Standby on earlier flight?
 

I have purchased a restrictive tickets which allow me to travel only in the afternoon flights from SIN-BKK. If I wish to take the morning flight, can I go the airport earlier and do a stand-by to get a seat? So far the morning flight seats are available for all booking classes. Would the check-in counter staff at SIN disallowed me to book since the ticket only allows me to take the afternoon selected flights? Anyone has an experience on this? Thanks.

Different airlines have different policies for stand-by. Your best bet is to call your airline ahead of time before heading to the airport. Good luck.

On a FRA-BKK sector I was once accepted to an earlier flight (at same day), also on a restricted TG ticket.

yes its possible
 

there is a service center at the BKK airport.

the checkin agent cant help you on this.

so do the following.

go to the service center next to the domestic checkin.
than tell them that you tried to checkin for an earlier flight but you were told that you have to go to the service center to get your flight changed.

its easier with an paper ticket as this will be stickered. with eticked it is a bit more difficult..

anyway, telling them a story (for example its your mothers birthday ) or a special reason normally does the trick.

i have been on standby on awards (issued by LH and UA ) so if they can change these non-changable awards, than they are able to change your ticket.

once approved you just go to the checkin and get your boarding pass.

i had V, W, Q, H tickets on Thai stock and were able to change the time of the lfights to earlier/ later without anyproblems.

thai is very generous in these kind of things.

but its not guranteed.

you might need a bit charm ... as they do it as a favour...

dp

You can do that for sure. I have done that out of many Thai destinations, such as SIN,BKK,BOM,FRA,KIX. All the time I bought ticket in class V/W/Q. So I doubt you are going to have a problem as long as there are seats.

Thanks for all the response.

For my ticket, the sale condition is that it is valid for 3 flights in the afternoon (TG414, TG404, TG412). As such, if i want to change to the flight other than the 3 listed, will there be problem? Thanks.

Yes, there will be a problem. Your fare specifies that it is only valid on the later flight. Thus you cannot change in advance. However, you could try to go on standby on the earlier flights on the day of departure itself. If there is space, they would not mind letting you get on in case of over booking on later flights. However, they may also deny you standby. In conclusion, you risk wasting the day at the airport waiting for nothing.

Well if you are willing to pay the difference in fare class (if your orginally booking class is not available on the flight you want) + a changing fee, you don't need to be on standby but confirm your flight status right away. It really depends how desperate you are to leave on that morning, sometimes you have to do what you have to do. Otherwise as dfs24 saids "you risk wasting the day at the airport waiting for nothing". I would how much that's going to cost and decide.

All the best.

I tried to do exactly this, but on a domestic flight, and was denied even though there were plenty of seats available. I happened to arrive at the airport a lot earlier than I'd planned and asked if there were seats available. They said "yes, but you'll have to pay the fare difference between 'W' and 'Y' class." So I suppose it will depend on what sort of story you give them, but I wouldn't count on them allowing it.

yes
 

as i said a good story might sometimes the key ....

the checkin agent cant decide on this. you have to go to the service counters next to the business class checkin desks.

actually it is between the business class checkin desks and the former domestic checkin desks.

dp

Any one tried standby between flights to DMK and flights to BKK? I will leave from HKT to DMK, then depart from BKK to NRT. If I can get the flight to BKK from HKT, that will be great! Anyone had such success before? It is a star award ticket.

yes
 

on awards they often let you fly on the earlier flights.

dp

In March I and a friend showed up early at HKT for a TG flight to BKK. We had M fare tickets (which is allow changes) and asked at the TG ticket office if we would take an earlier flight. After some typing on her computer the agent answered yes but the flight was full so she put us on standby. We had to wait at a designated standby check-in desk until the check-in deadline for the flight had passed. We got the last 2 seats in Y and I think the agent changed to fare class to Y as Y was stated in our FFP accounts some days later (the other TG domestic flights under the same ticket showed up as M)

Whether TG would have allowed us to take the earlier flight if the fare had been non-changeable (e.g. W), I do not know.

Thanks everyone for the comments and experience sharing.

Actually, I have bought a "W" class ticket from www.zuji.com.sg, an online travel portal in Singapore. When I first bought it over the net, I didnt realise that there was a flight restriction, and the fare condition is that I can change my flight details before and during the travel. I thought that the morning flight was full. It is only much later that I discovered that there was a similar promo on TG Singapore website at same price and same booking class that it dawned on me that it is not eligible for the morning and night flight out of Singapore.

Though I can still travel on the TG404 flight leaving on 1220 hrs, I will prefer the earlier flight at 810hrs so that my schedule for the day will not be that packed. Also, based on seats availability, "W" class is still available on the morning flight.

Should I take the chance and hope that I get on the morning flight or ended up with 4 hours in *A lounge in Singapore airport?

The TG morning flight is usually one of the fullest flights to Bangkok, the same applies to TG410. On these two flights, not only do you have passengers going to Bangkok, you also have connecting passengers going to China,HKG, and quite a no. of other places. For TG410, it connects with Europe,Japan,Australia. In the past, there was an additional morning flight TG422, but I am not sure when it was axed.