Southwest Airlines Reservation Center

[Pete]

I just saw some building permits come through for this facility and then tried to research it, but found little information.

The Southwest Airlines Reservation Center is at 5300 S. Meridian, between the airport and Airport Road -- right across from the under construction rental car facility.

It's on property owned by the City and thus there is no real record in the County Assessor database; can't even find a good photo of it.

I saw an article that said it employs 850 people, but that's hard to believe given the size of the building and parking lot.


What do we know about this operation? How much of the SW reservation load do they handle?

Why is it set way back from the road in the middle of a huge open field?

I know it falls under the purview of the OKC Airport Trust but there seems to be little info available.

[kevinpate]

The mum of a young adult I know works out at that facility, and has for a right fair spell now. Never really thought to ask them much about it. The working conditions must be fairly decent as I canna recall ever hearing a grouse from anyone in their family about the job. Fairly sure it is a 24/7 operation as my memory is both the parents work rotating shift work, the mum for SW and the dad for a printing group.

[venture]

That's the customs building, Southwest is south of that. They aren't hard to miss - they have their own traffic light and the street sign says Southwest Airlines.

[Pete]

That's the customs building, Southwest is south of that. They aren't hard to miss - they have their own traffic light and the street sign says Southwest Airlines.

The building permit says Southwest Airlines Reservation Center, 5300 S. Meridian which is the building shown in the aerial above.

The building south is U.S. MARSHALS SERVICE AIR OPERATIONS / CBP NATIONAL AIR TRAINING CENTER according to the County assessor and has a different address:

[venture]

Found this on the local operation: http://www.swamedia.com/media_storag...sheets/OKC.pdf

Updated November 11th shows 527 employees at the res center and 68 at the airport.

[kevinpate]

Yep, I did not look close enough myself. the SW facility is the first building to the north of SW 54th off Meridian. While it sits a bit off of Meridian too, its structure is more on a N/S alignment with the parking lot of the photo pictured above. Thanks David.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/50...8795a0fcd334c8

[venture]

US Customs is at the top and Southwest is at the bottom.

[Pete]

The County Assessor and the building permit system are all screwed up when it comes to the proper addresses.

Makes more sense the bottom building would be Southwest.

[Plutonic Panda]

So I guess they're expanding this or building a new one? Would be pretty cool if we got a new-somewhat-impressive building

[Pete]

No, the building permits were only for storm shelters, it's just when I tried to research the facility I ran into all types of contradicting info.

I'm told this is one of 7 res centers for Southwest.

[Plutonic Panda]

Oh, I see. They own all the surrounding property I'm assuming?

[catch22]

The airport owns all that land.

[venture]

It appears installation has begun of 4 large shelters with dirt being moved over there.

[catch22]

It appears installation has begun of 4 large shelters with dirt being moved over there.

Glad to hear that. While a different part of the airport, I was working last spring when the el Reno tornado was aiming for the airport. Honestly felt extremely vulnerable and unprotected.

[Nugyar]

Can confirm Davids post above, the pic on the bottom is Southwest. They opened the center around 1998 (ish) - in the early 2000's SWA had 9 reservation centers, but with the Internet evolution and the drive to get customers to book online, they ended up overstaffed and closed 2 or 3 of them mid-decade (Salt Lake and Dallas for sure, and I want to say that they closed a Little Rock location too, but it's been too long since I've tried to recall this info... ) OKC was considered a "mega-center" because it had capacity for a larger agent population, I'm assuming it's still considered one of the larger locations. (Other smaller centers were -and presumably still are- in Phoenix, San Antonio, Chicago, Houston and *i think* Albuquerque) They acquired ATA airlines a few years ago, so I'll assume that they potentially added another center back when they took on those employees. (No idea if that's factual or not, just a guess). Assuming my recollections are correct, OKC is the newest and largest of their remaining call centers - so it makes sense that they are investing in storm shelters / improvements in general.

Source: I worked at SWA Headquarters in Dallas in the early '00's.

[venture]

Installation is complete.

Airline looks to keep OKC employees grounded with state-of-the-art storm shelters | KFOR.com

[ChargerAg]

Holding a maximum of 125 people, Southwest Airlines says the four shelters will be able to house all of their nearly 600 employees comfortably.

125 * 4 = 500

So who are the 100 that they leave out in the cold when the F5 comes.

[Urbanized]

Are all 600 on the clock and at the facility simultaneously? Or - owing to the fact that is a reservations center that operates 24/7 - are perhaps some of them allowed to leave and go home occasionally?

[Mel]

They worked numerous staggered shifts, different days off. Drove by there yesterday and the shelters look like they should hold up but they will be packed in there.

[catch22]

^ Yup. Also need to factor with about 600 employees they probably have anywhere from 20-30 people on vacation at any given time.

My airline employs about 80 people (down from around 100). On any given day, 25% of the staff are on regular days off. On any given week, 4 people are on paid vacation time. So that leaves about 56 people at work on any given day, we have a 20 hour a day operation, so roughly half are days and half are nights. That leaves about 20-25 people on a given shift. Or 1/4 of our workforce. I'm sure their staffing is similar, given the same industry, with similar hours -- just a different work classification.