seek information.
Design Requirement: Needs fast, reliable ways to compare options and act on behalf of others.
Go-Along Travelers
Prefers minimal involvement in logistics. Relies on others to make decisions and avoids managing details unless necessary. During disruptions, they seek reassurance and clear direction rather than a choice.
Design Requirement: Requires clarity, confidence, and straightforward next steps without adding cognitive load.
Visualizing the Opportunity Space
To identify where intervention would matter most, we mapped the traveler journey during irregular operations.
While most moments met expectations, stress spiked after cancellations, particularly during gate rebooking, widening the gap between expectation and experience. This framework helped us focus on moments where reducing uncertainty and decision friction could have the greatest impact.
Design Challenge
How might we increase Customer autonomy and Employee efficiency in our gate areas without sacrificing our award-winning Customer Service experience (especially during cancelled/delayed flights)?
Ideation
Exploring possibilities via a Crazy-8s brainstorming session
To define feature directions to improve the experience for both flyers and gate agents, our team ran a Crazy-8s brainstorming session. This exercise helped us quickly surface, compare, and combine ideas to address the most critical user pain points.
Aligning with Business Goals
Creating Value for Multiple Stakeholders
For Customers:
Groups can rebook or cancel together without waiting in line, reducing stress during already difficult moments.
For Employees:
The feature offloads routine rebooking tasks, allowing agents to focus on complex cases and provide higher-quality support where it matters most.
Design
Notable Design Iterations
Confusion around ticket linking
Early designs assumed users would understand the value of linking tickets upfront. Travelers hesitated, questioned privacy, and often dismissed the opt-in before understanding the benefit. A short onboarding moment helps by setting expectations early and building trust before disruptions.
First Iteration:
❌ Copy is hard to skim
❌ Card feels heavy over trip info
Second Iteration:
✅ Cleaner layout, faster to read
❌ Looks like a passive banner
❌ Outlined CTA feels easy to ignore
Final Iteration:
✅ Strong hierarchy clarifies the value
✅ Filled “Start tour” drives action
Reassurance and familiarity matter
While Commanders were comfortable moving quickly, Go-Along Travelers looked for familiar steps, such as seat selection, to feel confident. We mirrored existing booking patterns to reduce cognitive load and rebuild trust without slowing the experience down.
Next Steps and Reflection
Validate assumptions with real travelers and agents
Test the group rebooking concept during simulated or live irregular operations to understand how people make decisions under stress and where trust breaks down.
Pressure-test operational feasibility
Partner with gate agents and operations teams to evaluate how ticket linking would integrate with existing workflows and systems during disruptions.
Explore edge cases and scale
Expand the concept to support larger groups, mixed itineraries, accessibility needs, and partial rebooking scenarios, ensuring the experience remains clear and manageable as complexity increases.
This project reinforced that designing for disruptions is about more than speed. Travelers often hesitate even when faster options exist, seeking reassurance through familiarity and clarity. Supporting both the person who takes charge and those who follow helped us design an experience that scales care without removing the human touch.
Designing for irregular operations pushed me to think beyond ideal flows and focus on moments when trust is most fragile. It sharpened my ability to balance autonomy, empathy, and operational realities in complex systems.