FlyerTalk Forums - Frustrating - elites can’t clear standby into empty biz seats (2024)

Yeah but nowadays on AA you can't even get an airport agent to put you on the standby list unless you are OW Emerald. Maybe you can get an AAgent to try in IROPS cases

yes, sorry. I had a failed oral surgery in the 1959 and my tongue is permanently sewn to my cheek

You were lucky. Most of GAs just want to close the flight quickly. OP-up is too much work for some agents. This is the reason for this thread. The agent followed the standard standby protocols, so there was no inconsistency in implementing the UA policy.

Seriously? Other airlines do this all the time.

Source? An example?

I cannot think of a single airline that I would expect to

passengers to accommodate standbys. Clear out he upgrade list? Sure. Upgrade random passengers from Y in order to create space for someone who has a confirmed seat on another flight? I've never heard of this.

I'm disappointed that OP couldn't be cleared directly into F on a CPU route -- I want to say pmCO did that for me back in the day -- but I agree with the general consensus that it would be a technical violation of policy. It's just one of those violations of policy that clearly meet the spirit of the rules and doing the right thing for the customer.

Again, my experience is predominantly with AA, and this was a few years ago (before all elites were automatically put on the upgrade list) but I was on an ORD-MSY flight and was given an op-up. Several pax (at least 4) were cleared off of the standby list after that.

Another example was flying LGA-ORD. Original flight returned to the gate and we offloaded, so went on standby for next LGA-ORD literally at next gate over, and cleared directly into F.

Perhaps this was not official policy, but it can be done. And I think we would all agree it's silly to let a flight go with empty seats when an irrops pax could be accommodated.

I have been upgraded by both TWA and UA at times that I didn't expect because the flight had been overbooked or oversold and they wanted the plane to go out full. I don't know if the person that got my seat in coach was a standby, someone who had bought a ticket for that flight but didn't have a seat assignment, or what. All I can vouch for is that I have (rarely) found myself sitting in front instead of on/behind the wing as I had expected in cases where the airline was motivated to fill the plane.

Entirely different scenario, and totally standard.

Overbooked / oversold would imply that you're talking about a confirmed passenger without a seat assignment.

Operational upgrades to clear space for a standby are not standard. aisleorwindow's example is unusual, although it makes sense given that there were passengers with status available to upgrade (back in their e500-equivalent upgrade process). I suspect this would mostly be limited to North American airlines, and only during IRROPS.

I agree it's unusual, but mostly because it's so rare that there are ever available F seats after the list is cleared :D

Not arguing, but genuinely curious why you think this would be limited to North America airlines and IRROPs situations? My LGA-ORD scenario was obviously IRROPS, but the ORD-MSY example was not.

North American airlines, because the idea of giving away J for free is pretty much limited to North America. (Also, intra-Europe, the size of the business class cabin isn't fixed).

IRROPS, because giving away a J seat to a passenger who didn't pay for it, to accommodate someone else, only really makes sense if it's a situation that's in the airline's control as opposed to just the whim of a standby passenger.

Late last year I was on a flight that went over as 1/12 in F (and I think pretty close to full in back). There were no names listed on the UG list.

Granted that was somewhere in Wisconsin (MKE/MSN/GRB/ATW)-ORD

It was kind of surreal and the FA spent way too much time asking if I was sure I didn't want/need anything relative to the time we were in the air :)