MSPeconomist

In the past during IROPs did DL just allocate all seats for rebooking on a first come, first served basis or was there higher priority for elites and those with higher fare classes? I suspect that there was a priority system which is now gone or at least now applies only to 360 customers.

I remember a time not long before COVID-19 when I was flying MSP-DTW-ICN and MSP-DTW was badly delayed, with no seats at all on the next MSP-DTW flight, which would have been a very tight but legal connection at DTW. I was in D1, probably on a cheap business class fare, and there was one seat remaining on the MSP-NRT/HND flight but the SC agent said that she couldn't give it to me. DL wanted to reroute me through LAX the next day, which I rejected partly because I had avoided this much cheaper routing because I didn't want to fly to the west coast on a domestic flight nor did I want the shorter TPAC flight because it would give me less sleep. EF showed me a routing using the KE JFK-ICN A380 nonstop (which was very lightly booked in business class) and arrived around 5 am instead or my original arrival time of around midnight IIRC. I was surprised that the airport SC agent wouldn't give me the nonstop TPAC DL flight exMSP (unless I were willing to downgrade to coach, which I emphatically rejected). Implicitly I wasn't high enough priority to get that seat, although I later heard them asking for two volunteers in D1 on that flight, so that it looked like at least three people were able to be rebooked onto it in D1 but I wasn't. (It hasn't been overbooked in D1 when the MSP-DTW flight posted the delay and I double that DL sold three TPAC D1 tickets at about an hour before departure, but of course it could have happened or DL could have had three "must ride employees, but IMO either scenario is extremely unlikely).