Adlerdriver

3 conditions, when all apply to your situation, will restrict you from trading, dropping or accepting a PDO bump on your trip.
1. You have deviated.
2. The deadhead flight on which you deviated starts or ends outside the contiguous 48 U.S., Canada or Mexico.
2. You are within 14 days of the the showtime of the trip.

So, don't deviate early unless your baseline fare is significantly higher than established and you need to deviate before the start of the trip's bid month to capture the higher fare.

123456

Not sure what I'm missing here.. Are you saying you a buying deviation ticket but not deviating so you still have your scheduled ticket also? I haven't deviated in a while but I didn't know that was even possible? I thought once you select a deviation ticket, your scheduled one goes away?

Adlerdriver

You're correct, If you buy the ticket using the deviation and deadhead section of VIPS (orange boxes associated with the specific deadhead leg you're deviating), then you can't buy the deviation ticket without cancelling your scheduled ticket and officially deviating.
However, if you want a deviation ticket while still retaining the scheduled ticket and not deviating until closer to the deviation deadline you have two options:
1. Call Global Travel and book the deviation ticket you want.
2. Select another orange box (last leg of a front DH trip, first leg of a back DH trip or even a non-DH leg from a completely different trip). You can alter the city pair and dates to what you want and use the online system to buy your ticket without deviating. This is because you're not selecting the orange box for the actual deadhead leg, therefore the system will not deviate you.

busdriver12

Buying a deviation ticket doesn't make the scheduled one go away (and it's perfectly legal to have both). Deviating or cancelling the scheduled deadhead ticket makes it go away.

123456

Thanks for the info! Didn't even know that was possible to do it that way!

busdriver12

Here is something to beware of....it has happened to me and others. Booked a deviation ticket, kept the scheduled, did NOT deviate (because I wasn't sure what I was going to do, trying to pick up a trip to turn into). Company never bought a scheduled ticket, probably because the flight was sold out. Called crew schedule when I realized there was no scheduled ticket the day prior when I got a trip, and realized they hadn't issued a scheduled ticket.

Put on hold, finally was told, "We see you have a deviation ticket to your home, therefore you deviated and we didn't buy a scheduled ticket". Fortunately I knew better, and told the scheduler, "I absolutely did not deviate, and according to the contract I can book both. I am taking the scheduled flight". They magically found a ticket, and cut the BS as soon as I called them on it. But what if I was unfamiliar with this? I wonder how many people they have fooled this way.

Dakota

This has happened to me as well, 3X in the past 6 months...........only on United however. Deviation ticket went away with NO notification, but scheduled ticket remained. The bad news is that when you deviate, the scheduled ticket goes away AND the deviation ticket was gone too!! No way home, and if deviating from Europe you may never get a ticket home..........or stuck in the middle seat in coach for a 10 hour flight home. OUCH!!!!

StillFlying

Has anyone asked how are they linking you to both the scheduled ticket and deviation ticket? If it's your frequent flyer number, would it be wise to have the company delete your FF# and then you add it at the gate of the flight you actually take?

I have a unique name so it could be by name. But surely the aren't looking and seeing two John Smiths leaving PHL with one going to MEM and the other to PHX and assuming they are the same person.

SF

Merica

Adding to the masses.... I am also being jacked around with Deviation tickets. Ridiculously cheap tickets are being "bought " by the company from MEM to XXX when there is no way someone off the street can buy a business class tix from MEM to XXX for $300!!!! MEM was/is (according to Kayak/Priceline, etc.) one of the most expensive submarkets for airline travelers.

Fdxlag2

Trade the trip with another pilot than trade it back. Make them buy multiple “Frontier” class tickets.