Originally Posted by
channa
In my experience, many oversales are a function of something wacky happening (e.g., flight cancelling and a mad rush of rebookings), and many "potential bumps that look good" often fail because of something unforeseen (e.g., traffic on the freeway, misconnects from a delayed inbound flight, a long line a customs causing misconnects, etc.).
This is my experience too.
I have found that the more I want the bump that the less likely it is to happen. I was a volunteer this afternoon for a flight back to IAH that had been zeroed out for weeks. I volunteered, she had me fill out the card, she took my bp, and she protected me for the next flight....it was looking good at this point--normally when I'm asked I just get the 'no I think we'll be fine'. But alas I heard my name called--too early for it to be good news--and sure enough I was thanked for volunteering, given a drink coupon and invited to board the plane
As Channa said, just volunteer, and be ready...but don't dream too much of what you'll do with the voucher until that door shuts and you're still in the gate area
