How to Tell if Your Flight is Oversold

Let's use this as a way to help people on here score voluntary denied boarding (VDB) vouchers on the airlines similar to Will Cover's negotiating with car salesmen thread.

The first way to tell if your flight is oversold is by trying to book a dummy ticket on the site. If you try to book an ATL-MSY ticket for today on delta, you'll see the first flight that shows up is at 1:40pm. However in reality there's a 10:30am and a 12:05pm. The fact that neither show up is a good sign for an overbooking. If you have an expertflyer account, that is a very good website for tracking inventory and actually let me know earlier that most of the ATL-MSY flights today are only selling 1-4 seats if they aren't oversold.

Second, you can always call the airline and ask if it's overbooked. Sometimes if it is and you wanted to get rerouted through another hub, they can change your ticket for free. Other times the agents aren't very helpful and just want you to go to the airport as usual.

Third, when checking in online, if the flight is indeed overbooked, Delta and United both have notifications that pop up that ask "This flight may need volunteers. Would you like to be added to the list?" At the bottom they have various prices that you can say for this 1 hour flight, I'd give up my seat for $200/$500/Other. For my 12:05pm flight today, I told Delta I'd do it for $500.

Fourth, when at the gate, before boarding, ask the gate agent if the flight is indeed oversold. If it is, tell them you are willing to volunteer if they need anyone. Caution: Do not go far from the gate! Sometimes the gate agents make an announcement to everyone and the first person that gets up to the desk to volunteer is the winner.

Fifth, if you are indeed chosen, the travel vouchers are normally good for use within a year. If you get $1000 or so, take a nice european vacation for free on the airline!

I hope this can help some of you score vouchers. I'm about to head to ATL and see if I can score some $$$ today, it's been a long time since I've been on an oversold flight. I'll attempt to keep you updated today and if you have any questions, feel free to ask!