Standby on award ticket

Old Aug 10, 2019, 8:19 pm
  #1  
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Standby on award ticket

Currently booked out of DPS-SIN on KLM on an award ticket. My booking used a lot of miles for this flight (33K vs 12.5k) which might help with changing it? I'd like to fly the day before but its unavailable neither in J nor Y. I keep rechecking availablility and will do so until flight departure but could I possibly go to DPS airport on preferred departure date and get on standby? I don't mind paying a change fee because thats what an extra night hotel would cost anyway. Anyone have experience with this? I could call FB and ask them to recite me the rules but I'm looking for practical advice from other flyers. I'm Platnium for life, if that helps. Thanks!
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Old Aug 11, 2019, 2:51 am
  #2  
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There is no standby policy on AFKL, except on full fare tickets. You can change an award ticket by paying a change fee of €45 + an eventual repricing and you have to do this in advance and not show up at the airport hoping to solve this. Airport contractors (or possibly GA agents) serving this flight are not able to handle FB ticket changes.
I am, like you, surprised that the DPS-SIN sector is full in both Y and J. You may also find availability on GA either on their non-stop services or with a connection in CGK.
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Old Aug 11, 2019, 2:54 am
  #3  
 
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On which date is your flight? If it is really full it might be hard. I would keep trying but in practice, same day go show is easier to have a willing and friendly airport agent accomplish against the rules than flying a day earlier. Standby is not the way to get it done, Goldorak is right.
It's not impossible however to still get it changed, the most likely way to change it is by checking if the reward booking class opens up at the last minute. This happens sometimes. Then you can just rebook with a fee via Flying Blue. At the airport, if award inventory is available, pronably they would call Flying Blue or ask you to call Flying Blue.
If the flight has seats but no award inventory, the flight manager at the airport might decide to help you out and make a phone call so that revenue control or seat control opens it up for you, then you can rebook. This would then likely be due to your status.
Finally, if by any chance the flight you have is very oversold and the flight you want has seats they might decide to rebook you for free at the airport for operation reasons.

And you could just call in now and ask the Platinum line to check with seat control why it is not available.
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Old Aug 11, 2019, 3:39 am
  #4  
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Are there paid seats available on the flight?

One of the benefits in the 'new' FB programme is that every single seat should be purchasable with wiles, right? So if seats are being sold, you may be able to call FB and have them make an award seat available for you.
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Old Aug 11, 2019, 7:38 am
  #5  
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The flight is booked for this Wednesday, August 14th and I'd like to fly on Tuesday instead. I did get the last seat per the new FB programme rules in economy and my booking class code is "Y". I only see one seat left for sale and its one J seat but I can't book it using miles. Its obviously a full if not overfull flight but I was hoping if there were no shows I could get on. There is only one flight/per day so no same day standby. GA is also unavailable. I am betting that they are contracting agents only working there with limited abilities to make these kind of changes even if seats were to become open last minute. I'll keep checking online though. Thanks!
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Old Aug 14, 2019, 4:37 pm
  #6  
 
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I took this flight earlier this year and the plane was quite full though not 100%, there were a few seats free.
KLM is competitively priced on this route, so personally I would not spend 33,000 miles on the miles ticket unless all alternatives were similarly expensive?
In terms of standby, you'd be better off calling KL reservations, then call FB if a seat is available so that it can be priced up. I don't see the local airport staff being able to accomodate you with standby but this is Bali and the people are very service minded. Anything is possible. KL has a station manager in MNL but I am not sure about DPS.
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Old Aug 14, 2019, 4:39 pm
  #7  
 
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Whoops, we are already at August 15 now so maybe the OP can tell us what happened in the end?
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