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This is a late trip report as I just joined. I had two weeks free the end of August 2005 and a friend of mine had just moved to Honolulu and said I can crash at his place so that's where I was going.
I looked at my choices and being born at the front of the cheap line I seek out the cheapest way to get there. I was going to depart from JFK and with no Non-Stop service to HNL I knew I had to route through LAX or SFO. I decided to get on United all the way to HNL and chose SFO as my connecting airport. I know the #1 rule is to take backups but i forgot that rule. I had a Delta ATL-LGA ticket laying around so I took that as a backup if I get stuck in SFO when I was coming back.
I was leaving on a sunday so the saturday night I called united and after a few tries I got someone who spoke a little english and he said the flight looked okay.
JFK=SFO
B757
So I got to JFK the sunday morning and everything looked okay the 1st flight out at 7:30 I missed, the 2nd flight I also missed so being about a mile away from the airport I went back home. The next day I did the same thing, waited for the 1st two flights and missed those so I left and went back home. There were a total of 5 flights a day but there were so many standbys and I was at the bottom of the list so I gave up. So after the 2nd day I checked other airlines and saw that Delta had flights to SFO and they wern't that bad so I got a one way ticket to SFO on Delta. The 3rd day with my Delta JFK-SFO ticket in hand I went to JFK and tried for the 1st flight on Delta which I made on Song.
SFO=HNL
B777
I made it to SFO and walked the mile over to the UA terminal to get my flight to HNL. The checkin lady was nice but no one can compare to the people at Heathrow which I will post later. I wasn't given a seat there but after going through security and got to the gate they gave me a seat right away.
Honolulu:
Honolulu was nice and I loved the people over there. I drove around the island went to the beaches even went to Pearl Harbor. It was really nice.
HNL=SFO
B767
I decided to come back a day early after finding out they had a convention/parade for WWII veterans and it was ending the day I had planned to leave. I was gonna try for the 9:45pm and 11pm flights as they would get me into SFO early in the morning and would allow me to standby for 5 flights to JFK. I went to the airport everything looked okay and made it to gate early which in the standby world means nothing. Getting closer to boarding time and I was thinking to myself why did I plan to come to Hawaii. There were people everywhere and I think the low point was looking across and saw a retired United employee with the badge around her head sitting with her husband. That's when I knew I would not make the flight. So they started boarding and I called home and told them I wasn't gonna make it because the gate was packed.
Everyone boarded then they started calling standby's. The retired couple got on and they kept calling and calling and calling. Then out of no where they called my name. THE LAST ONE. I was so happy that I couldn't even control myself because I was thanking them so much. I had grown homesick of Hawaii and just wanted to leave. I bought so much stuff in hawaii that I had three carry on. I sat next to a guy on the plane who worked for SAS and he told me his story. left europe to singapore to japan to hawaii just to make it to san fransisco. Needless to say I told him congrats and went to sleep.
SFO-JFK
B757
I waited for this flight which was the 1st one to JFK that day I believe and I made the flight. It was United and I didn't get business or first I acutally didn't get no first or business the entire trip. I got premium service or whatever they call it.. that's the reason why I couldn't make the flight from JFK-SFO. They had about 100 seats on the entire plane with probably 60 people in coach. I'm sure a UA employee can give the exact amount but it's a big plane but very spacious. Good for paying passengers but bad for non-revs.
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Welcome aboard Venusfan
So you non-revved HNL in August and made it out on your first try, that's not bad, in fact that's great. The stars were shinning on you my friend.
I had to laugh when I read
Originally posted by Venusfan:
I was so happy that I couldn't even control myself because I was thanking them so much. Trust me I know the feeling, one time I was 'trapped' in DFW, dragged from gate to gate all day, finally I heard my name called, I was so happy I gave the gate agent (my new best friend) a box of pralines, now that's happy.
From your 757 description it sounds like you fell into "non-rev trap #4-configuration"
That 757 premium service only has 110 seats, 72 seats less than United's standard 757-200 configuration. When choosing my flights I always look at the equipment and the configuration. (check out seat guru for airline seating)
It has made all the difference between relaxing in a sleeper seat in "first" and enduring the middle seat squeeze in 39E for me.
