A few years ago, my wife and I were traveling to Munich via Atlanta. When we arrived at our Atlanta departure gate, Delta was asking for volunteers to be rerouted through Paris to Munich because our non-stop was oversold. This meant we would arrive in Munich around 3 hours later than our original plan. The airline was offering flight vouchers for the bump. We volunteered but instead of taking the flight vouchers (set amount of money towards a future flight) we asked instead if we could fly overseas business class. They said sure...no problem. Then the 8 or so passengers who were behind us in line, volunteering for the bump, asked for the same thing. We ended up flying comfortably over the Atlantic, got good night's sleep, etc. In Paris we were given Air France Lounge privileges and arrived in Munich rested and well fed. Sometimes a bump can work well, as it did this time. We even made friends for a day with our fellow "bumpees" crossing in business class.

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