[colejohnson66]

The cultural difference between the US and Europe is very interesting. In the US, when a flight is overbooked, the airline is allowed to bump anyone if they provide good enough compensation. Usually what happens is the airline “auctions” being bumped where they keep upping the “benefit” for staying. Usually that’s just a voucher for the next flight out, a gift card for the future, and a nights stay in a hotel. “We’re sorry we got greedy, and made you miss your multi million dollar business deal, and it fell through. Here’s some money that you can only spend with us. We hope to see you soon!”

At the extreme, if no one takes the offer, they’ll just bump some rando and you have to pray it’s not you.

Of course, nothing is done about it because it doesn’t happen enough for enough people to complain. I also bet that the airline’s systems are programmed to never choose a powerful enough person for the rando being bumped. You wouldn’t want to bump a Congressperson, right? That’d be just rude!

[serjester]

As someone that's taken these offers before I think you're making a lot of assumptions. Yes there's some people on the plane with important business but on a plane with a 100+ people it's exceedingly likely there's also people casually travelling. $500+ in airline credit to move their flight to the morning is a real deal.

Personally I'd rather be in this system and pay lower airfare prices than pay a premium to guarantee I'll never be bumped off my flight.

[colejohnson66]

For me, the rub is with the benefit being a credit, not cash. If I’m not flying frequently enough, those credits are kindof worthless. Don’t they also have expiration dates?

[beagle3]

I’m sure they have a list of VIPs, but just “frequent flyer” seniority is a good proxy that sorts the powerful from the plebs.

[Gorbzel]

Just curious, but why wouldn’t one expect reliably repeat customers to be treated with increased consideration in these circumstances?

Seems to me this is true in pretty much every industry, yet for some reason with flights, certain folks (likely not the FFers) get very upset to realize their price sensitivity/lack of airline stickiness moved them to the back of the line.

[Scoundreller]

Can go both ways. The non-loyal flyers may never book with you again if they don’t get what they want.

A lot of the FFers don’t have much freedom in their booking, and are in too deep in the FF program to switch preferred airlines now.

[wl]

The frequent flyer programs have less lock-in than you might imagine. Many airlines have status match programs, where someone who has status in one airline's frequent flier program will be extended the equivalent status in another's for a short period of time. If the passenger maintains a certain level of activity with the new airline, they keep their status.

[Lio]

Ryanair famously also increases prices closer to takeoff time.

They give big discounts to people who book early and make their planning process easier.

In theory this makes the need for overbooking less necessary. If you don’t show up you’re not getting your money back anyway and the plane will use less fuel on its flight.

This from the airline that wanted to charge people for using the toilets. If overbooking was a better model I’m pretty sure they’d use it.