Southwest Airlines has regained most of the value it lost on Wall Street when its operations cratered in late December and left hundreds of thousands of passengers without flights around Christmas.
Despite concerns over outdated technology that led to the meltdown and a customer backlash in the next few months, investment groups are calling Southwest’s problems “manageable” and that management is “up to the task” of fixing a reputation battered by the worst operational meltdown in the Dallas-based company’s 51-year history.
On Friday, Southwest said the meltdown would cost the company $725 million to $825 million in lost revenue, customer reimbursements and goodwill gestures for a 10-day stretch where the company canceled more than 16,700 flights due to malfunctioning crew scheduling software.
