Award Double Booking - caught red handed

 
Old Dec 17, 2008, 10:26 am
  #1  
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Award Double Booking - caught red handed

Busted! I made an online 48 hr award hold (i was short 4000 miles the day i found the seat) ATL-SLC-ATL for my wife so we could ski over new years. I'm not flying again till next week so to get the 4000 miles in time i sucked it up and paid to transfer some from her account, which never has many miles because she's always on award tix out of my account. With one hour to go until my rez expired the transferred miles hadn't posted yet so to be safe I went and did another search and made another rez for her, outbound same flight, return a crappier 1-stop through CVG, but good enough for insurance. Next I called SMS to ask whether they could extend the hold since my transfer should post any day now. They were surprisingly accomodating and gave me an extra 2 days to redeem the miles, which showed up when i brought up the reservation on DL.com. So no worries, just wait until the transferred miles post, right? not so much. Miles posted the next morning and when i went to redeem the reservation was gone. only the "insurance" reservation was there, and of course the original flights no longer had saver availability. So back on the phone with SMS, they firmly told me I broke the rules and "double booked" so they went ahead and canceled the oldest of the reservations. made me feel like a criminal. Only problem was i wanted the original flights, not the 1-stop backup itinerary. No call to ask me before they did it, i guess the system just took the liberty and canceled one for me. And then, just when i least expected it, the SMS agent agreed to ask her supervisor if she could force me onto the original flights for the original saver miles. sure enough she did it! i was dumbfounded. of course when i went online to redeem the miles and avoid the phone fee i got the "we're having turbulence" message, but one call to website support and they fixed it for me free so I could finally ticket the itinerary. The lesson here i guess is don't double book, or at least don't get caught double booking, or at least if you're going to double book make sure the itinerary you really want is the newest one. I don't know why the system even lets you double book, but it does, i guess they assume the 48 hr hold limit is enforcement enough.

sorry if I am a jerk for hogging all the saver seats by double booking, i sure felt like it on the phone when I was begging for my seat back... i didn't even know it was against the rules
gte157q is offline  
Old Dec 17, 2008, 11:07 am
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i had no idea that was even a rule until i read your post. i noticed that a couple of times when i was playing around with itineraries that ones on hold would "dissolve" with certain legs remaining and others disappearing. thanks for the insight!
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 11:08 am
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I have done this a lot... and never gotten caught. Your call may have been the trigger to look.
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 12:48 pm
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Originally Posted by CarolDisney1
I have done this a lot... and never gotten caught. Your call may have been the trigger to look.
I have never double booked for the same location & dates but I have double booked awards to different destinations for the same time period many times. Does this count as against the rules too?
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 1:25 pm
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I enjoy the right to double book. As long as I cancel suitably in advance, I don't think I'm hurting anyone significantly.
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 2:27 pm
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So, are we allowed to make 48 hour holds over the phone still? For all itineraries or just domestic ones or just international ones?

And after the agent puts the reservation on "hold", we just sign onto our account and book it to save the $25?

Is it really that easy?
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 2:37 pm
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Originally Posted by MikeyZBT
So, are we allowed to make 48 hour holds over the phone still? For all itineraries or just domestic ones or just international ones?

And after the agent puts the reservation on "hold", we just sign onto our account and book it to save the $25?

Is it really that easy?
I've never done a hold over the phone for a domestic ticket, only International, but i also haven't tried. I think i heard they're not supposed to do it though. What I have done was made any old hold online and then called and asked to change a leg or 2, and then keep it on hold. as soon as i hang up i go online to redeem and save the $25. So yes, it really is that easy to avoid the $25 phone fee, i redeem awards often and it is my personal goal to never pay this fee. FYI the itinerary might not show in your account, sometimes you have to use the record locator and passenger name to find it (particularly if you are not the pax), but once you do you can redeem online.
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 3:42 pm
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Originally Posted by gte157q
I've never done a hold over the phone for a domestic ticket, only International, but i also haven't tried. I think i heard they're not supposed to do it though. What I have done was made any old hold online and then called and asked to change a leg or 2, and then keep it on hold. as soon as i hang up i go online to redeem and save the $25. So yes, it really is that easy to avoid the $25 phone fee, i redeem awards often and it is my personal goal to never pay this fee. FYI the itinerary might not show in your account, sometimes you have to use the record locator and passenger name to find it (particularly if you are not the pax), but once you do you can redeem online.
It just always seems that when booked an international award the agent says that they aren't allowed to do holds anymore...

By the way, great id, gte157q... fellow Rambling Wreck here! Great win over UGA!
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 4:32 pm
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Originally Posted by CarolDisney1
I have done this a lot... and never gotten caught. Your call may have been the trigger to look.
I have a business associate who has done this on full are tickets using the same routing but on different flights. He did not know which one he was going to be able to use and then cancels the unwanted one with a refund.

He did this several times and then he was contacted and told that if done again he would have a penalty of some type. And I have heard the same thing done by other airlines to monitor duplicate bookings. In that case they canceled all of the duplicated reservations, without notice.
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 6:06 pm
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Originally Posted by MikeyZBT
It just always seems that when booked an international award the agent says that they aren't allowed to do holds anymore...

By the way, great id, gte157q... fellow Rambling Wreck here! Great win over UGA!
can't believe it took 58 posts for someone to notice the GT id... go jackets! ME '04
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Old Dec 17, 2008, 6:11 pm
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Originally Posted by gte157q
can't believe it took 58 posts for someone to notice the GT id... go jackets! ME '04
ME '02 here.

I have to imagine there are a lot of GT'ers here considering DL's headquarter location.
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Old Dec 18, 2008, 10:10 am
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GT ID

We did notice the GT ID :-) a lot of us use those as logins for various accounts. By the time you finish undergrad, it's hard to ever forget....

Back on topic... if these are all holds, isn't it possible to ID the traveler as a "different" name or SM number, then switch later if needed right before ticketing whichever hold you want to keep?
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Old Dec 18, 2008, 10:53 am
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I am sure it is in the airline's conditions of contract that they reserve the right to cancel dupe bookings without notice. Honestly, if I ran an airline, I would have it in there. You know for a fact that you are not going to use two reservations on the same day, whether to the same destination or a different destination. By booking more than once reservation, you are tying up seats that I might otherwise be able to sell, or possibly sell at a higher fare.

So, short answer - expect dupe bookings to be canceled (some airlines cancel BOTH bookings) and if they are not canceled, count yourself fortunate.
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Old Dec 18, 2008, 1:42 pm
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Originally Posted by MikeyZBT
I have to imagine there are a lot of GT'ers here considering DL's headquarter location.
Even George (P) Burdell posts here.
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Old Dec 18, 2008, 3:46 pm
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I would love to be able to single book...

Originally Posted by Evan!
I have never double booked for the same location & dates but I have double booked awards to different destinations for the same time period many times. Does this count as against the rules too?
Given the pathetic award tix availability, I would love to be able to "single book" one of these days!

TFD
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