Double booking Delta flights with Celebrity after booking with the airline. How quickly will the duplicate get cancelled?

[MisterBill99]

Looking for information from someone who actually knows the answer to this question. I have flights booked on Delta that are cancellable (I paid extra for that). I just called Celebrity and can get the non-cancellable fare through them (their website had not been showing availability). If I have them book the flights for me without cancelling my Delta reservation how soon before Delta cancels the duplicates?  I want to be able to verify that I can buy seat upgrades on their reservation (exit row or Comfort+) before cancelling my existing reservation.

 

The Celebrity agent said that there have been cases where both reservations get cancelled, which is why I'm concerned.

Edited May 8 by MisterBill99

[Jeremiah1212]

25 minutes ago, MisterBill99 said:

Looking for information from someone who actually knows the answer to this question. I have flights booked on Delta that are cancellable (I paid extra for that). I just called Celebrity and can get the non-cancellable fare through them (their website had not been showing availability). If I have them book the flights for me without cancelling my Delta reservation how soon before Delta cancels the duplicates?  I want to be able to verify that I can buy seat upgrades on their reservation (exit row or Comfort+) before cancelling my existing reservation.

 

The Celebrity agent said that there have been cases where both reservations get cancelled, which is why I'm concerned.

You probably have 24hrs at most. They don’t publish a timeframe and there is also no guarantee which ticket they will cancel. Same name on same flight would likely be an automated cancelation. It does not matter if the itinerary is ticketed or not. 

[mahdnc]

10 minutes ago, Jeremiah1212 said:

You probably have 24hrs at most. They don’t publish a timeframe and there is also no guarantee which ticket they will cancel. Same name on same flight would likely be an automated cancelation. It does not matter if the itinerary is ticketed or not. 

how does one go about buying an extra seat (e.g. middle seat) to keep it empty?

[MisterBill99]

17 minutes ago, Jeremiah1212 said:

You probably have 24hrs at most. They don’t publish a timeframe and there is also no guarantee which ticket they will cancel. Same name on same flight would likely be an automated cancelation. It does not matter if the itinerary is ticketed or not. 

 

Thanks. Do you know if I'll be able to purchase a seat upgrade on the Celebrity-booked flights before they've been ticketed? Or can I do it after they book and then wait to pay until final payment is due (which is in a month, so not a huge deal to pay now). I just want to make sure that I'll be able to upgrade before giving up my current reservation, which I booked in Comfort+ going over and an exit row with lots of leg room coming back.  DL is currently showing C+ sold out on that first flight, but the exit rows are available so I could just get those instead.

Edited May 8 by MisterBill99

[Jeremiah1212]

1 hour ago, mahdnc said:

how does one go about buying an extra seat (e.g. middle seat) to keep it empty?

You have to call Delta and have the name on the second seat adjusted. The seat has to be on the same ticket so you aren’t holding two reservations.

 

55 minutes ago, MisterBill99 said:

 

Thanks. Do you know if I'll be able to purchase a seat upgrade on the Celebrity-booked flights before they've been ticketed? Or can I do it after they book and then wait to pay until final payment is due (which is in a month, so not a huge deal to pay now). I just want to make sure that I'll be able to upgrade before giving up my current reservation, which I booked in Comfort+ going over and an exit row with lots of leg room coming back.  DL is currently showing C+ sold out on that first flight, but the exit rows are available so I could just get those instead.

I don’t use FBC (nor do I recommend them) but if your reservation needs to be ticketed in order to open that option on Delta, you can call and ask them to ticket the itinerary. You would have to pay at that time. I wouldn’t expect to get a straight answer from FBC or Delta on this. The fare class Celebrity is selling could even impact your upgrade availability if it’s basic econ or something else odd. 

[Turtles06]

1 hour ago, MisterBill99 said:

The Celebrity agent said that there have been cases where both reservations get cancelled, which is why I'm concerned.

I know you said you paid extra for the cancellable reservations you booked yourself, but you also mentioned that you have gotten good seats on those flights.  Do you really want to risk having Celebrity in the middle of all this by booking through them and possibly not getting the seats that are important to you?  Only you can answer that of course. 
 

I hope whatever you choose works out for you. 

[abbydancer2003]

1 hour ago, mahdnc said:

how does one go about buying an extra seat (e.g. middle seat) to keep it empty?

I don't know about Delta, or FBC, but on United there's now a checkbox for extra seat.  You then choose the reason.  Luggage or comfort.  We just did it after booking June cruises on Beyond, where the only decent flight pricewise was a red eye in coach.  It wasn't that expensive, so I booked the row to keep the middle empty.

[MisterBill99]

25 minutes ago, Turtles06 said:

I know you said you paid extra for the cancellable reservations you booked yourself, but you also mentioned that you have gotten good seats on those flights.  Do you really want to risk having Celebrity in the middle of all this by booking through them and possibly not getting the seats that are important to you?  Only you can answer that of course. 
 

I hope whatever you choose works out for you. 

 

That's why I'd like to be able to have the new reservation in the system without having to cancel my existing one. Before I purchased my tickets, I had done a test purchase with free 24-hour cancellation to see what the upgrade prices were and then cancelled. 

 

I obviously should have called Celebrity before buying the tickets, and if there's no safe way to have double reservations to test the upgrade scenarios I'm probably better off just leaving things as they are and sucking it up on the added cost. At least it's $900pp less than the premium economy tickets I had booked on AA before they decide to stop flying non-stop JFK-ATH after Labor Day and cancelled my reservation. DL PE is over $4k pp and I'm not doing that.

