Played the BUMPING Game!

[rsschneck]

We just got back from our Spring Vacation @ Disney's HHI. We had a great time! The airports were hopping! I had checked our flights a month ago and Delta was only selling first class fares. I checked again before we left on March 21st and you could not locate 2 of our flights on their web sight anymore. I figured this would be a great opportunity for a BUMP! Boy was I correct.

We bumped on our flight out and received (3) $400 checks (not travel vouchers. We were able to go standby and get on the next flight out. So, our original plans only changed by about 2 hours. Not too bad for $1200 The flight was overbooked by 4 people. I was first in line to accept the BUMP.

On our return flight the second leg of our flight was overbooked by 20 people and it was late at night, so they scheduled us to fly out the next morning. We received $400 travel voucher, free night at the Hilton with shuttle bus service, $10 towards dinner and $5 towards breakfast (PER PERSON).

So, total we received $1200 travel vouchers good for 1 year, $1200 by check, free Hotel night, $30 towards dinner and $15 towards breakfast. I felt good about the compensation. We were only out 2 hours going and we spent the night and an extra 3-4 hours coming home. We had the time and I am glad we did it.

Word of warning! If you are planning to BUMP they send checked baggage with your original flight, so make sure you have toiletries, undies, etc. I totally was prepared for staying the night because we were hoping to get bumped so it was no big deal. I even packed DD swim suit for the indoor pool that the Hilton had.

Anyway, just wanted to post about our Spring Break Bumping Travels. If anyone has any questions please ask!

 

[CarolA]

VERY GOOD!

If you are prepared and flexible this can work.

Lately, they only want to bump me going out and on business I can't do that or they want me to accept a 24 hour delay and I often can't do that.

 

[SB in KY]

Our flight to Orlando next week has been sold out for 2 weeks and the return flight on Easter Sunday has been sold out for months....we are hoping to play the game...hope we do as well as you did!! Nice work!!

 

[TimeforMe]

How exactly do you get bumped? Do you offer when you check in or do they ask for volunteers?

Great Job!

 

[Tink42]

We were offered a bump coming back last Sunday morning. They would try to get us out on a later flight but wouldn't guarantee it. Most likely we would be flying out the next day. Trouble with this was you had to wait around at the airport all day to see if they could get you on a flight out that day. We said no thanks.

 

[CarolA]

You can ask when you check in if the flight is oversold. If so, go to the gate, ask what they are willing to give and then put yourself on the list.

Make sure it is worth it. For example, sometimes they start at $100. If they only want a 1 hour wait maybe, but for several hours..... Also, make them tell you what flight they will gurantee you on. You don't want to hang around an airport all day.

Pay attention, if they "up" the going price go back up and tell them that you want the new better deal or your ticket. (They hate that! LOL!) So if you agreed to bump for $200 and 10 minutes later you hear them offering $300 go back up and ask for the $300. Some airlines are good and automatically give everyone the high price, but I have had AA try to "stiff" me a few times.

 

[travellady]

I'm going to try to play this game for our return flight. The Alaska airlines flight I'm scheduled to return home on has not been available to reserve for weeks. When I go to the site to look at seats available, there are none. The non-stop flight leaves the Sunday after Easter, 6PM, and arrives back in Seattle at 9 PM - it's a flight many people want. I suspect many cannot wait until Monday morning to get out as they have to get back to work.

So, I have already scheduled that Monday off work. I did this coming back from Phoenix and scored 3 roundtrip tickets (there were 3 of us) to anyplace Alaska flies. I've now got reservations with these freebies roundtrip between Seattle and Miami in December.

Does anyone know of a way to check if the flight is overbooked before getting to the airport? Looking at the seating chart is a clue but doesn't tell me how many people the flight is overbooked by.

 

[CarolA]

Call and ask.
If you have a friendly TA they can tell, but I have never found any other reliable way. The airlines will usually tell you if you call.

 

[rsschneck]

When we left I had tickets in hand and we were close to the kiosk, so when they made the announcement I was first in line and they were only overbooked by 4 seats (we took 3 of those).

On the flight back they had a big screen up near the kiosk that said they were oversold, so I went up to the kiosk and asked how many seats they were oversold by (20) and the Delta employee said they were still looking for 6 to bump so we took 3 of those.

We knew we were VERY flexible coming and going on this trip, so we decided to try to BUMP. The airlines give you what is available when rebooking and aren't too flexible about that, but we did not really care.

Our 7 year old DD was pretty good about the whole situation, but we still owe her $50 Disney Dollars for her patience. I figure $50 is a cheap price to pay considering she made us $800 for future travel! Don't tell her that though because her price might increase. Plus, the more Disney Dollars she has the less I spend on her while in WDW.

 

[cgcw]

I was just looking into flights to HH yesterday. Which airport did you fly into??

 

[rsschneck]

We are west coast, so airfare to Savannah or Charleston runs anywhere from $450 to $500 per ticket (OUCH! )

We fly into other airports. In July we flew to Atlanta for $278 each and this year we flew into Raleigh, NC for $267.50 each. Both airports leave about a 5 hour drive to HHI. We have friends around both cities and try to fly a day early, stay in a hotel, meet up with friends and it doesn't make it seem too bad that way.

After our August WDW trip we will have enough FF miles that we will fly into Savannah next time! It is worth the money for us to have a short drive, but we would rather fly into Savannah and only drive an hour

 

[shelly3girls]

We decided not to try for the bump last week even though our flight on USAir was overbooked and they were asking for volunteers. Normally we try since USAir gives roundtrip vouchers. Just our luck that our plane had mechanic problems and we arrived the SAME time as the later flight that we would have been bumped to and they received their luggage before we did. I wanted to kick myself.

 

[leslieh]

DD flew to MCO for spring break on SW, they asked for voluteers, the only flight they would put them on was 6 hours later, so they passed. That would defeat the whole purpose of going down early on sunday. Oh well, maybe Ill get lucky in May, but there will be 5 of us.

 

[SyracuseWolvrine]

Airlines are required to tell you if a flight you're on is oversold. They're not required to say by how much it is, but they do have to tell you that it's oversold.

If you get bumped, be sure to report your bumps on http://www.bumptracker.com/

(one of my best bump stories involves being bumped in exchange for a free round trip ticket, on a flight that was paid for with a free rt ticket from a previous bump)

 

[jaysue]

If you are planning to BUMP they send checked baggage with your original flight

I am surprised this is still the case with all the airport and luggage security changes

thanks
jaysue

 

[seashoreCM]

A party with some children and at least two adults can volunteer with one adult first and one adult last, and say to the gate agent they are able to accept any number of bumps from one up to the party size.

>>> Just our luck that our plane had mechanic problems and we arrived the SAME time as the later flight that we would have been bumped to and they received their luggage before we did. I wanted to kick myself.

But what if you took the bump and the later flight you were bumped to had "the mechanical"?

They try to choose volunteers who don't have any checked baggage. But if the choice comes down to bumping someone involuntarily or pulling out the checked baggage of a volunteer, sometimes they do neither to save time, accepting the volunteer and leting his baggage sneak through on the original flight.

Disney hints:
http://members.aol.com/ajaynejr/disney.htm

I suppose but have never heard of, the first few volunteers being offered a $200. voucher and being processed and given that voucher and sent on their way and sometime after that the gate agent announces a higher bump compensation. (If it turned out the plane wasn't oversold after all because people did not show up, the volunteers processed prematurely could not be called back and the vouchers reclaimed.)