After many frustrations, today CO made me do a happy dance. I booked an evening return flight for a meeting this week which got out at 10am. I arrived at the airport around noon to stand by for a 1pm flight; I was 3rd on the sby list and it checked in full.

They couldn't get me on a CO/NW codeshare through DTW or MSP in any reasonable time, so I asked to get on the sby list for the next CO nonstop at 5pm. When the ticket agent put it in the computer, it spit back a confirmed res instead; I was the 54th on a jungle jet, so it wouldn't give me a seat but would confirm the res. I made sure they did NOT remove my 8:30 res just in case I didn't get a seat on the 5pm flight, and she said she'd do that, but to let the gate agent know at 5pm if I made the flight, so they could un-book me on the 8:30 at that time.

I got to the gate and volunteered to take a bump if necessary, knowing it was an oversold flight (hey, I used a $250 voucher for my $220 RT ticket anyway, so in my mind I'd be getting this one free plus another if they bumped me, all for a 3-hr delay).

We all boarded and I came up without a seat, so got back off to collect my voucher. They had the offer up to $350 + dinner + breakfast + hotel stay + 1 positive space upgrade. While the service counter was filling out my non-transferrable good for 1 year positive space upgrade, I asked if there was something else they could give me, since I'm plat and couldn't even give the upgrade to a traveling companion. I was thinking they'd give me some CO currency or something, but they gave me another $50 voucher ($400 total) instead. Wonderful!

All this for flying on the original flight I booked (non-refundable Q-class with a voucher). Dinner was decent too, and sitting in the PC for a few hours makes the wait bearable.

Sure hope it wasn't the same agents working the gate of your original flight after you took them to the cleaners!

Didn't they see that you had confirmed seats on the next flight when they attempted to rebook you on the flight for the next morning? Did you let them give you the hotel and breakfast vouchers? Congrats on scoring the free swag and all, but that's a bit of overkill for flying on the flight you were originally ticketed on.

Nope, it was a completely different set of agents.

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Didn't they see that you had confirmed seats on the next flight when they attempted to rebook you on the flight for the next morning?[/QOUTE]

Yes. In fact, I had a confirmed res on the 5pm and a confirmed res (with seat assignment) on the 8:30pm, which I would have had them cancel if I made it on the 5pm flight.

Nope, I didn't need them as I had a seat assignment on the last flight of the night; if for some reason that one was oversold or didn't fly, then I would have asked for the extra vouchers.

I agree, and in fact never expected it. I'm not sure why it gave me a confirmed res in the system when she tried to add me standby to the 5pm flight; I know it also happened to at least 1 other standby passenger though (one of the other three of us from the 1pm flight).