Originally Posted by MSPeconomist

Exactly how did you purchase a ticket with a twenty minute connection? This is clearly an illegal connection as it's less than minimal connecting time (anywhere, AFAIK) and in principle should not be bookable. The DL phone agent should have never sold you such a ticket.

However, to some extent, it's your responsibility too. Whenever I make a phone reservation, I always insist--it annoys some agents when I ask, but so what--that they tell me exactly when the first flight lands, the connecting airport, and when my next plane would depart for every itinerary that i'm seriously considering. Unless there's absolutely no other choice, I would never accept less than about forty-five minutes for a connection, more in some circumstances, some airports, some dates, some seasons, etc.

If the twenty minutes is the result of a schedule change or clear error by a DL agent, DL should make it right by rerouting/rescheduling you with upgraded seats, if necessary by opening up inventory IMO. You seem happy with the current solution, even though it probably means that you lose the upgrade and will have to pay for an additional hotel night, perhaps at a rack rate in Vegas because you won't be sure until you actually miss the connection. IMO, this is acceptable if the mistake was yours (or your living travel agent's), but otherwise not. If you can only get the upgrade for one of your two (?) segments in this direction, would you prefer to get your SWU back and lose the upgrade guarantee on the other segment? (If you were upgrading with miles, this would be easy--I've cancelled milage upgrades for no reason other than changing my mind and deciding to risk not getting an EUA--but if the ticket has already been reissued with the upgrades, the official rule is supposed to be no refunds of SWUs.) It might help to think of potential resolutions in terms of two separate issues: (1) fixing the ticket/itinerary (how can you get where you're going?) and (2) either using or refunding the SWU (remember, the SWU should either get you an upgrade that you can't get through EUA, i.e., TATL/TPAC or guarantee an upgrade for you on a flight that could otherwise be difficult to upgrade through the EUA process. If you're elite enough to get SWUs, they shouldn't be used for a domestic standby/battlefield upgrade because presumably if it clears, you also would have gotten the upgrade for free. The usual FT advice applies: figure out what you want, call, and if you don't like the answer, call again but be polite.

To me, it also seems very strange that DL would create a connection for you through a nonhub that I don't think is even a focus city for DL. (Have you experimented with trying to recreate your exact itinerary, perhaps for some different dates farther in the future, on delta.dumb? It tends to sometimes suggest some wierd routings, but I haven't seen such connecting times appear for a while on either paid or award tickets, although I did manage to generate a SLC connection with negative connecting time a few months ago.) Since LAS isn't normally a connection point for DL, there's a risk that if your incoming flight goes WX or MX and arrives very late, there could be no DL agents available to help you at LAS. It might also even be the case that the airport isn't set up to transfer bags to your next DL flight.