Southwest's Latest Codeshare Amplifies Labor Problems

You've probably seen the news plastered all over the media. Southwest has now decided to codeshare with Mexican carrier Volaris for flights south of the border. It's great news for passengers because it will likely open up new, low cost opportunities between the US and Mexico, but not everyone is happy. In fact, the pilots are really steaming over this move.

This move is very similar to what Southwest had previously announced with WestJet. The idea is to let the home carrier serve their own market and then connect up the two airlines to feed traffic across the borders. In the case of WestJet, that airline already flies to the US so it's easy to see how that works. Neither Volaris nor Southwest fly between the US and Mexico right now, so someone is going to have to do it. Everyone assumes that Volaris will be the one to do the international flying . . . and I would agree. Southwest doesn't want to deal with the hassles of international flying right now, so they get others to do it. Then they can benefit from the traffic.

So it's good for Southwest because they can grow traffic, and it's good for passengers too because they'll have low cost options to cross the border and penetrate deep into those countries. But there's one group that's not so happy, and that's labor. As noted in PlaneBuzz, the pilots in particular are not thrilled that, at least in one pilot's opinion, the airline has effectively decided to outsource its international flying.

You can, of course, understand his point. Southwest pilots don't want to sit and watch their airline slow its growth rate while other carriers get to start flying more to pick up the slack. It's somewhat similar to arguments we've heard against legacy carriers when they opt to give larger and larger aircraft to regional carriers. But this is Southwest, so we don't expect to hear those things.

The reality is that there are definitely some operational advantages to not actually crossing the border with their own metal. It just adds complication and Southwest has shied away from doing that sort of thing. Even the codeshare complicates things, but they understand that they're missing out on a big market by not playing in the international world here. So will it end up that this is just a transitional period and Southwest will start flying internationally when they're more comfortable? I'm not sure, but they need to convince the pilots that's what will happen. Otherwise, as negotiations drag on between the pilots and the airline, it's only going to become tougher for them to come to an agreement.