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Home » JetBlue » How A JetBlue Gate Agent Truly Gamed The System
JetBlueLaw In Travel

How A JetBlue Gate Agent Truly Gamed The System

Matthew Klint Posted onOctober 21, 2019November 14, 2023 18 Comments

a row of seats in an airplane

A former JetBlue gate agent faces up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for an elaborate yet simply-executed fraud scheme.

Tiffany Jenkins was an enterprising gate agent for JetBlue in Boston. She hatched a plan to save her family, friends and “clients” a lot of money on tickets. First, her co-conspirators would buy the cheapest JetBlue ticket possible, usually a ticket from Long Beach to Las Vegas that go for as cheap as $45.

Jenkins would look up the reservation, then exchange the flight(s) for far pricier international flights. Using the “involuntary exchange” override, typically reserved for situations when a passenger misses a flight or encounters a cancellation, the tickets were re-issued with the pricier flights at no charge.

But Jenkins was not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Between July 2016 through September 2017 she exchanged over 500 tickets for over 100 different people, all using the same trick.

It’s not like electronic systems never leave an electronic paper trail…

Eventually Jenkins was caught, fired, and later arrested. She is currently in custody, having pleaded guilty to three counts of wire fraud. Her sentencing will be on January 21, 2020.

CONCLUSION

I’m truly surprised she got away with if for so long…I’d think her profile would have been flagged far before she managed to re-issue 505 tickets. But like other inside jobs, it seems that the law eventually catches up.

> Read More: Ohio Woman Defrauds United of $400,000+

image: JetBlue

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About Author

Matthew Klint

Matthew is an avid traveler who calls Los Angeles home. Each year he travels more than 200,000 miles by air and has visited more than 135 countries. Working both in the aviation industry and as a travel consultant, Matthew has been featured in major media outlets around the world and uses his Live and Let's Fly blog to share the latest news in the airline industry, commentary on frequent flyer programs, and detailed reports of his worldwide travel.

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18 Comments

  1. debit Reply
    October 21, 2019 at 8:02 am

    Should have joined politics. Would have gotten away with it with her party making excuses for her behavior and dumb Americans unable see criminal behavior when a politician does it.

  2. Seth Reply
    October 21, 2019 at 8:02 am

    Let’s hope it catches up to trump and his co-conspirators too…it has been too long already and he’s also not the sharpest knife.

    If for such a petty crime she’s facing up to 20 years, I can’t even imagine what trump will be facing up to.

    • John L Reply
      October 21, 2019 at 2:03 pm

      You meant to say Joe Biden, or Hillary, yea?

      The only thing Trump is guilty of is hurting Democrats’ feelings on a daily basis.

      • debit Reply
        October 21, 2019 at 4:11 pm

        Yup. Put Biden and Hillary in the jail too.

        They all are corrupt. They just do soft corruption, the ones that is obvious but can’t be prosecuted. The media should take them to task much harder.

        The question is do you cry paid to kiss trump’s ass or are you just effing dumb?

      • Jackson Waters Reply
        October 22, 2019 at 3:49 am

        Exactly. Trump was not a politician in any capacity until he was inaugurated in 2017. All his life he was a businessman in real estate and an assortment of other businesses some that did poor (casinos, airlines) and some that did well (golf resorts are real estate). Hillary and Biden have been in the political realm for 40 years. Any of their business dealings or “charity” organizations come under scrutiny. After his father served as senator and Vice President for 8 years Hunter Biden’s dealings in Ukraine and China are suspicious. Trump has properties all around the world predating his Presidency so it really is a different situation.

      • Go Troll Trump articles Reply
        October 23, 2019 at 7:16 am

        This was NOT a political article, yet all of your comments are…

  3. Julian Reply
    October 21, 2019 at 9:11 am

    Given she got away with it so many times I wonder how the system or revenue accounting folks did not flag this sooner. A lot of airlines run algorithms cross referencing the reason code for the change against the status of the originally booked flights. If you reissue as involuntary exchange yet the flights are not canceled this would be flagged. If I was Jetblue I would set up some automation to audit all involuntary exchanges against actually involuntarily cancelled segments as if it this easy I would suspect this may have happened elsewhere, likely on smaller scale, too.

