It's about time for AAFF to jump back in and state "since OP volunteered, AA had no obligation to do anything above the minimum standard. blah blah blah."

Sue, I followed your argument about "best interest" and in theory it does make sense. But I will reword it a bit:

<i>Nor is it necessarily in the best interest of the <s>public overall</s> <b>airline</b> for the airline to always pay the maximum compensation, as measured in dollars, since if the airline can keep everyone reasonably happy for less rather than greater cost, the result is lower <s>ticket prices for all of us</s> <b>cost for the airline</b>.</i>

In this economic decision it is the best interests of the shareholders that come first. Which is as it should be.

Mrwunfl, that I acknowledge that the public benefits, should not be intended to read that I think that public and airline benefits are invariably mutually exclusvive, such that either one or the other benefits in any given arrangement. Benefits can be mutual, and in enduring arrangements, they generally are. Thus, I disagree with your edited revision, which clearly suggests that in this case the benefit is exclusive to the airline and its shareholders.

For those cynics out there, may I point out that one doesn't have to believe in the moral integrity of either of the parties to believe in mutually beneficial arrangements. In short, I don't think the airlines do this (share cost savings with the consumer) out of some moral belief in fair play, I believe that they do this because facing strong competition (or the threat of same) from discount and other carriers, they must seek to keep prices down. So it is not necessary for me to trust the airlines, so much as to trust that competition and deregulation work to produce a range of options for consumers.

It still helps to know how things work in the field, or in other words, to have as clear as possible an idea of what is at stake when one negotiates compensation, which is why this thread was so useful.

While I haven't played the voluntary bump game, I suspect a lot of the fantastic results reported are exaggerated.

This is handled by gate agents under extreme time pressure. I frankly doubt that they have a cabinet full of vouchers for various hotels, restaurants, and shuttle services; I would expect that the airline would have negotiated a good (for them) deal with one facility, and that is what you get unless they run out of vouchers and have to go to a supervisor for relief. It follows that the amount of the compensation voucher is what is most often negotiated. So if you are holding out for something they don't have, or which would take them some time to get, I would expect them to offer the deal they can easily deliver to someone else.

You can get a lot of information on this subject by hanging out in the appropriate forum at flyertalk and listening to people who play this game seriously. As with any information you get on the internet, you should be alert to the possibility that it is not accurate.