Would you pay a standby fee?

[dbaker]

No way here, except on very unusual circumstances.

Related: American Airlines Announces New Fare Policies

[chodson]

Notunless we're talking many many hours in advance (and in that case I wouldn't be willing to accept the uncertainty of standby)

Then again, for us plebes who don't get to wait in the "elite" area, not being in an airport is a Good Thing.

Funny that they would want to charge you for standby, but pay you to take a later flight.

[Nugget]

I think that adding a standby charge is a perfectly reasonable thing for the airlines to do if free standby travel is really being abused routinely to fly on higher-fare flights while paying for the lower fare flights. It's likely that some circumstance will arise forcing me to eat the $100 charge and I'm sure I'll gripe and moan about it, but I can count the number of times I've relied on standby booking on one hand. This isn't likely to impact me at all.

[dbaker]

I'm surprised to hear that standby is being abused to get on more expensive flights. It would seem to me that the more expensive flights would be full with high-revenue passengers, hence why it's so expensive.

I'd be interested in hearing if anyone here has real success buying a cheap fare and flying on a premium flight.

[BovineOne]

Originally Posted by Nugget

I think that adding a standby charge is a perfectly reasonable thing for the airlines to do if free standby travel is really being abused routinely to fly on higher-fare flights while paying for the lower fare flights.

Maybe the airlines should charge the difference in airfares when you successfully get on a more expensive flight via standby. (They wouldn't necessarily need to pay back the price difference if you manage to get on a lower-priced flight).