Seat Flex

SeatFlex shows active flights and possible rewards
SeatFlex has a functional chatbot
SeatFlex home screen
Our website has functional account creation and login feature

Inspiration

Overbooking is a significant issue in the airline industry, as many airline companies sell more tickets than available seats based on the assumption that some passengers will not show up. This primarily affects passengers, who may find themselves involuntarily bumped from flights, potentially leading to unexpected delays, missed connections, and other inconveniences. Families, business travelers, and those with time-sensitive commitments are particularly vulnerable. This issue not only impacts passengers, but also affects the airline’s reputation, due to customer dissatisfaction. Furthermore, overbooking can strain airline staff, who must manage complex rebooking processes. Our team has also had personal experiences with overbooking, which inspired us to create a solution to this problem.

What it does

Our solution is a rewards system that allows passengers to sign up to be a volunteer to be potentially bumped from an American Airlines flight that is predicted to be overbooked. Our website consists of a login/sign up system, that asks for user input for their name, birthday, email address, password, and AAAdvantage number, with password check features for security. The rewards point system page tracks the user’s points, available options to redeem points, a sign up option for the user to become a volunteer and earn points, as well as an AI chatbot available for the user to ask questions. Although this does not resolve the essential issue of overbooking, as there is still the possibility of passengers not showing up, it would still make the rebooking situation flow smoother and enhance customer experience.

How we built it

We started with a basic framework for a website in HTML. The website branched into many different pages, so the team divided and conquered, with each member working on an individual page. We implemented CSS to create more dynamic pages, with interactive features. Then, JavaScript came into play to ensure the website was functioning effectively. With each member having created a rough idea of a website page, we worked together to combine the pages into a cohesive, functional website. After the website was formed, we used V0 for front-end formatting, enhancing the aesthetics of our website.

Challenges we ran into

Our main challenge that we faced was sharing our code with each other, as most of us had little experience using GitHub. We temporarily fixed this problem by using Google Docs and constantly pasting our code, to ensure that it is shared with everyone. Another issue that we constantly ran into was making our website look more visually appealing because we aimed to create a more polished and professional look while ensuring a user-friendly experience. As recommended by mentors, we resolved this issue by using AI and V0 to enhance the visual presentation of our website.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

This was our first hackathon for most of our teammates, but we are still very proud of our final product. We believe our idea solves an important issue in the world, as it not only enhances the customer experience but resolves the rebooking situation for airline companies. Our main challenge was making our website look more visually appealing, but we are satisfied with the idea and functionality of our code.

What we learned

We learned how to properly format websites using html and improve our front-ending coding skills. We learned how to embed Javascript and CSS within our html code and how to effectively use generative AI to enhance our code. To post our project, we also learned how to push our code onto the repository on GitHub. This will be useful in the future, as we can easily collaborate on code with other programmers.

What's next for Seat Flex

SeatFlex is not just a rewards program. In partnership with American Airlines, Seat Flex can analyze data, actively track planes, and update passengers on their flights. Next, aside from just offering membership, SeatFlex will offer unique features and in-flight experiences. SeatFlex could search for and compare prices of hotels in the area after a delayed flight.