I had to pay an enrollment fee for myself and members of my family for travel benefits. I realize jumpseating is different but I have to pay to enroll and it's up to the gate agent/captains discretion as to whether or not I'm entitled to a seat on a particular flight? It's kind of like having health insurance, I have to pay the premium but they get to decide if they are in the mood to allow me to use what I paid for? Am I understanding this correctly?

 

Umm hey i think when snarge said "pass travel is a negotiated benefit" you all are reading that wrong.. Pay is a negotiated benefit, and we all expect that to occur, do we not? So my interpretation of his post was that we should expect the pass travel benefit to be honored in much the same way. No need to slam the guy..

 

Interesting thread.. I was a paying pax on the flight. It was from DCA-EWR. I started at IAD then canned it to DCA after my IAD flight canx. Crew was aware of situation but was also concerned about making wheels up time. I feel for the guys.. Wait to take non revs then don't get to go because your missed your wheels up? Now everyone is screwed. Throw a main cabin door that is not indicating closed at pushback and you have a royal mess. I witnessed it all from 3A. My only Monday morning QB comment would be use the deadheading f/a and pilot to make sure they were processing nonrevs. Tough day for all.

 

Just remember we really don't have the "big picture". In recurrent last week my sim partner was talking about being called in to CP office because his Capt made the agent open the door to put some revenue pax on after he had been asked to leave early.Come to find out company was trying to get a late 757 into that gate. By the time agent open door ect ect you get the picture 80 connecting pax miss connections .Iv alway looked out for nonrevs but things are so complex now I suggest we be a little more careful. In the case of my sim partner above there was a flt to same city 2 hrs later.

 

At AE (and therefore AA, I imagine), we do not have the authority to force a gate agent to board anybody. The company has made it very clear that not only will the gate agent win the battle, but we will be held accountable by the chief pilot's office if we attempt that battle and cause a flight to be late. Written up. Letter put into your file, etc.

In this case, it seems that maybe there was a wheels up time to be made. It would be wrong to miss the wheels up time because one was diddling around trying to get non-revs aboard. It sucks to be them, but it would REALLY suck to be a paying pax and be delayed even further because we missed our wheels up time because the captain was trying to get more non-revs onboard.

I've commuted off and on for 22 years - and I do it now. Commuting can be perilous sometimes. It is what it is.

 

Sounds like it didn't happen this time, but it's not uncommon for ops to tell me I don't have any jumpseaters or non-revs and when I walk inside I find jumpseaters...

 

Uhhmm let's see, what is the metric for performance for a gate agent? On -time departures. I know at USAir they have a giant clock on their computer screens. Do you think a gate agent cares about you going home? No. Yup, that scenario has happend to me...but thankfully only about 5% of the time.

If the flight crew knew about you, well I'm guesing there was so much more going on behind the scenes then you could possibly know about( I hope)

Look at the bright side..you got to take a road trip, split the costs with many other stranded non-revs, and maybe you stopped at White Castle.

It happens

 

More than likely it was the last leg of a long and horrible 4 day and the crew just wanted to get home.

FWIW, a few months ago (IN DCA)my CA and I got a call from a Crew Tracker in EWR and requested we walk up to the jetway because a commuter was trying to get on the flight, to gate agent wouldn't let him down, even with the jetway attached. Long story short, we told OPS we weren't going anywhere without him, they yelled and screemed and refused to let him down. CA didnt care, we simply waited, EVENTUALLY they pulled the jetway back up. by the time we landed we had a visit by our CP (Who was and probably is the best CP I will ever have) just wanted to hear it from us because he got a call from some very important person who got a call from the miserable Gate agent. This might have something to do with it, lol

 

I'm not saying it was right or wrong. What I'm saying is sometimes poop happens, plain and simple. Non-revs were over looked in this situation, I can see it happening. The crew was obviously running late, could have been their last leg and they got busy. There's plenty to do in a quick turn and although non-revs is on the list, it may not be the top priority.

In this situation, from what I gather, it was the gate agent. They are the one responsible for clearing non-revs so that they board and not delay the flight any more. Obviously in this circumstance it didn't happen. Should the crew have gone up and demanded non-revs fill seats, sure, did it happen, no.

In all, being a commuter, I think the last thing I would have done as the original poster is throw up my arms and created a thread about a crew who didn't do their job. So I stand by my original post, poop happens.

 

Yep...what do you do if you don't have a smartphone?