And unfortunately, at some point, the almost certainly will stop offering it.

To the original poster, I would give up on the idea of buying your tickets. Just not necessary. Half of JB is commuters, and somewhere between 0-.00000001% but their tickets regularly. If you did buy tickets you'd have to buy them early, and then you can't change your schedule.

I think you will find it is not necessary at all.

Thanks. If anything that works in favor of choosing JetBlue even if Atlanta is technically closer. Even commuting on Delta lately to Atlanta on some days would have me either taking the early morning flight for an afternoon report time because the others are all full, or driving in. And while having the option to drive seems nice, I really don't relish doing it 4 or 5 times per month.

If I were buying tickets, I would probably buy the Delta to JFK and if needed can change/cancel the flight and retain the flight credit in most cases. I'm just trying to come up with ways to make commuting less bad since I'm not moving to base.

Easy, take first class date that you can get....

Then when you get hired apply to delta!

I've only ever purchased my own ticket for commuting once. That was to make sure I would make it home for Christmas. You talk about buying hotels and tickets, are you not planning on using a crash pad as a commuter? That only adds up to about $5000/yr, which is much cheaper than you hotel and purchased ticket options. You might burn a few days extra a month getting to and from work, but honestly that's the life of being a commuter. If being at home is more important, you utilize the commuter clause on the front end. It doesn't count against you other than the loss of pay (I believe you can use pto to cover it if you have enough banked).

I've been able to avoid the crash pad while commuting for four years. The crash pad may be cheaper overall, but time at home and having my own space are 1000% more important at this stage (I'm definitely not floating the self-funded positive space idea as a way to save money). I figure there's a trade off on the flight/hotel option in that if I have a guaranteed seat then there's no reason to go in the night before. Obviously the positive space for commuters might make that moot for the time being but that could be pulled at any time. Just trying to figure out if JB is the kind of place where life will be better as a commuter even if the flight is an hour longer than to ATL. Thanks!

This man gets it! Thanks, I'll try but also need to pick a place that'll be a good fit if that doesn't happen.

There is NO way you end up buying your tickets. Not gonna happen. After the first ten flights where you see open seats on the jet, no way you'll keep buying tickets.

I’ve bought plenty of tickets for flights that were wide open a month out. Some filled up and some didn’t. Never regretted buying the tickets.

Also to the OP don’t forget about CLT at AA

Wow, you're the first I've come across that regularly buys tickets.

Not commuting but for travel, I live in base, but I have run into more than one pilot that buys tickets to work