I am flying to SFO via LAX on Friday for a dinner, and then back on Saturday on the direct flight. I am on a B fare class ticket and the load on the direct SFO-LHR is very busy and my upgrade unlikely to clear.

My question is how easy (or how hard) is it for me to ask to get re-routed to LAX and fly back from there as this flight is wide open in NC.

Appreciate your thoughts

Trappy

(You mean B fare bucket, correct? Or did you mean Business (C) class?)

If the B fare bucket, is it a restricted ticket? If not, it's very easy to make a change. If it is a restricted ticket, you'll pay a change fee. I have found that the change fees for flights originating in the UK are less than those for flights originating in the US.

If I'm reading your post correctly, you're flying LHR-LAX-SFO-stop-LHR, right? (If so, that's a long way to go for dinner! ^) So you not only want a reroute on the return, you want a coupon added as well (i.e., SFO-LHR -> SFO-LAX-LHR)

IME, calling the 1K desk days in advance to ask for this kind of change for free is not likely to result in anything -- it's just too soon to say. zrs70 is right, of course, that if it's a changeable ticket, it shouldn't be a problem.

What I would do is wait until the day of travel. If loads are heavy, particularly if the nonstop is oversold, they may be happy to reroute you. If not, you'd need to find a sympathetic ear at SFO. It could happen -- I've seen flights changed for far flimsier reasons than yours. Being a 1K absolutely helps in this situation.

So I guess the answer is that, assuming your ticket is non-changeable, it will be hard to change it in advance and, depending on the people you encounter at SFO, it might be easy to change it day-of.

Good luck, and let us know what shakes out!

you may get lucky. Point out the wide open C on the route you want and acknowledge up front that it is not quite kosher - honesty goes a long way as so many people are out to scam the system and are too outrageous for words. Actually this should suit UA to get you out of a potentially oversold flight as it could well save them real live cash if they have to bump someone or are able to sell a full Y ticket at the last minute - and it is a cheap way for them to burn up your SWU since it costs them basically nothing if the flight is wide open. Whether the agent is into activity based accounting and feels empowered to do this is another matter. Trying to do it before is a waste of time - the whole world would be changing their itineraries for spurious reasons if they folded to this.