Oversold flight - any luck getting SDC before 24h mark?
 

I have a flight Friday afternoon, no seats left on seat map to choose. Call to DM line confirms flight is oversold. I inquire if I can SDC to another flight to help DL and am told no. Is it worth HUACA? Anyone have luck with this?

Oversold flight - any luck getting SDC before 24h mark?
 

HUACA?

HUACA = Hang up and call again. Aka agent roulette.

it's not T-24, so the SDC window isn't open yet

This is a common occurrence and it's built into their ticketing algorithms. So no, they never bend on this except in a weather emergency.

If you ask for SDC, you won't get it. It's not the "same day" and the agent will get a popup on his screen.

Overbooked does not mean oversold. It's simply DL betting that some # of people won't show for whatever reasons (misconnect, late, bored, sick, drunk). Usually DL is correct. So, I wouldn't presume an oversell.

If you do want to try an early call, do not ask for SDC. Ask whether DL might consider a fee-waiver for a change in light of a possible overbook.

Ask the DM line nicely if they can please assign you a blocked seat. In these cases, I've been given a prime seat that was earmarked for special needs with the understanding that I could be booted if a handicapped person needs the seat.

As a vaunted DM...you'll get a seat. Might not be the one you want....but, with DL offering up to $1300 for VDB, someone'll take the bait....lol.

I am aware, hence why I asked before the 24-hour mark.

Understood. Please see OP - Agent confirms oversold by 9, not overbooked. His words not mine.

Understand it's the OP's words, but a flight can't be oversold until more people show up to claim the seats than are available on a given flight.

Not to say the agent used the wrong word, but until Friday when the flight is departing, it's simply overbooked.

The agent was sloppy and wrong. Not unheard of. His statement does not matter. But, if you repeat the term, it will.

If there are 100 seats available on a flight, the carrier sells 110 and 105 people who up by T-15, the flight is overbooked by 10 and oversold by 5. The former does not matter. The latter does as it dictates the # of people which the carrier will need to offload by IDB/VDB as the case may be.

This matters to the carrier, although phone agents have nothing to do with it, because carriers deliberately overbook, using predictive software to only overbook by enough that there will not be an oversale. Thus, 110 seats sold and only 100 passengers show up by T-15 meaning that the flight is overbooked by 10, but not oversold.

The reason I thought this was an option is because of previous posts like this one (post 817) where DL has not only offered to move people to other flights days/weeks in advance due to being overbooked, but offered compensation to take the move. I'm not asking for or even wanting compensation, just thought in return for helping DL alleviate their overbooking they could move me to an earlier flight ahead of the 24-hour mark to a flight that currently has tons of seats open.

For what it's worth this is F ticket, so all I need is any other flight with an open premium cabin seat.

If you're not looking for compensation and have a FC ticket, I don't see the big deal about waiting until T-24 to SDC. This is still lots of time in advance so that you can make plans, especially given that you know that your odds of the SDC working are excellent.

DL doesn't normally give VDB compensation until it verifies that flight is actually oversold.

The stories of people being paid in advance to accept other flights were situations where the aircraft was down gauged or something similar happened to cause the flight to be overbooked by a huge number. In this case, the software would have predicted a big oversell, not a flight exactly filled to capacity.

Normally I would agree with you. There's another decent sized snow storm predicted for tonight through tomorrow in NYC (critical alerts already published on dl.com) that is bound to affect travelers. My concern is that those people are going to be rebooked on flights for Friday before my 24-hour window opens tomorrow, reducing my options.

In terms of the second point I bolded of yours - I provided a link to a post of BOS-FLL traveler being offered a change as well as compensation 16 days in advance when the aircraft operating BOS-FLL has been a CR9 all season, no down gauge. Other posters have already said that a flight can only be overbooked until day of departure after which it's then oversold when more people show up than there are available seats. So how could they verify it's oversold 16 days in advance?