Just curious if in general selecting a seat helps prevent getting bumped due to overbooking? If one cannot select a seat at the time of booking would that be an.indication that the flight is overbooked?

Not seat selection, but the time you check in and/or when you arrive to board. Each airline has a cut off point in the contract of carriage when you have to be at the gate. Miss that you will not even get denied boarding compensation.

YES, possession of a seat assignment is the best way to avoid IDB. You may think there's some sort of detailed algorithm driven by fare basis or whatnot, but when it comes right down to it it's musical chairs. For my two IDB's over the years, it was simply because I was the guy with no seat assignment. (Non-elite flying NW/DL, for what it's worth. VDB's were not sought - they simply bumped the people who didn't have seats.)

But no, seeing a completely full seatmap at booking time does not mean that the flight will need to IDB or even VDB.

In my years of flying UA and AA, it seems like those carriers at least make a modest attempt at VDB before they go to IDB.

Obviously if you fail to show by the CoC check-in time, you're simply a no-show...not a denied boarding. At that point, they will usually put you on a later flight ("flat tire rule") but owe you nothing.

Some believe it does, some believe it does not. I have no proof one way or the other, but I believe it does help, especially if you are already on the plane when they decide they need to bump people and don't have the volunteers


Not at all. If they are still selling tickets for the flight or not is about the only real way to see if it's overbooked (at some point they will stop selling tickets)

Some carriers still list bumping priority in case of an oversell in their CoC. When I checked passengers without a seat assignment were first to get bumped. Equivalent with WN, check in too late and instead of a BP you'll get a security document. You'll be the first to get bumped if they don't have enough voluteers.

Do airlines actually bump people who are already in their seats? In all my travels I have never seen or heard of this happening.

It makes sense to bump those without a seat assignment, and although I have never been IDB'd I suspect it would play a significant role.

Sort of - it was thought my friend wouldn't make his connection (delay on incoming flight) so the seat was assigned to another passenger. My friend did make the connect (some serious sprinting) and was at the gate after boarding had finished, but still before the 10 minute before rule (something like 14 minutes). They went on to the aircraft, and removed a passenger to allow him to board.

DOT rules require the airlines to first ask for volunteers, though I know at least one airline has been fined for not following these procedures.

I was VDB'd one time when already in my seat. An agent came on the plane and announced that they were looking for a volunteer. I jumped up and was VDB'd because of it. I have never personally experienced seeing anyone IDB'd once on the plane.

I don't know, every time I've seen them come on and ask for volunteers they have gotten way more than they needed.

They can of course stop you before you get in the seat by just invalidating your boarding pass.

There have been previous threads here where somebody was asked to leave after they were in their seat

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...ld-flight.html

but I can't picture it being good PR for them to do it on a regular basis.

Happened to me twice.

The first time, I was a non-rev just settling in my first class seat when I heard my name called. Sure enough, a revenue pax needed my seat and off I went.

The second time, I was discussing a bump at the gate, and the CSR wasn't sure. I had a first seat, but by the time I made up my mind, it had been given away and I wound up in a middle seat in coach. As we sat at the gate, the CSR came on board - she looked at me, I looked at her, raised my eyebrows quizzically, she gave a slight nod, and I bounded out of my seat like the very hounds of hell were after me.

Worked out great - for some reason she couldn't print the VDB comp ticket for the right amount, so she printed two of the ones she could print and I think I wound up with about 40,000 miles out of the deal, along with a meal voucher.

Ahh, good times.

The only time I came close to being IDB'ed was on Air Canada MCO-Toronto, handled by UA agents. The criteria they were using was:
1) pax without seat assignments (7 of us). We had to wait until the end of the boarding process. They did ask very halfheartedly for volunteers, but didn't have any response.
2) Order of check in.

Status wasn't mentioned, but it didn't appear that any of the 7 had status, at least none of them (us) tried to play the status card.

They ended up with two seats available, and luckily I was one of the first to check in, and got one of them. So they left 5 behind and a couple of them were really steamed, yelling at the agents, threatening, etc.

My hunch is that the rules are pretty loose on this. For my IDBs, I didn't hear a peep about VDB in the gate area, but it's entirely possible that a kiosk or counter agent offer was made to someone somewhere...

I've also been on UA flights in recent years where the VDB offer was very weak - it made me think that they were okay moving quickly into IDB-land. One was going to be a six-hour delay leading into a holiday weekend and I never heard the GA move off of $300. In my head, I'm thinking that's worth $750-1000 in United vouchers, or maybe two DBCFREE vouchers, but I never heard where they ended up. I was 1K at the time, seated in F, and didn't stick around in the gate area to see what happened.

Long ago, it seemed like airlines were loathe to IDB. Now it seems like they don't care as much. Government reports the stats, but does anybody look at them or penalize airlines for IDB'ing too much?

Clearly they could have legally (per DOT rules) stuck to the $300, gotten no volunteers, and then IDB'ed people. I don't believe the DOT rules would have said "No, you really have to *try* to get VDB's."

Isn't it the case that people without seat assignments ARE people without status, or are paying a super-low fare? So of course they would be the first to be IDB'd?

Back in 2000-2010 I flew commut air 4-5 times a week and I often saw pax removed for weight balance after boarding on smaller planes.

I don't think having a seat assignment brings weight to keeping it....status and fare will trump mere seat assignment.