Swoop

Not Verified | Cancelled flights, changed return destinations, on hold for over an hour. Denied refund or credits by absolutely brutal customer service. Worst airline I have ever dealt with. To save $200 they cost me an additional $600 plus in extra cost and the lost time and frustration is invaluable. Avoid.

Not Verified | I purchased my flight in September and am trying to get a full refund as there has been a serious family emergency. I have tried calling SWOOP near 15 times and have gotten absolutely no answer and have spent hours on hold. I have tried emailing them around 40 times, and I have used the Facebook messenger service (which is awful) and have not been able to get anywhere let alone speak to a live person. This service is absolutely brutal and now am down $500 on a flight with absolutely no help with their company.

✅ Trip Verified | This airline has the worst customer service ever. I flew to Hamilton from Abbotsford on November 4th for diwali celebration with my family in Ontario. I was very excited. When I was checking in the lady told me that your bag seems not carry-on, I have paid for the carry-on. I told her that I have always travelled with the same bag and it easily fit as the carry-on, she didn’t listen to me and forced me to pay $73 extra or I cannot board the flight. Then I talked to the supervisor she told me that she cannot do anything but she advised me to call customer care, after 4 tries and being on hold for more than an hour someone finally picked up my call but she said she cannot do anything about it. And she told me to email the swoop airline with the receipt explaining the whole scenario. I sent them the email a week ago and they didn’t get back to me yet. While coming back as it was a round trip I thought they’re going to charge me again for the carry-on as the luggage bag but I preferred to stay quiet. The Hamilton swoop staff let me go with the same carry-on. It ridiculous and funny how they are okay with the same bag 10 time and this lady force me to pay this one time because maybe she was having a bad day.

✅ Trip Verified | When we first got to airport my senior parents checked in their bags, 1 bag was 2 kg over weight so they paid $113 extra for the 2 kg. Then as we were waiting Swoop announced the flight to Winnipeg was leaving. They made this announcement at least 5x. My parents were going to Edmonton so since their flight was not announced for boarding and boarding was cut off at 7.45am we waited before going through security. Finally 7.30am came, still no announcement about boarding the flight to Edmonton. My parents went through security, got to the girl who was taking boarding passes. My mom got through, but the girl was having issues scanning my dads pass. Then she got real snotty and told him he missed his flight anyways. It wasn't even 7.45am yet. Then my parents were informed they sent their luggage to Edmonton, and that they would not be reimbursed. The girl who was at the airport as customer service was very rude. My parents are seniors and with them not having the medications because Swoop sent it to Edmonton and then ignorantly said its too bad for them. Luckily I have a brother in Calgary who drove to Edmonton to get their luggage. My parents then had to pay for another flight with WestJet for the same day. Then when you try to call Swoop customer service they want to charge you $0 or $15. Just to call and talk to someone. Don't cheap out and use Swoop, they screwed my parents big time. Then ignore emails to try and rectify the problems.

✅ Trip Verified | We are a family of 4 that took a mini-vacation from Edmonton to Victoria over Thanksgiving 2021. I was hesitant to book Swoop based on the plethora of bad reviews but the price was just too good to pass up. I had only flew with Swoop once before on a solo two-day trip to Toronto that went without a hitch. Booking: Fully-online. No trouble. Seat selection: Paid for 4 seats up-front as a kids was free to select a seat for if an adult paid for a seat. Not too shabby. Bag Charge: Paid for one checked bag up front to save costs at the Airport. Weighed in at 48 pounds. Checked bags: Did not bring checked bags due to cost. Personal items: Kids brought mini-back-backs that held small electronics, snacks, a water bottle. All within specs. No issues. I brought a laptop case that also fit snacks and water. No issue. Wife brought large purse with no issue. Just don't expect to pack clothes to avoid the check-in bag charge and you will be alright. Post-booking: Swoop up and changes out return date from Tuesday to Monday. Given that we were departing on the Saturday, this cut the by a 1/3 if accepted. I did not accept and changed the flights to arrive and depart a day earlier resulting in the same length of stay. Did this on-line with no issues and no additional fees for either the change itself or cost of the new dates as the original cost of both those dates was $150 more than the dates we originally picked. Swoop absorbed the cost on-line due to the cancellation of one of the return flight date. Issues post re-booking: The paid checked bag moved over to the new flights but the seat assignments and the fact we paid did not. No ability to select seats on-line without paying the same fee over again. Called the call center number, put the phone on the desk while I did other things on the computer and was connected after 105 minutes. The call center agent was able to book the 4 of us together at no charge based on the fact we had originally paid for the tickets. A bit of a hassle but we were getting a better itinerary dates than the one we originally purchased so I took the good with the bad. Check-in: Checked in on-line and downloaded digital boarding passes. That did not take care of still needing to check in the checked bag so we arrived 60 minutes before the check-in closed to drop off the bag. Bad check-in took 4 minutes. Same experience on the return flight. No wait for agent to weigh and check in our suitcase. Flight: No issues. Staff were friendly. We brought snacks and water from the departure area stores before boarding. No issues with that. Bought a rum and I asked for two cups with ice and a full can of coke which they happily provided. Toasted by wife on what was an excellent vacation. Despite the cancellation of the return flight date (they cancelled all Tuesday flights from Edmonton to Victoria for the next year which meant we were not a one-off) everything else went as expected. Same thing could have happened with any other airline so we did play the victim card and had an excellent trip. The only word of advice I would give is to book refundable hotels in case this type of cancellation happens. We booked our hotels using air miles so lost a night at the end. In retrospect, we should have kept the hotel options open until closer to the departure date and not used Air miles for that part of the trip. Cheers.

