Originally Posted by caimakale

My company has a section in the Travel Guidelines of our policies and procedures manual that states all "points" earned while traveling can be kept and used by employees for personal use.

Originally Posted by edlin303

Maybe I should clarify, my company has little interest in finding the cheapest fare. They will not allow me to book ding fares for business travel, and would rather pay 2x the amount than to allow me to book it myself. However, I didn't intend to indicate that I would "pocket the difference" by switching from refundable to non-refundable. I am talking about re-booking the same fare class just so I can a.) get online bonus credits when available and b.) track my flights online (which I cannot if our travel agent books them) while not losing my flexibility with a lower class fare. If the fare happens to be lower, well then I guess I have an ethical dilemma. If I do nothing WN makes the extra money and I potentially lose out on maximizing reward credits. If I change and get a credit, there is no way for me to do so and get the money back to my company.

I guess I would be curious how people feel this compares to someone who gets a per-diem for dining, but eats at cheap restaurants to pocket the most money. It seems to be in similar ethical territory, in that they are benefiting from the company being willing to spend a certain amount on a meal. In this scenario, they chose to spend $x on a flight. If I can get that flight for $20 cheaper, is it better to give the money to WN or myself?

As for my flying my fiance out, I disagree about your ethics concern. If my company is willing to pay to fly me home for weekends, what is the difference if they pay that amount, but my fiance instead comes to visit me for the weekend instead? Either way the company is willing to pay a RT fare because I am out of town for multiple weeks. I would do all of this with the blessing of my boss. The concern is that that company has no way to book travel for her, so I am trying to find out if I can do it after the fact without causing a headache for my travel agent.

As for this being illegal, that's what I'm asking here I guess. I can't fathom it being illegal in any sense, but if it is illegal or against WN rules, I certainly wouldn't do it. As for my company rules, I also would not risk my job over it. If I did this, it would be with their blessing.

-Eric

Originally Posted by bofc

Aren't you describing what a number of NBA refs. did several years ago and got whistled for a technical tax foul? I thought several of them received first class tickets for their travel from the NBA, then sold them to travel coach and pocketed the difference. I believe they were convicted of income tax evasion for not reporting the gain as taxable income. BE CAREFUL.