The Dumb Little Man blog posts up a healthy portion of tips for those with flexible schedules and a desire to fly for free by booking themselves on overbooked flights. Along with pointing to a web site that details how many seats are left on certain flights, guest blogger Clay Collins suggests keeping your luggage light to up your chances at scoring a free flight voucher: Sometimes finding volunteers is like pulling teeth, but if the competition is fierce, airlines tend to prefer volunteers who don’t have checked baggage. On a similar note, one of the few downsides to getting bumped is the extra opportunity for the airline to lose your checked luggage. Try to stick to carry-on bags. If you can leave the turbo deluxe hair dryer and extra set of golf clubs at home, do so.
US-centric: MSNBC highlights how to invoke Rule 240 to get a new flight fast any time your flight is cancelled for anything other than weather. I invoked Rule 240—which states that in the event of any flight delay or cancellation caused by anything other than weather, the airline would fly me on the next available flight—not their next available flight, which might not leave for another 24 hours. And guess what happened? A lot of United passengers made it to Boston that day&mdash on American.
A relic of pre-deregulation airlines, the article says that most newer airlines won’t honor rule 240, but apparently most of the older airlines still respect this rule as a matter of company policy. If you know anything more about rule 240—maybe you’ve invoked it yourself?—let’s hear about it in the comments. For more details, check out Consumerist’s rather extensive guide to Rule 240. Photo by dougww. Stranded at the airport? Don’t forget Rule 240 [MSNBC]
Starting tomorrow, spare lithium-ion batteries—the kind found in laptops and cell phones— will be banned from checked airline luggage in the US. But you can still bring two batteries, in clear baggies, in your carry-on bags.
Webapp Flight Wait takes the guesswork out of flight tracking by providing you with a map of FAA flight delays in real time. Simply input the city or airport code and let Flight Wait determine whether there are any traffic delays that you may need to be aware of. If all lines are green, the wait is a maximum of 15 minutes. If the lines are yellow, your airport or area is reporting delays between approximately 16-59 minutes. A red line indicates a wait of an additional one to two hours, and if the line is black, you’re stuck for at least two hours. You can already track your flight with Google and view delays with previously mentioned FlightStats, but this application gives you an overall picture of whether an entire airport or city is affected by weather conditions or other delays. Flight Wait
Get frequent, accurate status updates for your next flight via email or SMS—from gate changes and delays to takeoff and landing alerts—with web site FlightStats. FlightStats is a perfect tool for both the traveler and the picker-upper, and according to the Wall Street Journal it’s the best status tracker available (even when compared with status tools provided by specific airlines). FlightStats does require you to create a free account to take advantage of its alerts, but it’s a simple process in exchange for accurate information. It even does real-time flight tracking (though you can quickly track flights in 3D with Google Earth, which is decidedly cooler). Thanks Jason!
FlightStats [via WSJ via Consumerist]
