Flying Standby - Air Tran

[1derwoman]

Here is my situation. I am flying to MCO from a small airport in Maine (portland), my flight leaves around 5pm and won't get in until after 10pm with a layover in Baltimore. I got a great deal so I am pretty pleased.

I just found out that you can fly standby on Air Tran for any flight on the day you've already bought a ticket for. There is a non-stop flight that leaves around 1 and would get us there by 5 which would be much better than 10pm.

Right now there are a about 10 seats open but its my understanding that Air Tran holds back a few seats on their seating charts until the day of the flight so there could very well be more open seats.

Does it sound like a crazy idea for us to try to get on the non stop flight? we are still 8 weeks away so the flight could very well fill up I am sure.

Has anyone ever done anything like this? tips/tricks?

Thanks!

Angela

 

[snowbunny]

Airtran is popular out of PWM (my home airport), it's about half the price of JetBlue to MCO right now.

It certainly wouldn't hurt to try, as long as you are truly prepared not to get on the flight. And of course, don't expect people to move so that a group of standby passengers can sit together.

 

[cbrfan]

We've flown stand-by on AirTran. We had a 6:30 p.m. flight out of Miami after our cruise, but went straight to the airport (arrived around 10:30) after getting off the ship. We went up to the AirTran counter and asked to stand-by for an earlier flight. The agent told me to come back in 20 min. We did and she booked us all the way through (had to connect in ATL) and got us on an 11:30 a.m. flight. They even took our checked baggage! As long as they have seats available, they'll put you on. Best advice I can give you is to get to the airport early. It's first-come, first serve.