risenshine85

Hi,

I am booked on an aeroplan reward economy ticket from YYZ to ORD on Friday evening in Class X. Would it be possible to show up to the airport early and request a standby on an earlier flight.

I called aeroplan and they said we do not do standbys we only do same day airport changes which cost $75.

Can anyone post their experience?

Tedgrrrr

In Los Angeles I had to speak to 4 managers and fight tooth and nail to get on an earlier flight, which was itself delayed by 2 hours, so that I could be sure i wouldn't miss my Vancouver to Sydney Flight. The flight I was scheduled to take was only going to get to Vancouver 75 minutes prior to the Sydney flight taking off. The flight earlier flight I managed to "talk" my way into was 3/4 empty!!!! Other than that, I've tried getting them to waive the $75 fee dozens of times with no luck whatsoever, so you'll probably have to pay, but you might as well ask - stranger things have happened.

If you don't have bags, you'll be able to ask - not only at check-in, but also at the customer service counter, and with the gate agent of the earlier flight, so that's three people who might possibly say yes.

jlisi984

Aeroplan is correct.

Air Canada doesn't have a standby option, only same-day change for the price mentioned above.

Singlepoint

I can only tell you my experience from three separate reward flights. Two years ago, I and a colleague were flying back from LGA-YUL-YYC and had a lengthy layover in YUL. I just asked the lounge attendant in YUL if we could switch to an earlier flight. She looked up the PNRs and discovered they were reward travel tickets. She then said that it made no difference to her as it didn't matter which flights we were on (we also had no checked luggage).

We did the same sort of thing from DFW-YYZ as well. We had two family members on the earlier flight and myself and another family member on the second (later) flight. I asked at check-in (I think it was UA codeshare) and they said OK.

Last example is flying back from YEG-YYC on three separate occasions in the past year. In each case, I was at the airport early and had no checked bags. I asked at check-in and they wanted to charge me BUT they also said to check at the gate. In each case, I did so and they never charged me an extra fee.

I'm E if that makes any difference. Maybe I'm just catching people on good days :-)

YMMV

Cheers,

Singlepoint