CALfly5

The official policy on BF waitlist clearing is that they are cleared up until 24 hours prior to departure of your int'l flight. Turns out that is NOT the case; the waitlist can be canceled MORE THAN 24 hrs prior to departure. (How much more is the question.)

My situation: I am booked on CO 120 EWR-BCN, ("Barthelona") tomorrow. Departure is 710pm out of EWR. Today at 4pm EST, I checked my res online and saw I had been removed from waitlist. That's at least 3 hours before the waitlist should have expired.

So, I called the Elite res ctr to inquire; she told me that I had, indeed, been removed from the waitlist. She checked the BF cabin and found 1 seat left open, in a J-class fare. (So, as of 4pm EST, there was still a seat left, but I recognize that CO would hold that open until flight time so they could sell it.)

CO clearly thinks they will sell that J-fare, and they canceled the u/g waitlist prior to the 24hr mark because they knew they'd be keeping that seat open for sale.

So here's the question: how far in advance CAN the airline cancel the BF waitlist? 25 hrs? 28? 32? 37? What happens if, in this case, somebody cancels their trip at 6pm tonite and frees up a BF seat. I'm no longer on the waitlist, so i can't get it even though the policy says they'll waitlist me up to 24hrs prior to departure.