Centurion lounge on arrival by booking/cancelling another flight?
Jun 28, 2023, 9:50 am
#16
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Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Pacific Northwest
Programs: UA Gold 1MM, AS 75k, AA ExPlat, Bonvoyed Gold, Honors Dia, Hyatt Explorer, IHG Plat, ...
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The real issue here seems to be about "fairness". Is it fair to the airlines (or Amex) to book a flight that you have no intention of using just to gain access to a lounge? Rules in our society almost always favor the corporation over the individual. It is considered illegal to book "hacker" fares that can save you money but it is completely legal for airlines to overbook and bump passengers off of a flight that someone paid for. Our society is based on loopholes (real or perceived) that some people use because they think it is "fair". That is unlikely to ever change.
Here is the ethical dilemma that I faced a few months ago: I had a six hour connection at LAX, connecting from AS to Condor. Single ticket, so I should be able to use the Centurion lounge. Except that AS is notorious for not being able to issue partner boarding passes, and Condor is notorious for having a website that is badly functional and often doesn’t allow online checkin. And Condor’s ticket counter only opens about 3-4 hrs before departure since they only have a single flight every other day or so. And Priority Pass has effectively no services at LAX.
So… I figured, while perhaps not 100% fair and ethical, it *is* to some degree AS fault if they can’t give me the DE boarding pass I need to get into the CL lounge. So I booked a one-way award from LAX that was scheduled to depart about two hours after my arrival and figured I would use that BP to get into the CL dungeon (and then, of course, would cancel it).
Turned out to be unnecessary as the Condor hamsters were fed and spinning their wheels, and the website did happily produce a boarding pass 24 hrs prior to departure, and so I was able to cancel the AS dummy flight at that time.
Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. Whether or not it’s fraud depends on what the meaning of the word “is fraud” is. Regardless, it’s certainly no more sleazy or fraudulent than getting multiple sock-drawered credit only cards for the SUBs, it’s not at the same level of sleaze as covering the words “gift card” with your thumb when showing a card to a money order producing customer service representative, it’s highly unlikely to be noticed or penalized, it’s certainly not illegal. BUT, most importantly, why go through all that effort to get into a mediocre lounge which is likely to be overcrowded and noisy.
Last edited by notquiteaff; Jun 28, 2023 at 9:56 am
Jun 28, 2023, 11:55 am
#18
Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: AUS
Programs: BAEC Gold, AA PPro, Hyatt Globalist, Amex Plat
Posts: 7,222
Jun 28, 2023, 1:15 pm
#19
Join Date: Oct 2016
Posts: 3,807
We're talking about one of the largest credit card companies in the world, not a small business. Their philosophy is to extract as much as they can from cardholders; my philosophy is to extract as much as I can from them.