re: Oversold Flights: At what price offer will you take a later flight?

I'd consider PAYING $1200 to get out of doing wedding shite.

Some of y'all are getting hooked up. Usually enough people whore themselves out on the first lowball offer on my flights that this dilemma never comes into play for me.

By the time I'm flying home Thursday or Friday evenings, I want a sit in my chair and drink a cold beer....not spend another night at in a hotel or sit around the airport bar for a few hours. I ask for a pretty significant credit.

Domestic nonstop flights for me in that situation usually mean a minimum of $600 credit. I've come pretty close to getting it a few times.

depends on my connection and what i have to do at my destination.

depends on what else I have going on...if it is during the week and just means that I stay the night and travel the next morning, I am typically good with a few hundred bucks and a hotel room for the night...Friday flight to get home for the weekend is a different story and would require $500+ if I have nothing important to do...

for $1,200 I would pretty much run over a few folks on my way to the ticket counter...

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in this situation couldn't they look in teh system and look at the order in which people book? Someone booking 3 months in advance shouldn't have to be waiting along side someone who booked yesterday.

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I think they actually look at purchase price of the tickets...you got a good deal, you are first on the chopping block...

Last week I took $200 and a first class upgrade to wait an hour and a half.

They offered me $1100 on Thanksgiving last year but it was starting to snow and I couldn't risk it.

Yes I agree, but either way when you book a flight it really pisses you off when they tell you they may not have room. They also make you wait until everyone has boarded before you can get on. I fly 3 airlines and Delta is the worst at this.

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omewhat of a tangent here, but can someone explain to me how in this era we live in it's even possible to overbook a flight? It seems liek with all the technology we have, after the last seat is booked you wouldn't be physically able to go in the system and book any more. How does this happen?

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Airlines routinely overbook flights, because if they don't, the probability of everyone showing up for the flight are very low. They overbook 2 or 3 seats, then usually a few people don't show up and the airline makes some extra cash. Of course, when everyone does show up, they lose the money gained by either shelling out money to people who are willing to give up their seats, or by losing a customer, which they want to avoid.

Not all airlines overbook, though.

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somewhat of a tangent here, but can someone explain to me how in this era we live in it's even possible to overbook a flight? It seems liek with all the technology we have, after the last seat is booked you wouldn't be physically able to go in the system and book any more. How does this happen?

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Actually technology has made it easier for airlines to predict oversolds and how many seats they can oversell certain flights.

Routes with a high number of connections, or have indicators of last-minute switches to earlier or later flights in the day? They'll sell an extra few seats.

A number of times when you'll hear that "This flight is oversold by a large number" its due to an equipment swap at the last minute where the airline determined it was cheaper to allow for 10 people to volunteer at $400 each and not cancel the flight all together.