Originally Posted by
EWRSNA
Recently I was booked LAX-SAT-EWR departing at 11:55pm. I arrived to LAX in time to make the 11:15pm LAX-EWR. Because it was full, I couldn't SDC before arriving to the airport / going standby. At 10:48pm the check-in counter told me they couldn't put me on standby because the flight was under gate control, but that the GA could do it. I arrived to the gate at 10:54pm and asked to be added to the standby list. Despite having not cleared any standbys yet, the GA told me that she couldn't add me to the list inside of T-30 minutes. That felt bogus to me, but I didn't have a good argument / enough experience to fight it. 7 standbys ended up clearing and I'm confident I would have been on the flight if she put me on the list. Is that policy? If not policy, how would you approach having yourself added to the list given GA denial?
Appreciate any thoughts.
Trying to standby for a flight after the check-in deadline is a YMMV situation. If there’s a policy, it’s against it; I’m just not sure whether or not they’ve actually codified it. It can be done, but you’re asking for a favor, and not all gate agents are inclined to grant favors.
If you were at the check-in counter at 10:48 PM, you did not “arrive... in time to make the 11:15pm” flight.
How did you end up on LAX-SAT-EWR? Was this an award ticket? If not, you had a broken fare — meaning, you had an LAX+SAT fare plus a SAT+EWR fare. That ticket cannot be applied to an LAX-EWR nonstop flight, so there’s a good chance that the agent would have had to get the help desk engaged to try to get you re-ticketed.