Airline Emails Man Telling Him They're Canceling His Flight Home Because He Never Boarded Flight to Florida. There's One Problem: He Got the Email After Landing in...Florida.

Things seemed to be going smoothly for Bob Woudstra as he got to the gate for a flight from Grand Rapids, Michigan, to Fort Myers, Florida, last month.

Bob Woudstra (Image source: WMMZ-TV)

Woudstra told WZZM-TV he gave his boarding pass to a Southwest Airlines agent to scan. "It didn't beep the first time," he told the station. "So she took it and did it again. I just made a comment that she had to do it twice."

No big deal, apparently. Woudstra said he got on the plane, sitting next to his friend, Gary Leeuwenburg, and after it landed they went their separate ways to visit different people.

But something else happened. Two hours after the flight made it Florida, Woudstra got an email from Southwest saying he didn't show up for his flight to Fort Myers — a violation of the airline's no-show policy — and it was therefore canceling his ticket back home.

Not only that, Woudstra would have to buy a new ticket back to Grand Rapids — a $456 dent in his wallet in addition to the original $616 he shelled out for the roundtrip ticket.

To say Woudstra was livid is an understatement.

"They are denying I was on that plane," he told TheBlaze on Friday. "I'm at the point that they need to prove to me I wasn't on it."

When he called Southwest asking for his money back, Woudstra said the airline was resistant: "They said, 'Well, do you have a receipt?'" he recounted to WZZM. But he didn't buy anything at the airport.

Of course there's his friend Leeuwenburg who traveled with Woudstra and has since gone to bat for him.

"I'm just speaking on his behalf, I feel bad for him," Leeuwenburg told WZZM. "I got picked up about noon, we picked him up at 12:15 p.m. and dropped us off at the airport."

Woudstra added to the station that Leeuwenburg boarded first and saved a seat for him.

Gary Leeuwenburg (Image source: WMMZ-TV)

After the first reports aired regarding Woudstra's plight, Southwest relented and reimbursed the $456 return ticket cost — but he wants it all refunded for his troubles.

Airline spokesperson Lisa Teller told WMMZ that it's investigating, noting there may have been an error at the gate.

For Woudstra such a "glitch in the system" spells bigger problems that simply his inconvenience.

"What would have happened if that plane went down and all the souls on it were lost?" he asked TheBlaze, noting there wouldn't have been any record of his presence on the flight.

And what if passengers who're up to no good can board a plane without a record that they're on it? None of those scenarios sits well the owner of a marine surveying company.

"Not too secure if you ask me," he said.

This story has been updated.

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