Keep'em flying
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You are right because when I finally got on the United plane more than 1/2 the plane was devoted to first and business and coach was given the back 1/3.
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I have been to Hawaii 9 times but I only non-rev'd twice in the summer (July) with the other times in mid September and early November. I have never gone out on OAL but did non-rev from HNL-LAS on HA and made the flight. I love Hawaii but always go on my airline so that I am not on the bottom of the non-rev list. I also travel on Wed or Thurs as to increase my chance of making the flight. I have always made my flight!!!!! In fact, I have always made my flight during my 9 years with non-reving. I consider my self very very lucky in that I have made all flights on both my airline and the other airlines.
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All---
NRSA travel to HNL/OGG/KOA/LIH is, in my opinon, one of the three places where you have a better chance of being "left behind" than actually making it on....
The other two??? BKK and SYD...
IMHO
--UALer
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As an HP (now US) employee, I usually try to travel to Hawaii at least every 2 years. In the past, America West never had Hawaii service so I had to non-rev on other airlines usually out of LAX/SFO which meant your boarding priority is lower than the employees of the operating airline. I have never had trouble getting to Hawaii it was always leaving Hawaii that is a problem. My last Hawaii trip in 2004 was the worst Hawaiin non-rev trip I had encountered. I usually schedule my vacations around Sept. 11 dates because many travelers still have the fear factor with flying on that date. Anyway, I flew on Northwest from LAX to HNL on 9/11/2004. I had no problem non-reving as the flight was half empty. I was in Hawaii for 9 days. Anyway, my plan was to leave HNL on a Sat evening get to LAX or SFO the next morning and take the next HP flight to back to PHX. I left LIH Sat evening got to HNL where I had to reclaim my luggage from the interisland hop (Just an FYI-- Aloha and Hawaiin will not provide interline baggage transfer for non-revs) and recheck with my intended non-rev flight on UA. But before I checked in w/UA I had to get my luggage go through the agriculture check. Anyway, my plan was to non-rev on the first red-eye flight from HNL-LAX which was a 777 aircraft. Before I left LIH I called UA which took forever to get through at res. When I did I must have been speaking to one of their outsource res agent who told me the flight did not look good. But said their was 2 HNL-LAX, 2 HNL-SFO, and 1 HNL-DEN all back to back flights within 45 minutes of each other. Long story short we kept getting bumped off each one after being rolled over on each one. The flights were not oversold with paying passengers, but there were several UA non-revs. Each flight there were some UA non-revs getting on each flight. My partner and I had to end up staying at a motel in HNL that evening. The next day the first morning flight was HNL-SFO. The gate agent said are chances were looking very good as there were 25 seats open. After boarding all paying passenger, they called all the non-revs which were mostly UA employees. Soon my partner, myself, and a non-rev were the last one's standing at the gate. Then out of the blue 3 paying passengers showed up running to the gate, we end up getting bumped. Then they rolled us over the HNL-LAX flight that was departing the next hour where we finally got on after being bumped 6x. My luggage got on the orginal HNL-LAX I had listed for. I learned my lesson the hard way that I will never try non-reving again on a Sat. evening when most people want to get home with enough time to rest before returning to work on Mon. Anyway, with America West now going to Hawaii I am planning on going to Maui. At least I know what my priority status will be and I can check internally with the PBT's on the flights.
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[quote]Originally posted by skyfly:
Then they rolled us over the HNL-LAX flight that was departing the next hour where we finally got on after being bumped 6x. QUOTE]
...and another non-rev falls victim to HNL.
(see Non-Rev Black Holes for more adventures)
Welcome aboard Skyfly
Keep'em flying
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It's those UAL employees. If 1st class have 20 seats I would guarantee you that 15 of those seats are filled with UAL empolyees traveling non-rev.
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My luggage got on the orginal HNL-LAX I had listed for. ... so it travelled on a flight you didn't !!
Isn't it nice to see that US carriers have learnt their lessons from Lockerbie and 9/11 and take baggage security seriously
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Paul -
I know the TSA is not the best agency in the world...however, all bags that get on a flight out of the USA have to be screened. Either by an ETD (explosive trace device) or a CTX.
JIM
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Thats irrelevant .. those systems can only check for 'known' suspect items .. the bags should not travel without the passenger unless a full reflighting process has been adhered to.