[mahdnc]

30 minutes ago, abbydancer2003 said:

I don't know about Delta, or FBC, but on United there's now a checkbox for extra seat.  You then choose the reason.  Luggage or comfort.  We just did it after booking June cruises on Beyond, where the only decent flight pricewise was a red eye in coach.  It wasn't that expensive, so I booked the row to keep the middle empty.

 

Is "anti-social" not one of the reasons listed?

[goofysmom99]

2 hours ago, mahdnc said:

how does one go about buying an extra seat (e.g. middle seat) to keep it empty?

David, when my DH and I traveled to Europe, except for a very few times we flew in first class, we'd choose an airline/aircraft that had 3-3-3 coach seating configuration.  Then one of us would book the middle "extra seat" to have a passport assigned against it.  Worked wonderfully and would also give us an extra checked bag which I liked, DH didn't (he used the term sherpa a lot).  FBC can only book one seat per cruise reservation passenger, so no extra seats possible through them.  If I can't afford business class these days, I'll still book coach directly with an airline, being sure the overseas leg is on an aircraft with 2-4-2 configuration.  Then I upgrade my two seats to coach-plus on just the long-haul, overseas leg.  It's actually pretty comfortable and usually waaay cheaper than premium economy.

[mahdnc]

6 minutes ago, goofysmom99 said:

If I can't afford business class these days, I'll still book coach directly with an airline, being sure the overseas leg is on an aircraft with 2-4-2 configuration.  Then I upgrade my two seats to coach-plus on just the long-haul, overseas leg.  It's actually pretty comfortable and usually waaay cheaper than premium economy.

 

Hi, Ruth!  I didn't quite follow the 2nd half of your post (the part I quoted in this post).  In the 2-4-2 instance, would you purchase the two outboard seats?  And you would upgrade both coach seats to two coach-plus seats?  Yes?  

 

And what plane these days have 2-4-2?  It sounds kinda like the old 767 planes, but every time I have flown long haul on United it's either 787 or 777 which have 3 outboard seats in each row.

 

David

[goofysmom99]

1 minute ago, mahdnc said:

 

Hi, Ruth!  I didn't quite follow the 2nd half of your post (the part I quoted in this post).  In the 2-4-2 instance, would you purchase the two outboard seats?  And you would upgrade both coach seats to two coach-plus seats?  Yes?  

 

And what plane these days have 2-4-2?  It sounds kinda like the old 767 planes, but every time I have flown long haul on United it's either 787 or 777 which have 3 outboard seats in each row.

 

David

Yes.  On the flight from MCO to the hub (either IAD/EWR), I sit by the window, own the middle, and someone else sits on the aisle.  I don't upgrade that first leg to coach plus.  But on the long-haul, the 767 out of IAD/EWR, I upgrade my two seats to a set of the "2s" in coach plus.    

 

Going from Orlando to Barcelona this November, United has a choice of 767-400 (2-4-2) from EWR or 767-300 (2-4-2) from IAD.  I actually had booked United business (thru IAD) with FBC when it first came out for $500 less than it has been ever since.  But the end of April, when I was checking FBC options (do it every weekend), AA business popped up on FBC through MIA for $1600 less than my UA fare!  I dialed FBC on-the-spot.  Whew, the good deal was only there 24 hrs before fare went back up to well over $5K.  I still can't believe my good fortune - I think first/business for less than $2K to anywhere in Europe qualifies as the holy grail (so I've quit checking).

[mahdnc]

1 hour ago, goofysmom99 said:

Yes.  On the flight from MCO to the hub (either IAD/EWR), I sit by the window, own the middle, and someone else sits on the aisle.  I don't upgrade that first leg to coach plus.  But on the long-haul, the 767 out of IAD/EWR, I upgrade my two seats to a set of the "2s" in coach plus.    

 

Going from Orlando to Barcelona this November, United has a choice of 767-400 (2-4-2) from EWR or 767-300 (2-4-2) from IAD.  I actually had booked United business (thru IAD) with FBC when it first came out for $500 less than it has been ever since.  But the end of April, when I was checking FBC options (do it every weekend), AA business popped up on FBC through MIA for $1600 less than my UA fare!  I dialed FBC on-the-spot.  Whew, the good deal was only there 24 hrs before fare went back up to well over $5K.  I still can't believe my good fortune - I think first/business for less than $2K to anywhere in Europe qualifies as the holy grail (so I've quit checking).

Nice! It seems like you often luck out with air fare!

[MisterBill99]

I'm the OP and wanted to post an update. Last week, I got an email from Google Flights saying that the price had gone down (basically to what I had originally paid) so I called to book through Celebrity. I cancelled my reservation with Delta and paid for the new tickets so they could be ticketed, but I was told that would take 24-48 hours to happen. I still wasn't able to do paid upgrade seats at 48 hours so I didn't check for another couple of days. I finally checked again this morning and not only was I able to upgrade to the exit row seats that I wanted, there was no charge to do so! I had originally paid $135.99 per person to upgrade to row 42 on the A330-900neo, so I ended up saving close to $1,000 on the tickets (which was mainly the extra charge to make them refundable), plus over $500 on the seat upgrades. I've seen this before, not being charged for a coach seat uprade when booking through Celebrity. Not sure why, maybe the fare code they use, but I'll take it!

 

I know people have concerns about booking air through Celebrity as opposed to direct with the airline. Hopefully I won't have a problem, I haven't in the past.

Edited Monday at 04:44 PM by MisterBill99