seahawks10177

So I am curious if this frowned upon or "illegal" or what haha

So I am planing on going back home on Saturday and I booked a red-eye flight earlier this year because it was cheaper fare and now I plan on doing the same day confirmed change (as a MVP Gold) so switch to the morning flight. How bad would it be to purchase a ticket for the morning flight using miles to make sure I have a good seat (exit row or premium) then canceling after being able to the same-day?

Let me know your thoughts on this

mbluecpa

Violates the Contract of Carriage:

https://www.alaskaair.com/content/le...arriage/rule-7

Whether they’ll catch you may be a different story.

Often1

Do it once and nobody knows or cam be sure. Do it a few times and that is costing AS serious money in revenue forgone. AS doesn't spend money on anti-fraud software so that it can let ticketing fraud go.

It's a private business, so hard to blame it for not wanting to be defrauded.

flytoeat

So you're seeking to assuage your guilt by asking permission from a bunch of people you don't know on an internet bulletin board? Go for it! If you get caught, just tell them I said it was ok...

seahawks10177

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Haha sounds good I don't plan on doing it but was just curious

beckoa

Sounds rather dubious.

T2A

Normally the system will catch it as a duplicate booking and cancel one of the reservations.

craigthemif

I recall that some frequent flyers have gotten into trouble for IT glitches that allowed First Class seats to appear as occupied, so that their upgrade is more likely to clear on the day.

Definitely a bad idea OP...

agurg

As soon as you cancel ticket your good seat will be assigned to the highest priority Elite which might be someone else. Correct me if I am wrong but doesn't the system lock the seat change on the day of travel that only gate agents can upgrade?

be_rettSEA

You can still change your seat assignment after check-in, but I do believe it locks closer in (maybe <1 hr).

lg20

The system is pretty good at catching the same flights on the same day, or any two flights in the air at the the same time, making it impossible to fly both reservations. I had a ticket on the final LAX-SEA this week, a mid-morning LAX-SEA flight the next day, since I didn't know how late my project would run, and they flagged that and required me to cancel one of them. I think it wouldn't have been flagged if the first flight didn't arrive on the same day as the second flight.

Two flights leaving the same day would definitely be flagged.

nomiiiii

I mean, normally I don't mind doing whatever against big corporations to get whatever benefit you can squeeze out of them, but in this case it doesn't seem worth it at all. If you were getting some good benefits out of your strategy, sure. But in this case you're only doing it for a slightly better seat - not worth it.

How was this enforced (call, email etc?). E.g. Southwest and AA do an automatic cancellation of one/both itineraries. Does alaska auto-cancel or give you time to think etc?

CDKing

My past experience is an automated phone call. Now if you book one on AS and one one AA, they dont catch those (or at least the last time i had duplicate)