Originally Posted by
TommyC80
Last I heard, you can waitlist for a paid BF seat as long as you have a booked Y seat on the same flight.
This is not necessary if a travel agent is doing the waitlisting.
Originally Posted by
EWR ATC Hold
1) Even though a seat might open up and you're on the waitlist, you might not get it. This happened to me once and I noticed it, called my company TA and was able to get the seat, but just being on the waitlist didn't seem to do much.
Well, like I said it's always worked for me. I've cleared off waitlists for FC on sold-out flights without ever seeing the inventory open up publicly (by way of an ExpertFlyer alert). Again, this is domestic, so maybe that system works better?
2) When I've done waitlists, I've generally booked a business seat on another airline (generally AA or DL out of JFK) and found a discount ticket . . . when the waitlist has cleared, its cleared into full J . . . with generally a significant price increase.
Well this is definitely true. I do it domestically and am always waitlisted (and clear) into "A" class. Of course on many routes A is the only paid FC fare available, and even if there was a discount R fare, it's not usually much less. Internationally there is a much wider variation in front-cabin fares. I assume you can theoretically waitlist for D or Z or R class, but when that one seat opens up, it's likely to only show up in J inventory, so if you really want to get on the flight, you have to waitlist for J class, and then deal with the pricing consequences of that. But if there were say only one seat available in the first place, there's a good chance you'd end up having to pay the J fare anyway. It's not common to see J1 D1 Z1 R1, except maybe shortly before departure. That's just how revenue management works.