Originally Posted by garykung

Long story short - I would drive instead.

Originally Posted by mattp1987

One other thing to note is that depending on any schedule changes that have occurred since you booked the ticket you might have additional flexibility. Assuming the ticket was purchased after July 30, the threshold for a free change or a refund is 120 minutes. It also looks like those flights are operated by DL Connection on a CRJ9. If they were originally mainline Delta flights when you book, that's considered a schedule change as well.

If you did have such a schedule change, you might be able to convince an agent to change your flight by a day rather than rerouting to a connecting flight on the same day. Additionally, if you choose to drive it would allow you to receive a full refund for your ticket rather than having the money tied up as a Delta e-credit.

Originally Posted by tardyturtle

That's a very good point. If the flight has had any schedule change by Delta, agents are usually flexible and willing to change dates. You just have to say something to the effect of "there was a schedule change, the new time doesn't work for me, so I need to travel on a different day." I have had no issues getting this done with schedule changes less than 120 minutes.

Originally Posted by LHCVG

That would be a perfect situation, if I ended up needing to change but DL made a change triggering that clause.

Originally Posted by tardyturtle

As others mentioned, I had a little bit of a hard time following.

I think the bottom line is that you can cancel or change the trip plans at any time--even after taking the outbound on a round trip. All residual funds will be left in your account as a travel credit which you have a year to use (I think a year from booking your original flight, but others could clarify if I'm mistaken). This essentially allows an unlimited number of "changes" to your plans while retaining the value of the original ticket. Just note that if you make changes to your trip closer to your travel dates, fare prices may have increased and you'll be responsible for any difference in fare between what you originally booked and the new flights. That is going to be the biggest issue you are likely to run into if you change your flights.

Regarding just no-showing vs. calling to cancel, I know that at least early on in the pandemic they would automatically issue a credit if you no-show. Not sure if this ever changed, but my policy has always been to actively cancel. You can do this on Delta.com or call an agent.

Also note that it seems if you have already made a change to a reservation, any subsequent changes (E.g., second change and beyond) have to be handled by a reservation agent by phone (the website won't let you for some reason).

Originally Posted by flyerCO

You can make multiple changes to a ticket online. Heck I just did one where I changed an existing reservation and used an ecredit to pay for the fare difference.

Only time you shouldn't be able online to change is if a certificate was used to upgrade (includes mileage awards), if you checked in already (I just cancel auto checkin for this reason), if part of a group reservation, or some oddball error. The system is a lot better than it once was in this regard.

Originally Posted by koreanair720

Montgomery County, eh? ugh, so sorry about the coming shut down...

Originally Posted by tardyturtle

Hrm... none of those apply to my situation. The only thing I can think of is that I never "confirmed"/acknowledged the schedule change with Delta prior to trying to make the change. Maybe I need to acknowledge the change before making more changes?