  4. Nick Reply
    October 21, 2019 at 9:25 am

    This is why we can’t have nice things….. I’m sure this will change JetBlue’s polices and make things more difficult for people who actually needed tickets rebooked.

    • AK Reply
      October 21, 2019 at 10:05 am

      I wonder what happens to an airline when it defrauds 300 customers weather-related delays?

      Or when a rental car counter upsells by claiming they are out of compacts?

      Or when that passenger is asked to give up his comfort+ seat so the fight attendant’s buddy can sit there.

      Remember, all of these are types of monetary fraud, and we don’t see tax-payer-funded cops jumps and enforce the law for the consumer in these situations.

  5. M Casey Reply
    October 21, 2019 at 9:36 am

    This is an opportunity vs the risks.

  6. Jetsetter Reply
    October 21, 2019 at 10:18 am

    Do you know how they actually caught her? Can you find that out in the trial court documents? It could be that someone flagged her, as opposed to some kind of snazy revenue accounting find, or IT report flag. She might have gotten away with 10,000 tickets, if say for instance, a fellow employee maybe resenting it perhaps tattled. Sometimes I think people give these companies a lot more credit, the when the honest truth may be they have no viable ”
    IT” or “revenue accounting” mechanism to readily catch this. So I’m saying if she had a 30 year career, and maybe only fudged 25 or 50 tickets a year, she may have ?”gotten away with it” for her entire 30 year plus career. I could also see one of her “clients” calling reservations or interacting with an inquisitive agent, so the bottom line why she was caught may well be that someone reported it again as opposed to some wiz bang accounting, IT, or internal audit process! 🙂 With many orgs, not just airlines, there likely is not in practice any wiz bang accounting, IT, or internal audit process. They want you (employees and to some extent customers) to think there is a wiz bang process in place, but likely there simply is not. I’m saying there could well be dozens or more employees across airlines that do this maybe on a smaller scale, and big brother has decided its not worth the money and manpower to fix it or say audit every transaction.

    • Sexy_kitten7 Reply
      October 21, 2019 at 12:38 pm

      That’s a good point. Reminds me of the UA voucher guy! The complaint suggests that B6 did catch her. No mention of a tip off.

      https://www.dropbox.com/s/67mmccgww99152m/1-1.pdf?dl=0

  7. Jetsetter Reply
    October 21, 2019 at 12:07 pm

    Also the “20 years,” is kind of a headline grabber thing, it is the maximum sentence for wire fraud. They might very well give her time served and probation. The comments in the linked Boston Globe article are by and large sympathetic, and people are comparing this to the sentences given in the BOS area college admissions scam. In those cases, most parents are getting about 7 days in jail or so. As she pleaded guilty, also, there may have been some sort of deal made with the US attorney. But “20 years,” is not the real deal, again, its just something to get people excited and talking which it worked, haha.

  8. James Reply
    October 21, 2019 at 5:53 pm

    Maximum sentence for a guilty plea? Clickbait. How low have you sunk?

    • Matthew Reply
      October 21, 2019 at 5:58 pm

      James, James, James. No clickbait in this title.

  9. David Reply
    October 22, 2019 at 10:08 am

    Black skin privilege.

    • Leave Race Out Of It Reply
      October 23, 2019 at 7:24 am

      She’ll get the MAX because she is NO Felicity Huffman…. to teach blacks to stick to DRUG dealing and leave “white collate crimes” to the whites…

  10. Not Felicity Huffman Reply
    October 23, 2019 at 7:29 am

    David ur an idiot.
    She will get the MAX because she is NOT Felicity Huffman.
    Instead she will be an example to blacks to stick to DRUG dealing and leave “white collar crimes” to white people…

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