Not Verified | I've been experiencing quite possibly the worst few month of my life and Swoop agents showed me zero compassion in anyway that actually matters, adding insult to injury. I had to cancel my flight within the 24 hour window on October 5th due to illness and had to get a COVID-19 test. I was told my flight could be rescheduled. Under the impression my flight was successfully cancelled I was instructed to call back to reschedule the next day when I knew a return date. That very same day, my father had a stroke. I was actually visiting him because he had a heart attack just 2 weeks prior. Needless to say he was in the hospital and this was a scary time where I was far more preoccupied with my parents and making sure my father was going to be ok. A few days after that, I get the news that the man I love and was supposed to spend my life with passed away suddenly. I don't think further explanation is needed for just how taxing what I have been experiencing is on one's mental and physical health, let alone finances. My week long visit turned into one month and it's quite evident why calling Swoop back was not a top priority. I put a request in for an agent to contact me days ago and never heard from anyone. I called today and was on hold for around an hour. The agent I finally connected with, despite my specific circumstances around my return, was purely focused on the fact that the last agent who was supposed help me with my flight conveniently did not "cancel" my flight or take any notes that mention the word cancel. Meaning she could not credit me for a flight that was not cancelled and was unwilling to consider any other way of assisting me. Life happens, and being a budget airline I thought that they may understand the gravity finances have on people's lives. Due to life events entirely out of my control that I am still learning how to cope with today, I'm now out more money paying for another flight so I can return to work before I stop getting paychecks. All I can say it when it rains it pours. Thank you Swoop for adding to my snowball of issues. I left this same comment on one of their Facebook posts and they got back to me giving me their empty condolences and stating that had I reached out via social media they may have been able to help me. The reality is it should not matter how I contact them. I contacted them by phone and spoke to 2 customer service agents who should have been able to help me. I replied highlighting this and the fact that they can help me but just refuse to and I never heard back after that. I have supported them fully up until now.

Not Verified | It was such a bad experience. I took a bagpack with me and when I went to check in they charge me for the carry on. I was forced to pay that. The customer service is so horrible I will not travel with swoop anymore. The customer service number never work they only talk to you on messenger which is so frustrated typing text over and over. Anyway I will not recommend them.

✅ Trip Verified | This airline is honestly the worst for customer service! I few with them in July and it was fine but for my October flight I am so unbelievably upset. I am so unhappy with them and will never fly with them again. I bought my ticket 35 hours before I had to cancel due to a unexpected family emergency and the customer service team did nothing but give me the same answer over and over again, after a few emails and several days they stopped responding. I get the rules but less then 48 hours and they wouldn't do anything. Never use this airline.

Not Verified | I booked a flight out of Kelowna, BC in in the middle of August 2021 for departure the second week of September 2021 back to Toronto for a business trip. I was happy to see the cost of this flight was around $150 + about another $100 in baggage fees for a total of $250. Great deal! My issue is closer to the date Kelowna was suffering various forest fires that were reeking havoc on that part of the province. With these unforeseen challenges my work decided to move our meeting venue to Vancouver, BC and avoid Kelowna due to these challenges. I reached out to Swoop via their Customer Service email because they do not have a call center you can call in to (unless you want to pay $15 to get someone on a call). I made them aware that I understood that this was a discount fee I received on my flight but at minimum I should have a refund on the luggage fees I paid for ahead of time ($100). The auto response I received was "Someone would reach out to you within 30 days". I have followed up twice with no response as of yet. The service I have received has been zero from them and I will never book a flight through this airline ever again. Be aware of this when looking in to a booking with Swoop!

✅ Trip Verified | I paid for a checked bag before my flight to Toronto, 46$ which I found reasonable due to the cheap ticket prices. When I arrived at the airport the Swoop employee told me I had not paid for my return flights checked bag. I would need to pay 69$ plus tax for a checked bag since it was not in advance. I explained to him that I did attempt to pay for my checked bag for this flight and that it made no sense to pay for a checked bag a week in advance and not for one on my current flight. He had no answers or solutions for me and was extremely quiet and unhelpful. It’s extremely poor service for a new airline to treat customers like this. I will not be flying with this company anymore.