I got AA once out of IND, but everything was oversold on UA that day, so it seemed an easy sell to switch. At hubs, I wouldn't count on getting signed over, even if the next flight is many hours later.

Ok I figured I would give an update on that.

The GA said it was no problem and they would be happy to put me on the DL. They ended up with 8 no-shows so no need for volunteers.
Interesting note tho on the return today I was supposed to go back through ORD but they canceled the flight (weather is pretty bad right now). They offered me a seat through IAD but mentioned my connection was overbooked too.
Asked if they could just put me on the DL direct and they booked me into J on DL, (original flight was UA upgraded from Y).

Sweet!

David

About 6 years ago, I was returning to the US from Darwin, Australia via Sydney. When I was finally able to check in for my SYD-LAX flight, it was oversold and several of us volunteered to give up our seats, being told we'd be put on a flight 3 hours later. Seemed like a no-brainer to me. As it turned out, we waited for hours and hours, got taken outside passport control, back through passport control, and finally I got booked on Hawaiian Air to HNL then UA to LAX and finally back home. I got ORC plus a voucher for $800 that I used to upgrade the following year's trip.

A few weeks go my coworker and daughter saw offers from Chicago to Bonaire reach $6000 per person. The flight was oversold and she had the opportunity to accept $12000 in vouchers. They didn't do it because there were no other routings to get them there on flights (on any airline) with space for 3 days.

I would have thought the predictive algorithms would have been a lot more stringent in allowing overbooking on a flight that operates 2x/week to a leisure destination during busy Spring Break travel season where the no-shows are probably not very high. Apparently not in this case.....

Is Bonaire really that special? I would have taken the $12,000 and had them rebook me to somewhere else.

I am, frankly, surprised that UA would opt to not take a volunteer in this situation vs. IDB someone and literally have the same outcome where the IDB pax wouldn't be able to fly til 3 days later..... what was the outcome of the situation with respect to VDB vs. IDB?

UA would rather have someone tweet a picture of $12k in VDB vouchers than an angry one about how UA ruined their vacation because they couldn't get them to BON for three days.

If you're a scuba diver it's really paradise in that the reef surrounding it is great, excellent marine life, numerous shore diving options. When I was there we did four dives a day. Whoever is going probably has a lot sunk into a nonrefundable dive hotel and package.

That said, I would do the same as you!

Got an offer at check-in for $1k for tomorrow AM EWR > SFO. Now with weather waiver and booked out flights through the morning, wondering what it'll look like at the gate.

If you get offered a VDB, can you request a bump to Biz for the rebooked flight, or will they insist on keeping you in same class of service?

You can certainly ask. If they need your seat badly enough, they may well say yes.

Don't get too hopeful. The weather will also cause pax to misconnect...but definitely make yourself known to the GA and report back!

I'm on the first flight out so very curious to see how it plays out -- will report back, think it's going to be an interesting AM as it is.

Got a call tonight in advance, got pushed to another flight w/ etc much lower at $300 but first on the new flight! The time difference wasn't bad at all so I didn't push on the $$ because the closer flight only had 1 seat left and then it got into evening time so just wanted to strike while iron hot!