It was priceless! Having just moved to Dubai and just made Gold on EK in the space of 5 months, I was looking forward to my first flight as a Gold member.

I had booked economy seats for a quick weekend trip to COK. I had a date change supplement to pay for having changed our travel date by one day. Having paid the 700 AED at the ticket counter, I get to check in and get told that the flight was oversold and I had been bumped .... wait for it ... to the very flight I was initially booked on and that I had just paid to change from!! What made it bad was that it was just a long weekend trip and so was it was a short visit to begin with and was now cut even shorter. I needed to go anyway since it was a 70th birthday celebration.

We were offered the hotel stay (which I did not take up as we live in Dubai) and free economy flights to the destination but the whole experience was .. well ... not shocking but certainly unpleasant and surprising. To the credit of the desk staff, some were professional, apologetic and handled it well ... except for the lady at the Economy desk that told me that I should be very grateful that I had a seat on the new flight since that was full as well!!

"Tiens, allez ket, ge meen et nie" ...


This has happened to me once, with a canceled flight though, not an overbooked one.

Considering you were gold (or even silver), it's strange they would have bumped you off the flight.

Then again, I believe they will only reserve you a seat (aisle or window, depending on your prefs., but most probably not a middle seat) up to a certain point/time before take-off, then bumping you all together.

As a matter of fact, they might have kept a seat reserved in J (if you were booked Y), then noticing you were probably/possibly not showing up after all, or having some genuine cash or miles paying J-travelers showing up at the very last minute, which might have made them decide to bump you off...

Golden rule: if you think the flight is full and/or you might qualify for an upgrade, show up on time: both at check-in and at the gate.

Of course, if you check-in online you're pretty sure to get the seat you have selected. If you don't, then it's basically a game of Russian roulette: and they bump you either up or off (although everything probably depends on your pnr profile), especially if you were late for check-in.

I realize OLCI is not (always) available at every destination served, and things might have been extra-complicated because of the date-change/extra-payment for your booking... but still,... Yeah, I'm really guessing here...

Just wondering though: Did you do OLCI?? And did you show up on time??

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I usually OLCI but as I had the fare difference to pay, the system would not let me. I was there 1.5 hours ahead of time ....

Here is from skywards.com:

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Yes - but that is for reward or full flights. I had a confirmed reservation on the flight...

If you hadn't paid the change fee then the flight is not confirmed. It is the same as a travel agent making a booking on a flight and not ticketing the reservation. If they need to clear space, those are the first to go as the payment was not made to fly on that flight. If you want to be truly confirmed, you should pay the change fee in advance. Emirates was already being generous by allowing you to wait up until departure to pay the fee. Try doing that on most other airlines. They will happily charge you a fee to cancel your flight if you have a non-refundable ticket and take another fee to reticket it or even have you buy a whole new ticket.

Have done so routinely. Its always just a matter of going over to the ticketing desk and paying the supplement. No issues whatsoever. The EK Agent who made the change assured me that my seats were secure and that there was no need to pay in advance "simply pay when you go to check in - make sure you have enough time" was the advice given. I had paid for teh flight it was just the supplement that was outstanding.

In any event, it all had a happy ending - they upgraded me to Business both ways and won me back - though I suspect it was more of a function of overbooked economy and light business class and my Gold card rather than service recovery on the part of EK. ^