Airlines often overbook flights, and then people who don't check in early enough might find that their seats have been sold to someone else.

Just as everyone has a credit score for their credit cards, everyone should have an air travel credit score, too. If you always show up on time to the flights you've booked, then your rating remains perfect. Repeatedly miss flights, or cancel at the last minute and your air travel credit score will be lowered. Airlines that wish to overbook can then choose to bump passengers in order of dependability, rather than at random.

The Air travel credit score should be maintained at a central level and apply to all airlines together.
-- phundug, Oct 10 2007

In my experience, airlines do not currently bump passengers at random. Instead, they go by how much was paid for the ticket, what the passenger's frequent-flier status is, when they checked in, things like that.

The specific rules vary between airlines.
-- jutta, Mar 16 2008



random, halfbakery