Changes to Reward Ticket Question
 

I'll ask this here since this seems to be the right forum for OnePass questions and I got it wrong the first time.

I'm trying to book reward travel on through Continental for a round trip ticket in mid-August from Albany, NY to Cancun. There's a Saver Award available through Newark (EWR) but it's got an 11 hour layover. I know there is a 9:40am flight from EWR to CUN that I would be able to catch (besides other code share partner flights throughout the day), but they're not showing Saver Award seats right now. The question is can I book the Saver Award ticket and then later change my flight to catch one of the earlier flights and not have to cough up any more miles? Even if I pay the $75 change fee? Or am I better just trying for standby?

As long as you keep the city pairs the same you can change flights for free so long as you are 21+ days out.

..."for free"...
 

...and they won't try to get more miles out of me?

On line they want 30M miles for connecting to the 9:40am flight to CUN as opposed to the 17500 I would use for the original 11 hour layover flight they're offering.

Sorry...I should have included the ever-present "assuming the inventory is there" for the reward at that lower level. You can even waitlist for it when making the original reservation.

I'm not sure how standby or SDC works on reward flights both by the book and in reality.

SDC or Standby
 

This is what the OP rules state:

TRAVEL REWARD RULES

FLIGHT CHANGES: Flight changes, including standby, may be made on the day of departure in accordance with the Same-Day Change Policy. All other itinerary changes will be subject to the applicable change fees below.

OnePass Elite Members
General Silver Gold Platinum
Ticketed before Dec. 15, 2009 $75 $75 $75 $0
Ticketed Dec. 15, 2009 or later $75 $50 $25 $0

* Fee is waived for reward changes 21 days or more in advance, as long as there is no change to the origin and destination.


My only concern is that I would need three standby seats with my wife and 6 year old in tow.

Fees are based on the status of the account holder at the time the change is requested.