"beat the system" tip #27: increase your standby luck
 

1) hand the gate staff your ticket immediately
2) go immediately to the nearest phone ans make a reservation on the next most convenient flight
3) ask the gate staff to give you a written statement of their boarding priorities (in the US they are required to do so by law)
4) make an appeal based on undue hardship (if possible quietly, to the side, to the head of staff, out of earshot of other passengers, in all sincerity and humility)
5) See if you can get/buy an upgrade
6) find someone in the waiting area who as a boarding pass and buy it (students, young singles)
7) If your ticket is confirmed, make sure the airline asks for volunteers
8) if you are absolutely desperate, you might consider forgery: a friend of mine had to go to his brother's wedding. As each standby passenger handed in his ticket, the gate staff wrote the time on the envelope and put it at the bottom of the standby pile. Taking note of the style of writing, my friend moved away from the podium and wrote on his ticket envelope a time which put himjust after the one on top of the pile. Then, when no one was looking, he dropped the ticket envelope on the floor behind the counter for the staff to find it, which they did ... The forgery worked out ....

Rudi ~ Those are some good ideas, except I don't think 3 is really such a good idea, you don't want to piss off the gate staff by asking for stuff that they're going to have to work to come up with. Also, with all of the security requirements in place these days I'm not sure 6 is really feasible anymore.

and number 8!! Rudi...come on. This is all ridiculous!

thank you jeyna - any tips and improvements of tips are more than welcome ...

and jeyna - I am more than happy that I succeeded to have had a minute of your time - your life will not be the same anymore after having given me that minute ... (but I don't know in which way it will be different - but I know, different it will be anyway). enjoy it (and let others enjoy). thank you.