Bump Story # 2 A very planned bump

For the first bump story, follow this link. For general tips, go here.

Almost ten years ago, I had to participate at a conference in Bali, Indonesia. (It was a tough job, but someone had to do it!) A good way of ticketing that flight seemed to be to get tickets that involved a round-the-world trip (RTW) using United and British Airways. The trip to Bali was ticketed separately from Singapore Airlines.

So this was the itinerary:

Baltimore - San Francisco (United)
San Francisco - Hong Kong (United)
Stop over at the Conrad in Hong Kong
Hong Kong - Singapore (United)
Stop over at the Hilton in Singapore
Singapore - Bali (Singapore Airlines)
About ten days in Bali at the Sheraton, Nusa Dua, Bali
Bali - Singapore (Singapore Airlines with an upgrade to First Class!)
Singapore - London (British Airways)
London - Paris (British Airways)
Time for a quick trip to taste wine in the Loire Valley
Paris - London (British Airways)
A couple of days visiting some pubs in Brighton and Chichester
London - Washington (British Airways)
Washington - Baltimore (United Express)

Yes, the last leg was Washington (IAD) to Baltimore (BWI), one of the shortest flights in the world! It used to be operated as a United Express flight by Atlantic Coast Airlines, the company that evolved into the now defunct Independence Air.

The planning for the bump worked like this. We changed our tickets from London Heathrow to Washington to the British Airways flight from Gatwick to Baltimore. (This flight used to be a BA flight operated by USAirways in BA livery but with a USAirways crew). This meant we still had the Washington - Baltimore coupon, and I scheduled that for the end of the July 4th weekend. Getting bumped off that flight was no problem whatsoever. A friend drove me to Washington (Dulles), and I was bumped immediately.

This was also an extremely lucrative trip in terms of frequent flier miles. There were a lot of miles involved with a bonus for flying in Business Class. I also got a $300 voucher because my IFE system did not work on the Gatwick - Baltimore leg. The final free ticket for the bump was icing on an excellent and large cake!