Chokkoubin

How likely is it that Finnair will let me fly on an earlier flight than I booked, on a standby basis?

eg: If I've got a boarding bass for the 18:10 RVN-HEL, but I want to get on the 09:35 instead, is the gate agent likely to take pity on me?

lkrt

mechu

Just hit platinum for the first time with 3 weeks left to my tracking period. Thanks to all the AY experts here on FT

Was hoping to use up at least some of the first batch of upgrade vouchers before they expire in 3 weeks but realized the upgrade availability for SIN-HEL route is just plain horrible. I don't see a single space available on all the dates I checked (random dates 6-9 months from now). There were more than 10 J seats empty when I flew HEL-SIN last Fri so wondering why the upgrade space is so poor. If I purchase the tickets now and request to be waitlisted for the upgrade. How likely is it going to clear in the next 3 weeks? If it doesn't clear, will I simply lose the upgrade vouchers once my tracking period resets on 1st June?

Will be flying with my wife and daughter (all 3 of us are newly minted plats) which I suppose is going to make finding space even harder. Are there other routes that has better availability? I checked HKG and it's not much better...

Jainzar

Difficult to say, but my waitlisted SIN flights (there and back with +1) got upgraded within a few hours. Also to my understanding your vouchers will only be lost if the waitlisted flights do not clear. It doesn't matter when they clear.

Chokkoubin

Purjelentaja

Welcome to the club! It is very difficult to say and as you prob have read from other threads, practically all upgrades nowadays go via waitlist. For Plats it seems the situation isn't actually so desperate, at least this far I haven't had any upgrades not cleared, though I don't have experience of so many cases. This far 3xHKG, 2xJFK, 2xFCO, 1xDEL and 1xBKK have cleared (all except one for 2 Plats), only one is still pending, and none have expired without clearing. Most have cleared within a few hours and only one has taken more than a week to clear (that one took a couple of months). To my understanding the earlier you make the request the better the chances are. The flight doesn't need to be within validity period of the voucher, but it has to be requested before it expires and in the unlucky case it doesn't clear, then it is just lost if the voucher has already expired.

SuloL

Don't have a personal experience at either ARN or RVN, but here's how I see it. ARN is one of the most business heavy short routes on AY, where you have a lot of last minute bookings and changes. Thus, by letting you standby, they have a reasonable chance of selling the vacated seat on a later flight. RVN, on the other hand, I would presume to be much more leisure travel and less last minute bookings, so not much of an incentive to accommodate the request (you get the flexibility you pay for and such).

Some other airlines, like CX, take a similar approach. You'll have no problem switching to an earlier flight without fees at e.g. PEK or PVG, but at HKG, no chance unless there's some kind of IRROPS.

intuition

I find it odd allowing it at ARN, because thye always refused this before. Yes, i agree the reason but that means there actually is a company policy and then they should publish it.
Surely this cant be an emplyee initiative.

lkrt

ffay005

Interesting. While I don't have experience from RVN, my experience at ARN has been very similar with yours at RVN. In general, the contract staff at ARN seem one of the most unfriendly and incompetent out there.

intuition

Maybe you are right, but doesn't that mean check-in/gate agents then are authorized to alter inflexible tickets and void the charges? Risky business giving that power to agents if central policy still is "no standby for earlier flight unless paying full change cost".

My only experience years ago was that agents wasn not authorized to do anything and had to call Helsinki (not exactly the same scenario and also in NRT, but check-in supervisor had to "fight" central control on behalf of me to alter a ticket to next day after a involuntary downgrade)

mechu

Thanks for the replies. Good to know that the voucher expires only if the upgrades don't clear. Will try to book dates where I see lighter loads then and try my luck

ffay005

What?! You had a confirmed (paid?) J ticket, AY wanted to seat you in Y, and you suggested to take a flight next day and had to fight to make this go through? That's extremely poor customer service, IMHO AY should have been happy that you were so flexible. Of course not the NRT agents' fault, though. Does AY have a station manager at NRT?

intuition

Short explanation not to drive the thread off track:
Paid Y ticket, confirmed upgrade, ie ticketed in J (F). At airport the check-in staff says "Did you know you are sitting in Y today?" and that was the first and only communication about the downgrade. I refused. Third party check-in agent and supervisor calls HEL, message is "what is the problem, he'll gets his vouchers/points back". I ask to be rebooked on the JL flight (with AY codeshare on) that left within 1 hour of the AY flight, AY refuses. I ask to be rebooked to next day which is finally accepted and processed in Finland.

lento

You can also work around that if you have multiple existing bookings. Let's say you wait list for flight 1. At the same time you can ask them not to return the voucher but to apply to flight 2 if flight 1 does not clear.