andymo99

There are only 3 seats left for sale in B/E. The back is overbooked by about a dozen.

But why bother with facts when speculation is so much more fun.

Mountain Trader

3 BE seats left an hour before takeoff. How does that support the premise that Delta oversold the BE seats?

Maybe you could come up with a little more explanation and a little less sarcasm.

DeltaPurser

Believe me, I have absolutely no problem with him going for what he was promised in the first place... If Delta offered him BE seats, he should have been given BE seats. Period. But it didn't happen... They were oversold and had to take someone off. Happened to be him...

Here's what I don't get... It's your honeymoon!!! Who, in their right mind, would offer to be bumped off a flight on their honeymoon?! Is this a new thing? ANYTHING to get vouchers????? My spouse would have killed me! And if we then split up on the flight and didn't even sit together... Well, I'd be dead!

You must have a VERY understanding wife... Good for you! That beats a good seat ANY day...

DeltaPurser

carolinaflyr

AF did the same thing to me while on a code share returning from CDG in 11/2002. They had cancelled a number of flights a couple of days back (strike) and were working the pasengers through the system. First they told me I was bumped, then when I pulled out a medallion card they decided I wasn't, but wouldn't I like to volunteer for a bump in return for AF vouchers? I negotiated with the agent at the counter and was promised euro 710 of vouchers, meal and room, and an Espace d' Affaires seat the next morning on AF. Got out of line and sent the rest of the family home. Had the agent write it all down. Went down to rebooking. With AF all promises are inoperative at the next step and was told no business class, no voucher other than euro 500, no boarding pass for any flight next am (standby only). That note from the gate agent? Obviously incorrect or forged because we don't do that. Can't ask her, she's gone now. After the nice "oh my please help" approach went nowhere the ugly american thing worked, sort of, and I got the vouchers and the promised flight but a middle seat in tempo only (ask when you check in - maybe then. . . uh-huh). I was sent to an AF ghetto for the evening with an undentifiable meal substance served to the 100 or so non-French passengers there (NO French nationals were bumped . . . what are the odds of that at CDG?).

Of course no E/A seat the next day but hey, they did fly me home, unlike some other passengers who were heading for another night in Paris.

I complained to Delta SMS, who said so sorry - it's an AF problem - "we do have some system integration problems from time to time." AF said (in essence) too bad for you - but thank you for being such a loyal customer and we hope you fly us again. Guess they decided that E710 was enough no matter what.

Moral of the story - never give up your boarding pass for a promise of an upgrade until you have the B/E or E/A boarding pass in hand. Once the agent gets you out of line their problem is solved, and your disappointment (or anger) becomes someone else's problem).

Moral no 2 from this and other A/F experiences - they are great when things go as planned but disastrous (esp at CDG) when they do not.

Moral No 3 - the law of contracts means nothing to any airline - they will do about what they please - and leave you to sue them if you don't like it!

andymo99

MT, Pay attention to what I was responding to. You were claiming something like 11 available seats since 11 were unassigned. I was pointing out that in reality, there were only 3 seats available for sale.

Update: 2 seats available for purchase 30 min before departure. I am sure some DL employee can tell us how the flight goes out.

NJUPINTHEAIR

First, his spouse obviously agreed with him. Second, if I were given approx. $800 in vouchers and the promise of flying B/E only one day later and it did not cause much of a disruption in my schedule, I would take it in a heartbeat!

Flying B/E instead of cattle car coach on your honeymoon is nothing to write home about.

Of course, your flying B/E is probably not very difficult to obtain for a pittance, but I can assure you the cost differential between B/E is substantial, and so is the comfort level.

Unless, of course, you subscribe to the notion that Delta's B/E cabin is vastly overrated as compared to its coach class product.

I thought so.........

NJUPINTHEAIR

But not this one!!

Although I certainly don't begrudge your suspicions, this is not the type of fact pattern you present for you forget one very salient and important point -- BKNIAZ was given Boarding Passes for the B/E seats by the Delta Gate Agent who has the authority under implied or explicit auspices to act on behalf of his employer.

