Most bloggers dump on us who love Delta due to the fact that we have to work for our free seats and Delta does not have a “real” 1st class cabin like say United or American. While it would be nice to have this, I think the Delta full flat seats are very nice and the food is often, to me anyway, better than what I have had in a “real” 1st class cabin. Also, Delta FA’s are most times much better than their counterparts. As to finding seats, well, that is hard to argue with and we all know that it IS work.
The result is we have to spend extra time and book crazy itineraries like THIS one for my spring trip to Sweden that I booked this summer. I would rather be flying out of South Bend (SBN) only 30 minutes away compared to having a friend run me to Kalamazoo (AZO) that is 1 hour away is much better. When I booked I was confident that the mighty schedule change would happen and it has (well sorta anyway).
The out bound flights changed by more than 1 hour. I was able to change from an AZO departure to an SBN departure. The very nice phone rep attempted to change my return as well, but was not able to due to the fact that the return had NOT changed (at least the outbound was now better).
I had booked these seats back when I was only a Silver Medallion so back then any changes, not due to a schedule change, would have cost me $150 each. Now that I am again a Platinum Medallion, again even though I booked as a Silver, I can change all I want for free (as long as low level seats are there that is). So, I was able to change my return from DTW-AZO to DTW-MSP-SBN! I really, really, really don’t want to fly up to MSP and back down to SBN when there is a perfectly good 30 minute flight from DTW-SBN, but in this case adding more legs should only improve my chance for another schedule change, or for availability to open up since I am Platinum, to get what I want 😉
So how has using this technique helped you? Each week I get e-mails from readers who are so happy to get just what they want. How about you? – Rene
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Ha! Congrats! It always end ups working with the schedule change!
I thought that you could not change the city of origin on schedule changes?
@Rookie10 – it can mean more points, but, since the issue was schedule change related, there were no extra points for change! 🙂
Question: Award booked while Platinum. Now Silver. Want to make change. Have to pay change fee right?
@TBB correct. But you have till last day of FEB as PM so you will have some time to make free changes. And if schedule change happens status does not matter anyone gets free 🙂
I have a Delta question.
It’s website says its miles never expire, but I noticed a new page which gives a schedule of charges for the reinstatement of expired miles.
Is something new in the works?
@Martin – no nothing new. Could be from before when miles did expire would be my guess.
But that’s just a guess.
Can anything be verified that they are not planning on instituting expirations again?
@Martin – as Gary said to the same question on his blog, it is old. Miles DO NOT expire with Delta Air Lines. The only thing 100% certain in life is your tax bill in April each year!
I had a great experience with this recently. I was doing a mileage run to Cape Town SA (20,000+ miles!) and had to book ATL-IAD-AMS-CPT on the outbound, all KL metal except the ATL-IAD part. Delta changed that first leg causing a mis-connect in IAD; and the PM phone rep gladly switched me onto an ATL-AMS (Delta metal) with no issues at all. She was happy to do it for me, took maybe 5-7 minutes tops to get Inventory or a Supervisor to open the seat for me.
I have another issue actually right now, maybe someone has experience? I haven’t called PM line to complain yet. DL SM award ticket, AF metal from BCN-CDG-ORD in Biz Class. Had a 90 minute AF connection at CDG; AF changes the 2nd leg, and now I have a FIVE hour layover instead. There is a perfectly good first leg BCN-ORD that leaves 3 hours later; which would get me back to a 90 minute layover. Will DL rep get AF to open the award seats for me? I’m going to call sometime this week, I usually try problem calls btw 9am-5pm, I think the PM daytime reps know a little more? (Might be wrong, just my hunch)
@Jim – under rules you have more than 1 hr change so YES but under the rule with AF space must still be there. What you CAN do is look at changing to DL flights, if you want, that make the layover shorter keeping the last AF new one.
Schedule change on NRT-SEA allowed me to fly NRT-ICN-SEA on KE in Biz all the way!