True or False?
 

Last week on a domestic flight, I handed the gate agent my boarding pass and Super Elite card and asked if I could get a better seat assignment. I had a full fare ticket and was in a middle seat on an A320.

The gate agent said, "that will never do" and checked the computer. She told me that she was sorry that there were only middle seats, but that she would bump me up to business class. I thanked her, but explained that I had no U/G certificates because Aeroplan had not sent me any. She said not to worry, because there were plenty of open seats and I was Super Elite. After she handed me a new boarding pass she turned to a group of deadheading AC flight attendents and said, I had to give away the seat....which one of you wants to voluteer to sit in the back?

True or False?

I would say true.

should be true

True
 

If you're a full Y, true!

I would say True.

Sounds True

According to the rules, false.

The crazy thing is that it could be either way. I have had awesome agents that changed tickets that required change fee's and said "don't worry we appreciate your business" and I have had agents that told me that I couldn't upgrade a companion till I read the rules of the voucher to them.

A real a crap shoot.

My sentiments exactly.

Sounds "too good to be true". ;)

False.

:D

I'll say false.

It would have to be false- :td:
If she said there were lots of open seats, and gave you the boarding pass, the FAs were not given the seats yet. She would simply have later given new boarding cards to the crew- except the junior.

Experience and history of past posts dictate that anything can happen, especially since agents (i.e. gate agents) do the most interesting things and are not always according to the rules.

I don't know what the exact rules are, but if a flight attendant is deadheading, my understanding is that they are not required or obligated to sit in J (? on at least domestic ?)...

I would say TRUE.

I'm guessing TRUE ---

but only because if it were false I'm sure that your post would probably be more of a complaint than quiz !! :p

Spoon!!!!!!!

i say TRUE...as it has happened to someone i know...ME!

from my understanding from past posts, a deadheading flight attendant only is confirmed in economy class and is subject to business class providing seats are available. but my understanding, is that unless all the flight attendants have exact same seniority, would the gate agent ask them for volunteers to sit in the back.

when i arrived at the gate to board the flight, they were paging my name, and i gotten an op upg. soon after, the announcement came that buisness was full, and to please board. then came the 5 or so flight attendants in uniform.

I would hope it would be true, I fear it will be false

I vote for true
 

The only time I noticed this was in YOW on the way to YYZ. There were approximately a half dozen uniformed staff (pilots and fa's) waiting somewhat close to the gate.

As I was working to get my upgrade at the counter, I overheard the staff conversation saying that there was a chance that all would not make it on the flight as it was pretty full. Sure enough, one of the FA's did not make it on board. Two pilots and two fa's made it up front, one was sent to the back of the bus. I did sit in front!

I expect that given that there are hourly flights between YOW and YYZ that the last fa made it back later on.

Bear in mind -- the OP has no certificates. This would be a courtesy op-up, or perhaps a GA seeing C availability at the same price point or less than what the OP paod for Y, which seems unlikely.

If the OP was using certs, I would agree that this sh/would happen.

Simon

True ^ ^

IMO, should be true!

False, but it would be very nice if it was true.

On the other hand...

AC149 Jan 20 during boarding, dude sitting in 1D was almost bumped by an FA. The gate agent came in and told the dude he would have to deplane and he was confirmed on the next YYZ YVR flight. There was an FA who was assigned his seat and there was some mixup. After he started to retrieve his belongings (and grumbling under his breath, rightly so), he was given 1C but the FA who originally had 1D let the dude just take it back as a swap.

Anyway, I still stick to my answer of "true" since I've seen gate agents do things differently on a consistent basis.

Edited to add: This scenario happened because of the wildcat strike and we had alot of people backlogged onto AC149... so there seems to be some legitimacy.. but the correct thing was to at least put the dude in Y and bump some non-status low-fare pax... OR put the FA in Y and bump some non-status low-fare pax... so many better outcomes.

Could be true , could be false , I'm sitting on the fence for this one !

Does anyone know where Empress is?

I think it is true too.

When do we find out?? can't stand the suspense :D

My exact thoughts on Empress.Somethings up,just cannot pin it down.


I say true to the question. ^

I am well and alive, thanks for the concern. Have been very busy with work and will continue to be. Been bumping into quite a few FTers lately though, had a nice chat with mtachhi last Sun on a flight to YYZ. :)

At the risk of agreeing with beach digit, is the OP planning to given us the answer anytime soon?

Glad that you are still with us, thought it might be work related as I have been bathing lately :D !

Sorry for dragging this OT, back to the topic !

The answer is: NOT true. FYI there were six AC staff in J.

Kind of makes you feel wanted, eh?

At least AC is consistent. ;)

dbyyz, if that happened to me I would be pissed too.

At the LEAST, did you get reassigned to an aisle or window in Y?

I'm not arguing that it would be great if AC had done this, but given what we know about the rules, why would anyone have expected them to?

OP did not have upgrade certs. In order to go from the economy cabin to the front cabin, unless it is an op-up due to overbooking in the back, unless you are very very lucky (or SH or parnel, it would seem :) ) the rules say you need a cert.

Simon

I have actually had a great experience with AC when they upgraded me to J just becasue I was SE on a Long Haul flight YYZ-LHR. No upgrades certificates or anything, so i WOULD have said true hehe

I did not expect an U/G. I know what the rules are. But I do know that people on lesser fares (Latitude) get upgraded automatically without an U/G certificate. If AC were interested in treating its loyal and high-revneue customers better, this would not have happened, and the responses on this thread confirm this. I am just very dissappointed in AC. If there was a choice in full-service domestic carriers I would walk in a dime store minute.

Plain Latitude fares, or a Latitude pass ? The former, I agree, should not happen over a full Y Freedom pax. The latter is a function of that particular (new) brand of "loyalty" that the passes entail.

I think we've been through the discussion that it would be great if AC did any fare upgrades for its high-level customers (E/SE or full Y), however clearly this is a different model than the one (passes) they are choosing to follow. Time will tell if the US model is sustainable -- I certainly like it too when I'm doing it on DL or UA. We shall see.

This issue was raised at the AC visit on 14JAN in YUL. Montie Brewer himself said the model was NOT sustainable and would be going the way of the Dodo bird when the US carriers were done with this current, or the next imminent, round of restructuring.

So he said, OK. But is this gospel, or could it just be your everyday spin as usual?

(Let's not jump to conclusions too quickly, or let ourselves be manipulated by smooth talkers too easily.)