Hey Tom,

The UG finally got processed on 12/26, late night - the same time that the Gold UG's normally go through (a little more than 3 days out). My reservation showed Platinum & it seems to have processed with the Gold window (which is what I was when I booked the reservation). I, too, was surprised that IAD didn't clear before DCA - I live in Falls Church, equidistance between IAD & DCA almost - and if I'm flying during non-peak times, I'll choose DCA over IAD any day of the week (security at IAD is really annoying & the economy parking lot buses take for ever!). But since this was 12/30 - Friday before a long New Years weekend, I figured IAD would be the better choice for UG processing...

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On a side note - another reason why I hate flying DL. I'm in SLN right now on business & flew into ICT yesterday on DL. I'm scheduled to fly out from ICT on 12/29 around noon. The only other flight that's DL operated that I could fly standby on is at 6:45AM - it's about 1:30 drive to ICT from SLN - I don't mind getting up at 2AM (or just pulling an all-nighter) so I could leave at 6:45AM instead of 12 noon since I'm flying out on 12/30 at 9AM, getting home 6 hours earlier is worth it to me.

So, I call up DL to inquire about the standby options - they tell me that since I'm a NW elite & not a DL elite, I can only standby with a 25.00 confirmed standby fee. Fine - not a problem - I'm booked in DL's Q class & there's plenty of Q class availability (and plenty of seats) left on the two flights it'll take me to get back to DC. Then the res agent tells me that if I want to do that, I'll have to pay a re-fare as well. I ask why as it says nothing about the refare on Delta's website that I could see. He says - that's just how it is and that's what the rules are. So, I ask what the refare price is - he tells me he can't provide this information (note, this is DL's central reservations line here) - he says he's got to transfer me to the Ticket Reissue desk - so I get transferred (it's 12:40AM local time here) - I'm on hold for 15 minutes (thank goodness for speakerphone) - finally ended up hanging up & figuring I'll deal with it later...I hate DL - at least NW lets you fly standby for free if there are seats available. DL doesn't have free standby unless you're a DL Gold or Plat...