flyingdutch90

Quick question: I live in Europa, but fly Delta TATL and domestic. What are my options if I bump? Only the Delta voucher? Or is there a way to get the Amex prepaid card without having a USA address (receiving the card by email, etc.)?

sydneyracquelle

Canadian residency options are fewer than American so European is probably also more limited.

mridley2

I finally had a nice VDB success 12/20 evening LGA-CHA nonstop. $600 final offer for a flight the next morning

Gate agent initially offered $300 for a flight the next day getting into CHA about 1:30PM. I accepted but hoped the offer would go up.
They needed 4 people they confirmed.

Offer goes to $500 and finally $600 where they got the four they needed.
So the four of us hang tight as usual. With one no show, only three were needed but I was #1 so it all worked out.

In the past, the days before Christmas NYC-CHA (usually through ATL) have been very good to me VDB wise. That has not been the case in recent years though.

I almost got another VDB on 12/21 booked on the 8:59AM LGA-ATL but they had several no shows and ended up clearing a few standby's even.

Here's hoping my return flight on the 26th is also generous and kind.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, flyers!

gfunkdave

Had my first bump yesterday. Was on PWM-DTW and they announced they needed 5 volunteers, and were offering $700. We asked and they said we’d need to be rebooked from BOS. We said no thanks.

When they got to $1000 we signed up. Got rebooked on a flight later that evening BOS-DTW in F. DL paid for a taxi to take us to BOS. We had several options for compensation and chose the Amex gift card. I’d do it again!

ab2013

LGA-DTW $700, meal voucher, guaranteed seat on last flight out on the same day - oversold by 5 (standby list exceeded 20 with 0 seats remaining on an 739 before bumping started). Bidding started at $200 and at around $500, people started showing interest. Seemed like they ended up having 1 no show, so they used 4 volunteers. All 4 volunteers didn’t have connections or had DTW as a final destination - the one who was asked to board did have connections.

The flight I got put on ended up being oversold by 5 as well (standby list of around 15 on an A320) - final offer was also $700 but with guaranteed seat on first flight out on next day (at 6 AM) and a hotel voucher. Did not participate in this round of bidding, although one of the volunteers from the original flight ended up getting paid twice for a grand total of $1400 for the day.

’Tis the season to be jolly... falalalala lala la la....

bunsofsteel

I had a SJC-DTW-LGA ticket to DCA but really wanted to go to LGA due to my plans changing (a baby failed to appear on time), but they wanted $400+ to issue the ticket. I offered to trade the SJC-DTW ticket for a SJC-MSP-LGA routing with 20 minutes to go. The GA was rather confused, but a guy in a "Delta Private Jets" shirt looked at her and said "do it", as there was a DM member standing next to me.

Quite grateful -- got home 9 hours earlier. I'm sure the DM guy was pleased as well.

Ordhater

BOI-SLC needed one volunteer this morning due to "payload optimization." $400 gift card to take the flight 2.5 hours later. I overheard a couple of snippets of bump conversations this morning; that might be because of the midwest weather.

Howste

We got hit with a pretty snowy winter storm in SLC today too, so that may have been what they were talking about. The Governor even delayed opening state offices for two hours due to weather conditions.

CMK10

The 5:30 PM STL-MSP today on a CR9 was oversold likely due to the earlier flight being significantly delayed, the offer was a $500 DL gift card. I offered but there were no options on DL to my final destination of RDU. I suggested AA and was told the agent was only allowed to put me on Delta. By the time I fiddled with Expert Flyer and found something to GSO the agent had taken other people

Stocktc1

I volunteered at the kiosk but at the baggage drop , they didnt mention anything .

Is it because I had a connection and they probably asked people that didn’t have a connection ? If I had to take another flight , my connection flight would probably make me arrive the next day .

steveholt

It sounds like you volunteered at the kiosk and then asked about it at the check-in/ticketing area before security. They're not the ones who would offer VDB compensation. That happens at your gate, and it only usually starts to happen around 45 minutes before departure, which is well past when you would want to be at ticketing.

Stocktc1

for Ana I was asked at the counter one time.

i was already assigned a seat. Do people just walk up to the gate people ? I have no other reason to talk to them. Do others just go up to them and ask ?

steveholt

I see. I can't speak to ANA, but I've never been asked at the ticket counter by DL.

You wouldn't believe how many people go up and talk to the gate agent without any real reason to talk! If you get asked at the kiosk, you can certainly go up and ask whether they'll be needing to look for volunteers, but I've found that about 80% of the time, the kiosk is being conservative and the flight doesn't actually need volunteers. Around the 45-minute mark before the doors close, at or just before the beginning of boarding, you'll hear the DL gate agents announce that they're looking for volunteers with a certain price tag attached. You can volunteer immediately or wait for the price to go up. (If the flight needs multiple volunteers and the first offer doesn't solve the overboarding issue, I believe all volunteers get paid whatever the maximum eventual offer is, although I know that's changed elsewhere and it might have changed on DL.)

Zorak

Yes? If you want to maximize your chances.

Note that just because you weren't subsequently paged or asked, doesn't necessarily mean you missed an opportunity -- sometimes they end up not needing people because of no-shows it they're able to make other arrangements etc. Just tonight I had a flight that was soliciting bids at OLCI (and not available for purchase in any class of service), to when I politely asked the GA when the flight opened if they were still overbooked they said no, and they ended up clearing the entire standby list too.

There's a large body of experience collected in the main VDB thread should you be interested in more (there's a quick guide in the wiki, and a link to a post with more detailed how-to advice)

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/delt...-boarding.html

(Tech note: this post invisible to not logged in)

vincentharris

I always assumed they asked at the kiosk as DL is trying to get analytics on how many people would normally volunteer and how much they would be willing to take so they can figure out the lowest offers in the future, and that if they really needed to bump people they would announce it at the gate.