Standby with Virgin Atlantic?

rainbow_carnage

I booked a return flight to JFK with Virgin Atlantic leaving this Friday. My grandmother has had a stroke, so I've had to change the flight so I could be there sooner. Availability is really bad around Thanksgiving, so the earliest they could change it to is tomorrow afternoon. I paid £170 for the privilege, plus another £100 to get a new connecting flight.

The problem is that it only leaves me 50 minutes between the two flights. Knowing the mess that is JFK, there's a good chance that I'll miss the connection. There's nothing later that day.

There is another Virgin flight to JFK five hours earlier that's now showing a few empty seats. I was wondering if I could turn up at the airport early and try to get a standby seat on it. In the past, I've been able to take earlier flights with other airlines without having to pay extra. I called Virgin to ask about it, and they said that I may have to pay another ticket change fee.

Has anyone tried to do this with Virgin? Were you charged for it? I really can't afford another £170, but nor do I want to miss the connection. If there is a chance that I could do this without it costing any more money, then I'll try it, though it means the possibility of a six-hour wait at Heathrow.

Any advice would be very much appreciated.

Thank you in advance.

Alan_Bowen

Well you need to try something because 50 minutes isn't going to get you on to another flight. I assume it is on a different carrier, since Virgin Atlantic don't have internal flights and this means re checking your bags, even if you can check in on line. JFK isn't one of my favourite arrival airports and in 50 minutes you would be lucky to even reach the front of the queue at immigration. Would it be cheaper to change your connecting flights than the Virgin one?

Many years ago, when airlines still made a profit, I was travelling to Miami for a conference with a colleague who despite have three alarm calls and 30 phone calls from me, overslept and awoke one hour before departure on Virgin. As I was at the airport, I asked if they could assist and they rebooked him on the afternoon flight to JFK at no charge and looked for the best connection to Miami which was with Delta, which I think cost £90. The staff on the desk could not have been more helpful so it might be worth a try, even more so if your connection was with Virgin America but if I was a betting man, I fear they will look to make the extra again, so maybe look at your connection or see if you can get another internal flight on a different airline, JetBlue has a big operation at JFK and started a sale a few hours ago. Good luck to you and Grandma