The fee is now up to $120. Here's the kicker: It's non-refundable. I was actually stupid enough to bring myself to pay the $120 fee to change the flight (didn't really have any choice at the time) and the flight got canceled. Do you think they refunded my money? Hells no. I'm STILL in the process of calling everyday to fight for a refund.

Best part: That was my honeymoon flight. They don't care though. They have no souls.

If you are willing to go unconfirmed standby, there's no charge. That being said, you wind up at the absolute bottom of the standby list (even behind non-revs), and you will board last. If you want to do a flight change (where you're guaranteed a seat on a different flight), they'll charge you the difference between your fare and the unrestricted fare. That being said, if it's in the airline's best interest to get you on an earlier flight (e.g., oversold flight, bad weather), they'll waive the charge (and have the ability to do so without supervisor approval).

To piggy back on N301DP, Northwest now does charge $25 per passenger to change flights day of if you're not an elite customer. However, my mom (who is Silver Elite) told me she's never seen it collected at the gate. What this means: if you're going to try to same-day switch flights at NW, don't make the change at check-in. Go to the gate you want to try to get on, and make your case there.

I'm an assistant here in Houston and we use a Corporate Travel Agency too...there are many times when we have meetings that end early and therefore the participants want to fly out of Houston and get home earlier. I have dealt with many many many different airlines with having to change flight times and have to say that SWA and Continental are the best in my book for this. SWA will allow you to change your flight times day of if there is room on an earlier flight and Continental will do the same too usually with a small fee and sometimes with no fee at all. On a personal use for myself I recommend SWA if you dont have a long flight(like Houston to Dallas)...its a 30min flight and theres usually always room on every flight out..so you can always go standby if you're already at the airport and just dont wanna wait around.

@Gari N. Corp: "it took just over 2 hours to get to that terminal. blech." What did you do, crawl on your hands and knees backwards through the connecting halls? I've flown over 30 trips the last three years, and every one of them connected in ATL. The longest it's ever taken me to get from one terminal to another is about 15 minutes. And that's if I walk and skip the subway/tram.

For a same day departure: show up at the airport early. Head straight to the gate of the flight you want, skip the ticket counter, and ask if they will let you go standby at no additional charge.
This has worked for me in the past. If they say no, no big deal, you'll just be spending a little more time in the airport. This strategy is most likely to work when the flight you are originally scheduled for is sold out.

how does southwest airlines make a profit without having to charge these stupid kinds of fees ?

As of April it now costs $25 to space-available stand-by on any Northwest flight within the United States. This is an unconfirmed standby that only gets charged if you make it on the flight. I believe Northwest and USAirways are the only two airlines that practice this.

They do charge if you want a confirmed seat on the flight to which you wish to change.

I've always done stand-by and I've always made the earlier flight.

Maybe I have been given exceptional treatment, because I havent ever had to pay, I am talking about flying standby earlier though.

Though I don't remember flying Delta ever, I can recall my hatred for US Airways. UGH. Fuck you!

No fee just for the change, though.

# Things you need to know prior to changing your itinerary:

* Changes will apply to all passengers in the reservation.
* Changing your itinerary may result in a higher fare.
* You may be required to pay a higher fare on all segments in your itinerary even if you only made changes to one segment.
* Any changes you make will apply to all Passengers in your itinerary.
* Changing your itinerary is subject to availability at the time of change.
* Some flights and fares that were available when you booked your original itinerary may no longer be available.

It looks like you probably would have to do it before you check in, but I seem to remember seeing the "change itinerary" link there the day of flights in the past. If I remember, I can look for it on Friday.

But it looks like Southwest is an exception to your 'every single airline' rule.

And for everyone saying that $70 to $100 or more for a change fee while they are on business needs to look at some information. If I'm billing at $75 an hour, then saving an hour of my client's time has an intrinsic value of the same as the flight change fee. Thus, spending $75 for a 3 hour time savings should be a no brainer....and even more so if you're just driving around town instead of working.
PS...for those of you with no concept of money or business practices...you usually bill at a rate of about 3x your hourly rate.

Guys, if you have a full fare ticket, there are no change fees on any airline that I know of.

@Buran: I was ALSO going to say this. If I need to fly between cities, and Southwest will take me there, I don't even look at other airlines.

Independence Air out of DC/Dulles was the absolute best for business - no change fees to switch to an earlier flight...which is probably why they went out of business...

Flying from Denver, I try not to fly anything but Frontier. Awesome service, DirecTV, on time more often than many other airlines, and cheap to boot.

The one drawback is that there is no first or business class, so when I fly back east or on longer flights, I tend to go for a bigger airline.

But I highly recommend Frontier if its an option for you.

The last time I had to pay a change fee it was on the company's bill so I can't say I cared one little bit.

If the change fee is important to you, Will, go ahead and switch, but you may not like the other trade-offs.

My new favorite airline is Allegiant, it's like a flying Greyhound bus passenger and service wise but the seats rock.

Southwest charges the price between the fares.

These charges annoy me too. Really, you are doing them a favor. If their early flight has empty seats and you take those instead, they still have time to sell the seats on the later flight, instead of letting the flight leave half empty. I can understand a 20, 25$ charge for "processing" but anything more than that is too much.

Delta means change right?

stewardii?