Fly Confirmed For Less - "I didn't know you could do that."

A comment that I get regularly when doing something with a FCFL ticket is: “I didn’t know you could do that with that ticket”. I haven’t heard it since last evening when I was using Global Upgrades for a TATL trip where we have set dates and the flights are filling up already in J.

There are some aspects of Fly Confirmed for Less which many employees aren’t aware of and therefore don’t make their Pass Riders, especially parents, aware of or take advantage of themselves. That is that the Fly Confirmed For Less (FCFL) program has some interesting provisions for Pass riders who have Medallion Status. Important: These DO NOT apply to the Fly Confirmed for Even Less program. I know that many employees use FCFL themselves when they have to be somewhere at a specific time and/or need to be back at work by a certain time and their destination isn’t one that they can comfortable get to and or back via NRSA.

The most important aspect is that the FCFL pass rider gets ALL of the benefits that come with their Medallion Status including Frequent Flyer miles, both Qualifying and Redeemable as well as Qualifying Dollars. The also get Complimentary Upgrades and can use Global and Regional Upgrade Certificates, $ and miles for upgrades after the ticket is issued. If they have Diamond or Platinum status, they will be upgraded to Comfort+ automatically when booking. They can also do Same Day Confirmed changes. Effectively, a FCFL ticket is a discounted regular ticket for leisure travel only. In that respect it is basically the same as a NRSA ticket.

While many employees have Sky Miles accounts, I don’t believe that there are too many who have Medallion Status. There are those of us who qualify to use FCFL who also travel enough for business to have Medallion Status, mostly parents. I’m a Diamond Medallion as a result of my business travel and also my “have to be there at a certain time” pleasure travel such as a wedding or other social event where we can’t leave until the same day or day before. I buy FCFL for pleasure and take advantage of my Medallion Status. So for those of you who have Medallion Status or have Pass Riders who have Status and are eligible for the FCFL program, I recommend that you review the benefits and go over them with your eligible Pass Riders – ESPECIALLY YOUR PARENTS if they travel a lot.

We have choices when we travel for pleasure; NRSA, Award, FCFL and Regular Tickets. We’ve learned that there’s a time and place for each of them and so we plan each trip with that in mind. We’re fortunate that our son enjoys helping us and doesn’t mind the few minutes it takes to look something up or book something for us.

I'd like to wish all of you a Happy and Healthy New Year and Safe Travels.

So just to clarify, this is all assuming you have the status, right? You don't get any additional benefits compared to a full revenue traveler with similar status? At United, we'd get 20% off, and it seemed to give us the lowest available fare class regardless of applicable rules to get that fare. Beyond that, we'd be subject to the same benefits and restrictions as anyone else - Economy Plus would have additional charges, though I'd generally be able to sweet talk my way with an agent ;)

Oh! They did waive bag fees for us, at least.

Yes, you get a percentage off the lowest available fare although there are times where a regular revenue ticket is cheaper. The system hasn't been upgraded to allow you to book Discounted First (G, A, and P fare classes) although Comfort+ is now an option and I presume that the Premium Select fares will become available once the A350's start flying.

Whether or not you have status, you're treated like a regular revenue customer, at least you're supposed to be treated that way. if you have status, automated systems will recognize that for most things such as automatically upgrading you to C+ (your E+) and F at the appropriate windows and properly placing you on the Airport Upgrade List. It's the Customer Service Reps on the phone and the Gate Agents and Redcoats who don't know about it and don't believe that you'e allowed to ask for something because "you're on a special ticket".

I thought we could upgrade FCFL with miles, like any rev tkt. Is not true any more? We have about 250K combined. No other status.

I believe that you can. I've never done it since I won't use miles at $.01 - they're too hard to accumulate nowadays.

I'd save those miles for an emergency as you're apparently doing.

I'll let you know how things work. Our miles are from my old biz flts and inherited ones when parent passed and all the ones accumulated w/purchases on cards, etc

I spoke with 5 different Diamond Desk reps and I'm not happy with the answers I got. None of the reps were from Chisolm or CVG which are the only places I really trust for answers to out of the ordinary questions. In any case, all 5 said no to upgrading with miles. I asked the question, not in general terms but specifically in reference to a FCFL reservation that I have booked.

I have been able to upgrade them for cash, both domestic and international. The only international I did was at the gate for my wife and took a while for the re-issue desk to figure out the fare. In all cases, doing them for cash, change fees were waived (which is pretty standard on a buy up). I didn't ask about "Pay With Miles" since you have to be an AMEX Delta cardholder, Gold, Platinum or Reserve, to do those.

Sounds like a 'no' , but I'll go exploring to verify. Our Amex is not DL but I could always move miles into hotel program or use them another way yet to be determined by your truly...Thanks for the info, as always.

You can do something I can't - check directly with the Pass Department,

I've given up trying to get enough documentation together and then asking him to ask them. There are always followup questions that he has to get back to me about and by time we give up, everyone's frustrated, us and them. :confused:

I fully understand and agree with not letting non-employees use the systems directly but as an IT professional who flies Revenue, Award, FCFL and NRSA I think I know a lot about how to use them. It does get frustrating at times.