I don’t understand how someone gets put on standby. Is there some sort of standby ticket? If so, how.. and do people really go through all the hassle of going to an airport while having a possibility of going home?
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The airline makes the _most_ money when an airplane is completely full. Yes passengers and their luggage do weigh a considerable amount, but +/- 10% of the passengers isn’t going to radically alter how much fuel is required to fly from New York to Miami. So to maximize revenue, you want airplanes to fly as full as possible.
Now, people cancel or bail from flights all the time for good reason. Emergency, last minute change of plans too busy to reschedule.. slept through your alarm, whatever. So if the airline book just up to the capacity of the plane, you’d always have a few seats go empty because of people not showing up at the last minute.
So, if you’re not in a hurry to get there, book standby. If everyone shows up for the flight, you might get bumped. If someone doesn’t show, you get their seat.
It’s sometimes given to pilots or plane crews, yes that’s ‘special’ type of ticket and they can fly for free or really cheap (depends on various things)
I’ve sometimes ended up at the airport early for a flight and found that there was another earlier flight on the same airline to the same destination, if you ask they would add you to standby list of the earlier flight in that case. Generally, you’ll want to not have checked bags in that case.
It’s also worth noting that some airlines offer same-day-standby changes to elite customers (and/or charge for it).
This might be attractive for someone who booked a late flight, but then later realizes they don’t need to be at that origin city any longer that day. The airline notes there’s one or more earlier flights that same day that would get them home earlier, but they’re already sold out. The traveler might as well hang out at the airport with the chance of getting to go home earlier instead of the alternative of spending all day without anything productive to do
Had a relative who retired from Southwest and enjoyed free flight benefits, but had to fly standby. She would take a good book with her and patiently wait for the first available flight. Sometimes it happened quickly, sometimes she went home and tried another day. She had the patience to accept that and spent her retirement traveling all over the world as a result.
If a full plane can hold 350 people historically the airline knows 10 won’t show up on average or re hook last min. So the airline sells 360 tickets and on an average day 10 no shows equals a full flight so they make max money.
They also made money on the 10 no shows or at least admin fees if someone had a flexi ticket etc.
Now if only 8 are no shows (let’s say each ticket is £100) there are 2 too many for the flight, airline has made £800 from the 8 no shows so they offer 2 people a free upgrade on next flight or say £100 each, and airline still makes £600 more than only selling 350 tickets.
Hotels also do this along with restaurants etc.
When i flew on my sisters buddy pass, it put me on standby. Basically meaning that if someone doesnt show for the flight, or all the seats are not purchased ( for regular price) , i get a seat on that flight.
If i dont get a seat on that flight, i simply get bumped to the next available one to my same destination.
**Buddy pass is like an employee discount on flights.
Ex: Was flying to LA from Atlanta, bought my ticket 2 days before for $300, normal price was $1100. Trade off is just that i might be waiting at the airport longer than anticipated
Airlines want to maximize how much money they make.
Passengers and luggage don’t impact how much fuel you need by as much as you think. So a totally full flight and a totally empty flight cost the airline roughly the same amount of money to run. Obviously a full flight will make them more money than an empty one, so the airline wants to have every flight be 100% full.
Airlines have figured out that some percentage of people who buy tickets don’t show up for some reason. Maybe they miss their flight, or plans change, or whatever it is.
So let’s say that the Airline figures out that, on average, 10% of people who buy a ticket don’t show up. So if they sell 100 tickets for a 100 seat plane then they’d have 10 empty seats. So, to have the flight be full, they would need to sell more tickets than there are seats. However if someone gets stranded they’d be pretty upset, so the airline sells standby tickets.
Let’s say there are 3 flights from City A to City B each day. You let someone buy a cheaper ticket on the middle flight, with the understanding that they could get bumped to that later flight if the early one is full, but could also get on the early one if a seat opens up. Essentially you’re agreeing to potentially wait around for a while in exchange for a cheaper fare.
I had to fly to a work conference recently and when I checked in for my flight they told me that I didn’t have a seat and that they had put me on standby. The lady at the ticket counter told me that I should go to the gate and that MAYBE I’d get a seat. If not they’d put me on a flight in the next few days. I was fucking pissed. I didn’t book some kind of “standby” ticket or anything like that. I bought a regular ticket expecting that they would transport me from point A to point B at or around the agreed upon time, and I had a work thing I had to get to. They ended up calling me up as the plane was boarding and gave me a ticket in the back by the lavatory, but it was a stressful hour and a half or so as I called every customer service number I could find only to have people tell me that there was nothing they could do.
TLDR: fuck you Frontier Airlines
If you missed your flight or it was cancelled, you might already be at the airport. If you really HAVE to fly tomorrow, you might be ok with waiting around all day. In those cases, you get a standby ticket which means they’ve already collected your info, you can clear security, and be ready to board when someone else misses, cancels, etc
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