Originally Posted by
flyerslc
From the other side, I would never forsake showing goodwill and courtesy for money. And I suspect you would not either.
I get that Delta's BE fares on Delta are much scorned here on FT, and for good reason. Delta doesn't say explicitly, but I think it is not unusual for a third of the pax on a given flight to be on BE. This is strictly my unscientific impression that a week before a flight, the Delta often shows over one hundred people as "standby" (meaning no seat assignment), and the seat map shows all the back-of-plane seats as blocked off. Assuming I'm right, I find it unlikely that so many people are making irrational decisions buying BE. I've bought UA basic economy myself because I have no United status, and it's extraordinarily rare for me to miss a flight. A lot of FT'er in the Delta forum are not chosing BE just because of being kept out of the upgrade lottery.
It would seem that as bad as TSA lines are nowadays for no-precheck people, I would expect lots of BE pax miss flights for that reason alone. Delta can't tell if someone who just misses a flight did so because of TSA chaos (common) or just overslept (less common, but the OP's situation.) I'd be curious to know how Delta handles this for BE flyers. I guess the situation is rare for Delta FT forum people because of precheck and paying for regular coach as the normal practice.