AntonS

About every 3rd DL international flight I take has a "schedule change" 3 hours before departure to leave 10 minutes earlier. Am I the lucky one or others experience it with same regularity? In reality the flight almost always departs at original departure time or just a few minutes earlier, never 10 minutes earlier.

I do not want to her about any operational reasons to move 30% of flights by 10 minutes forward on the day of departure. It has never happened to me on any other airline except NW, so I guess it's something DL inherited from old NW.

I think it is a deceptive practice to make people show up at the gate earlier or bump passengers from overbooked flights without giving compensation.

I do not want to show up at the airport or gate early (earlier than required based on the scheduled departure time). I set my wake up call based on scheduled departure time one day before the flight. Ten minutes is usually not a big deal, but it makes me nervous and I do not like when airline is playing games with me.

I just filed DOT complaint and from now on will do it every time it happens with my flight.

flyerCO

So you're just wasting the DOTs time. 1)it doesn't happen that often, 2)when it does there's a reason for it, 3)when it does they still have to compensate (if required by law, which it isn't in the US) if there's missed passengers that meet the original cutoff, 4)they usually only try and do it when ATC needs require, and finally 5)10 minutes is less then the cutoff for being at the gate, they have every right to offload you at latest of T-15 minutes. Which means moving forward by 10 minutes means you needed to be there 5 minutes before.

Also airlines are allowed to change flights as needed, all the way to departure. Nothing DOT can do about it.

Only reason DOT would care is if they do this to get around paying out IDB, which is very unlikely.

lyndonmaxewell

What's the difference between afew minutes earlier and 10 minutes earlier?

DL-Don

10 - "a few" = "several"

lyndonmaxewell

"a few" + "several" = "alot"

flyerCO

No such word as alot thus equation does not compute.

kettle1

A DOT complaint? Really? Good luck with that.

Set your alarm a little earlier and show up at the airport. There are many reasons flights need to depart early or exactly on-time.

DOT complaint on something like this is a joke.

This should be filed in the DYKWIA post.

AntonS

My point was

- It happens only on DL (at least in my experience)
- With alarming frequency (30% of my traspac/transatlantic flights, maybe I am just lucky?)

If this is not sort of scam to deny boarding without compensation or ti get people to the gate earlier to ensure on time departure, what's wrong with DL scheduling? If they want to push back a few minutes ahead of schedule, just start boarding earlier.

RealHJ

Happens every single time on some flights without exception, like KIX-HNL. Always, without exception, moved up by 10 minutes. Been so for the last few years, without fail every single time. I wonder if the ground staff get some kind of bonus for "ahead of schedule" departure. As 100% of the time it's always moved up by 10 minutes, why not just move the schedule up by 10 min? (Only ever happens in that direction. I think also may be to NGO-HNL, perhaps also NRT-HNL, but not to FUK-HN. Never for any flights departing from US, from my experience.)

Zorak

I don't see how this angle would work. If the flight is supposed to leave at let's say 7pm, and they issue a schedule change saying it leaves at 6:50pm, then "ahead of schedule" presumably would be measured from the changed time of 6:50pm, wouldn't it? So if the flight actually leaves at 6:50pm then it ought to be considered on time (not 10 minutes early compared to 7pm).

Or is the system that dumb

ashill

This happened to me on BA last time I flew them. No announced schedule change at all, though. It was an eastbound TATL flight. I was siting in the lounge casually 40 minutes before scheduled departure through boarding announcements, waiting until T-35 to head to the gate. The lounge attendant came through and told me to get going; they're leaving 30 minutes early due to lighter-than-usual tailwinds. Sure enough, with the early departure, we arrived right on time.

BA said they would not have closed the door sooner than the required cutoff time relative to the original scheduled departure time unless everyone was aboard; do you have any reason that DL would be any different? Sounds to me like an attempt to have an on time arrival without padding schedule times for weather that only happens 1/3 of the time (assuming your experience is statistically representative). With DL's good operational performance, they can do that.

doglover

Alaska has been doing this so often, I no longer fly them. It's just rude.

Xeno

DOT????

Cory6188

On a mildly related note, I've noticed that the flight status for international flights at JFK often updates about an hour or so before the flight to show a departure time 5 minutes early. In practice, this doesn't end up often panning out, and we still push back anywhere from a few minutes early to on time (if we're not late) - so I wonder why DL bothers to put that in the system.

AANYC1981

I actually find this very annoying as well. I've never seen another airline move the time earlier on DOD. I've had tight connections at JFK (ATC flow control issues at DCA getting into JFK etc) where 5-10 minutes earlier would have made me miss my intl flight....not kidding.