Originally Posted by
houserulz77
This is all going to be a matter of what they can do and what they will do. ... This is where that oft-used acronym YMMV comes into play.
I also think ... (i)f you are the companion, they are probably less likely to be accommodating than if you actually are the one who technically paid for your seat ...
Originally Posted by
bumble
... I thought it would be much more likely that they would prevent my companion from travelling without me at the beginning of the return trip ... It seems that if they do manage to catch that he (he's the "free" part of the companion ticket) is on board w/out me and deny him flying, our only option will be to book him a one way separately DTW to SEA...
a LOOOOONG time ago (prior to cell phones, in the days of paper tix and next-to-nonexistent security) my fiancee accompanied me on a TW companion ticket LAX-STL-DAY and return ... she needed to get back to work a day earlier due to lack of vacation time, so we both checked in and went to the gate as if we were indeed traveling together (amazingly they had put us in C on a DAY-STL-LAX 767); after she boarded I headed back to the hotel, and an hour later she knocked on the door in tears, telling me the TW GA had paged me, and then thrown her off the plane because I was not actually on board as the paying party ... she had spent her last $15 to pay the shuttle driver
I don't remember how I finessed the reservation changes, but we were able to travel back to LAX together the next evening at no additional cost (later flights, Y, 727 and L10)
and before anyone asks, she married me anyway and we are still together; coming up on 25 yrs