Lisbon ‘04 #01: Standby
June 28th, 2004
As I sit here alone at the departure gate, listening to an instrumental version of ‘Time after time’ apparently recorded by Hank Marvin, I find myself reflecting on the week’s events.
It has been huge. Monumental. Neil’s stag week in Lisbon has been such an incredibly good time that it’s hard to know where to begin writing about it. But before I do so, I’ve one paticularly salient piece of advice to impart:
If you’ve got a standby ticket for a flight, go straight to the gate.
Don’t browse the airport’s duty free, and certainly don’t go to the bar for a quick Superbock. Standbys are allocated first come first serve and you’ll be competing with all the other standby holders for what will in all probability be a very small number of seats. This required urgency seems obvious to me now, but forward planning skills are only now returning to nominal, and were severely impaired this morning.
So …I was bumped from the flight. And with no confidence that the low number of spare seats on BA’s later flight would accomodate me, I’ve bought a new ticket with Portugal’s national airline, TAP (€300). The silver lining is that I’m now flying into Gatwick rather than Heathrow and will save about two hours journey time across London.
Just for the record, the problem with my ticket was that BA had been unable to confirm my seat with the travel agent, who had failed to follow this up. Now lets see if either they’ll cough up, or if my travel insurance is up to a claim…