Anyone accepted an offer to take money as flight overbooked ? How much did you get ?

[Whatdoyouthinktothis]

Just curious as on our last trip to USA
came up on the app it was over booked and they were looking for voluntary people to take money and fly home later
we couldn’t do it but I’m curious how it works

would they pay your hotel for a few more nights then also give you money
as that’s sounds pretty good

$1200 and a night in a hotel. Flight was too heavy to take off in the extreme heat

When I was a student they gave me £100 in airline vochures to be willing to move onto another later flight on the same day.

But then they had a space in business class on the original flight so I got my planned flight, a business upgrade and the voucher. That was a good day!!!

Wow that was great

Yes that’s good deal, I’d take that

I got £400 for volunteering to offload in Athens - the next flight was only a few hours later, so I just sat in a cafe with a book.

I remember I got £200 plus a free night in a hotel near Gatwick with a meal allowance. Boarded a flight to Ibiza the next morning!

When I was 15, on a school trip to the USA, we were waiting in JFK for our flight home and they were offering £1000 (this was 1999 so worth considerably more than now!), hotel room, plus a Business class upgrade if people were willing to change to a flight the next day and go via Frankfurt rather than direct to London. Several of my friends and I thought this was a brilliant deal, but our teachers wouldn't hear of it, unsurprisingly

The first time was 30+ years ago, we were due to fly from Heathrow to Los Angeles with TWA. Because they went bust we were moved to American Airlines and would have to travel via New York. At the gate we found out the flight was delayed, a 5 hour lay-over in NY and we would arrive in LA around midnight. They asked for volunteers to stand down for $500 each, a night in an airport hotel, flying the next day, as we were having a long trip we decided to do it. When OH approached them it had gone up to $800, hotel and a direct flight to LA! We worked out that we lost about 5 hours off the trip, didn't arrive in LA at midnight and the following year we booked UK to New York to San Antonio, to San Francisco back to UK and we paid, for 4 of us, a total of £425 using the $800 vouchers!
After that we always travelled ready to stand down, spare underclothes etc in hand luggage, we offered to stand down a couple of times more and even when our seats weren't needed we were bumped up into business!

They offered $2500 per person and a non direct alternative flight - we didn't take it

I was offered $900 once to get the next flight home from Philadelphia- it wasn't till the next day so I'd have had to sleep in the airport, they didn't offer a hotel.

I was flying home to the UK, but a few people who lived in Philly took it and just went home to return the next day.

Yes. 600€ plus night in hotel and all meals covered. Plus taxis. Happened end of March. Istanbul to Tokyo .

I’m a frequent flier and always tell people to familiarise themselves with EU261 regulation before getting to the airport (or UK261). If flying with an European carrier, or out of a European airport, the airline are legally required to pay compensation if they are the ones to deny you boarding due to overbooking.

When looking for volunteers to accept some cash and the next flight, never ever accept the first offers - they are likely either under or just matching the legal amounts. I see a lot of 200 / 400 / 600 quotes upthread.

The minimum lawful compensation for being offloaded off the shortest flight is €250. If they get enough people to accept that initial (under)offer, they won’t have to go higher or deny people boarding.

Wait for the airline to start increasing the offer past the minimum legal amount. If there are no takers, they’ll have to deny boarding and pay compensation. They always try to save some money that way.

Wow some generous amounts on here

On the way to NYC a good few years ago we were offered I think £500 each and a hotel with dinner and breakfast at Heathrow. We declined as we were only going for 5 nights, but we’d have snapped their hands off ok the way back!

I was once put on standby on an overbooked easyJet domestic flight and it would have been €250 and a flight 3 hours later. Sadly not everyone turned up so I was put on the original flight!