Therefore, this is not a situation where someone could offer you the moon but you would not have any proof of same.

jwhite4

I don't know about you, but on every bump I've ever been involved with, Delta (or other airline) has NEVER processed the bump passengers until after they got teh current flight off the ground. It's always, "Thanks a lot, go sit down, we'll call you over when we are ready." If you take a bump you basically have to believe what promises the gate agent makes.

Jeff

DeltaPurser

Sorry, I didn't catch this one until too late... Flight's already gone, but here's what happened:

Flight left with 2 emty BE seats and 25 Coach seats. (6 nonrevs in BE, mind you...)

DeltaPurser

Pointfreak!

Well...I think it's obvious that she was violently opposed...begging and pleading with him to PLEASE not potentially ruin her special day. BUT rather than make waves on the first day of her marriage, possibly causing a horrible rift that could last for years and end in a financially draining divorce...chose to allow her new husband to make the first important decision of their married lives.

Then again I guess neither of us really knows though...huh.

NJUPINTHEAIR

I very much enjoyed your "parade of horribles," but then only an attorney could -- especially since the preternaturally arranged impending divorce would have required the efforts of one of my bretheren.

However, in communicating with BKniaz, I did not get this kind of bad vibe, at all, especially since he had wanted the two Mrs. to become acquainted with one another, and I with he.

Knowing BKniaz from his other posts in the Hilton forum, and the way he was able to get a suite at the HGI in Napa for 6 days, I think that there is very little his wife would complain about, considering his prowess in parlaying his FF knowledge into tangible benefits.

Of course, you neglected to mention that it was his wife who wound up sitting in B/E for the trip over.

Moreover, he has not had time to write his trip report about Paris, but I know that it included a room with a spot on vue of the Eiffel Tower.

So, although one could perhaps posit that she was against his ultimately futile attempts to make Delta live up to its bargain, I don't think so!

Mountain Trader

Delta Purser-

Thanks for some real facts. So much for the claims that "assure" us that "Delta routinely oversells" BE seats. With 2 empty BE seats and 6 non-revs filling others, those 11 empty seats BE seats this morning didn't change much, did they? Should we view this flight as oversold?

My observations are, of course, specualtion since I don't have access to Delta's screens nor the actual stats on push-back. Maybe I am wrong. But my hunch that the lack of BE upgrade seats isn't due to full fare BE customers we don't see or understand is still unrefuted. Hopefully we'll get more real facts to see what the truth is. Until then, I'll be "paying close attention".

6 non-revs. Wow. I need to think about that one.

BumpMe!

So, if rule 245 is followed for overbooking Y, does the same apply for the "premium" cabin?
I mean this: Will passengers be invol. bumped based on class of service, elite status, check-in time etc?

Also... I wonder if the J cabin is -1 (full of revenue passengers, no upgrades, no non-revs), and Y is +1, will DL bump one paid J passenger to Y or put them on another flight in J (letting the Y seat saty empty)?

If they do put them in Y, what difference in fare does the bumped passenger get back?
The difference between J and Y or the difference between J an the lowest available economy fare at time of purchase (ie U,L,T)?

This F/J overbooking baffles me.
In years of flying DL I never saw this.
But, most of my miles as a GM were domestic.
What about domestic flights... if F overbooked now too?

Erasmus

Folks, I can't believe everyone's arguing about this. DL, like most other airlines, overbooks F/J internationally. I have flown several flights that have been overbooked in B/E where gate agents were looking for volunteers. In fact, a couple of years ago, a red coat came on my JFK/ARN flight at the last minute and offered $1000 & a confirmed B/E seat on a later connecting flight for someone to give up their B/E seat. Sadly, I was in row 5 and somebody in row 1 beat me to it...

indufan

I can only speak of domestic travel....the overwhelming answer is no. This was discussed here this a few months ago and all came to the conclusion that it may happen under some very strange circumstances but overall the answer is no.