psubill78

I'm confirmed w/ seat on UA907 on the 21st. 'Consultant run' flight out of ORD to SFO.

Showing all 0's, I called reservations to see if they would offer an early volunteer for a bump, and they said they don't do that.

I could have sworn I've read in here of that occurring.

I'm a 1P....

Any suggestions, or just attempt day of flight?

jhayes_1780

Its happened, but from what I remember they contact you. So it might be lightly oversold, or they are expecting several misconnects.

I would sttempt the day of the flight (and make sure you have a good contact phone number in your profile)

BlissWorld

Don't believe UA's IM! Reservations will never take VDB, period. Seriously, don't count on these things to happen because you will only be disappointed.

LessO2

I've gotten a VDB on flights that showed '9' in Y before. And have had the direct opposite, Y at '0,' and having empty seats on the actual flight.

These kinds of things happen when you least expect them.

The thing that's going against the likelihood of a VDB situation on your flight is that there's a very good chance a lot of the people on that flight will be connecting from another flight, especially on a flight departing at 5:00 p.m. And I doubt that 100% of the connecting flights would be on-time, more misconnects means more empty seats.

While even this isn't a guarantee, but usually the first flight out in the morning, regardless of city, if that is zeroed out, you have a slightly higher chance of getting the VDB, but again, even that is far from a guarantee.

craz

Besides that, all too often E+ is wide open so UA simply will fill up those seats before having to use even 1 Vol

OP log-in and check 'seats' as a 1P im sure you are already in E+ so just see if E+ is full, if it is and the flight is still oversold then the Flight might be in play. If E+ has alot of empty seats , be prepared to be on the flight

bseller

907 can be quite full given it's timing. Sunday nite is likely to be busy as well - but I think day of flight is what is going to work, if anything.

Dave

emcampbe

UA has no idea how many misconnects, much less no-shows there will be until just before the flight departs.

If I own a business, I'm probably not going to offer you compensation based on a scenario that might or might not happen. That wouldn't be smart business. Then I'm just giving away $$ for possibly no reason. And UA, nor any other airline can afford that right now. I've been on flights with Y=0 for a week before, and there isn't a need for VDB's. So you just never know.

psubill78

I've already looked at many of the things above. Yes, E+ is 100% filled, as well as every E- and first seat...

We'll see what happens... my inquiry was more of if UA called in advance... seems they do, and it's just dumb luck.

Thanks

bdesmond

I've been flying this route almost every week lately and the ORD-SFO flights are consistently over by 10-50 people generally. I've never been contacted but I don't think you'd have any trouble getting bumped at the gate if that's what you want.

1P

And SFO-ORD is even worse. My flight at the beginning of the week had 128 people waitlisted for it.... Just 13 people volunteered to be bumped.

LilZeppelin

So how did it go? The flights seem very full even tomorrow - Monday?

fadeforward

The number of people on the standby list, if that's what you meant by "waitlisted," is almost always far more than the number of people they need to take VDBs. There is no way UA would oversell a cabin by over 100. Perhaps there were cancellations from other flights or an equipment downgauge?

You won't be able to tell the number of volunteers they need from any screen, though you can get a positively biased estimate by subtracting the number of people "confirmed awaiting seats" from the number of seats remaining.

VA1379

It has been mentioned before that large lists of people on standby often include lots of NRSAs who are trying to get on a free flight. Many NRSAs do not show up if it looks like they won't be able to get a seat, and their name(s) stay on the standby list.

fastair

True. UA reservations does not manage inventory. They don't take DB's. If WHQ IM sends them a "pre-removal" request, they will call you, but calling them results in a "and how would you like to pay for the $150 change sir, Visa, MC, or AmEx?"

1P

I'm willing to admit that I misunderstood what was going on, but the gate area was an absolute zoo.

The figures seemed to be 5 people "confirmed awaiting seats", 128 people (and they were all there - this was the last flight out of SFO that night, 11.10pm) "awaiting seats" rather than "on standby", according to the display, which took for ever to scroll through. This could have included cancellations from other flights, though I had been following flight patterns during the day and there didn't seem to be any cancellations. It certainly wasn't a downgauge, since this was a domestic 777 and had always been a 777. I was in F, which was absolutely full too.