ohh... there are thousands of bad stories about jumpseating... I do have several, but this one really made me mad. It actually wasn't about me, was about another jumpseater trying to get on and gate agent not letting her.

I was deadheading with my crew and when we got to the gate found that the flight was full and there was a jumpseater trying to get on. She aproached us and asked if we were flying this leg. I told her we were deadheading (more like "heading dead"). She said she was trying to jumpseat and she flew for a small 121/135? outfit (can't remember the name) and altough they weren't CASS approved, they had a jumpseat agreement. She even mentioned that she had been jumpseating for a while with this company, off course not in the actual cockpit but if a seat was avail. in the back, there were no problems whatsoever.

Now, the problem was that the flight was full and she didn't have acces to the cockpit (no CASS). So here's when I offer to lend a hand and came to the gate agent very politely with a smile on my face (while she wasn't really busy) and asked her if I could list for the jumpseat since I'm CASS approved, and let the non-cass jumper take my seat in the back. Gate agent gave me an attitude and told me I couldn't jumpseat 'cause I was deadheading. I told her "I understand", but actually it wouldn't affect her who was ridding where and told her that I was trying to help get everybody onboard. After trying to convice the GA to help "us" out, she asked the jumpseater what airline she was with. Jumpseater told her and the GA was like "what? I never heard of them before" Jumpseater politely explained that they had a jumpseat agreement. GA said "I don't think so" and didn't even look in the computer. Jumpseater insisted to look it up in the computer (the most logical step). and gate agent refused saying again "I never heard about that company before". So again, me approaches the GA and asked her to check in the computer, that will clearly be the answer if she could be listed or not. Ga now p*ssed, again refused to look it up in the computer and start asking stupid questions to the jumpseater like : "where do you guys fly to?" "what kind of airplanes do you have"? "are you an airline or what?" "private pilots can't jumpseat..." "if you are not CASS can't jumpseat" To this I was like "AND THAT'S THE MAIN REASON WHY I'M TRYING TO JUMPSEAT IN THE COCKPIT, SO YOU CAN LIST HER AS A JUMPSEATER BUT SHE'LL RIDE IN THE BACK. SHE WON'T GET ANY CLOSE TO THE COCKPIT, I PROMISE !" This argument went on a on, and yet.. she didn't want to look it up in the computer. When the whole plane was boarded gate agent told me "you better board this airplane" and I told her "what about the jumpseater".... after another argument (AGAIN !) she agreed to look it up in the computer. And suddenly a miracle...It was in the computer after all, what do you know... took her 30 seconds to list her and list me in the jumpseat. We finally got on board. Jumpseater was really thankfull since she was a long way from home and that was the last flight of the day.