Virgin Atlantic Flying Club - Upgrading using miles - a newbie question

Hi,

I've had a search and can't find an answer here, or on the Virgin Atlantic website (although knowing me it's probably staring me right in the face), and hope someonce can help.

Basically, I signed up to Flying Club a couple of months ago, and through a combination of converting Tesco Clubcard points, taking out the Black credit card and doing a few big purchases through that and the bonus 6k miles, I now find myseld in a position of having just over 50k miles.

However, try as I might, I cannot for the life of me find where I would check the availibility of an upgrade. I can find where to book flights using miles only, but if I want to book a flight in Premium Economy but use miles to upgrade to Upper Class, where would I do that, or check the availaibilty of what I want to do?

Sorry if this is obvious to some, but as a long time BA flyer this is all new to me

you need to click the little 'radio button' for 'spend miles' just under the place you enter route and dates and travel class.

If you wanted to upgrade from PE to UC then choose UC as that will tell you if there are any reward seats available. If there are no UC rewards then you can't upgrade. Upgrades from Y and PE into UC come from the same inventory of seats

But to upgrade from PE you also need to be in either the W or S fare buckets

You can do this search under the 'spend miles' tab then the 'upgrade/companion flights' tab in the flying club section of the website.

But you might as well phone VS as you would need to phone them anyway to process the miles upgrade and they will be able to check if there are any seats in UC that you can upgrade into

Thank you - I checked the pay by miles to see if there were flights available to where we wanted to go, and on the dates we wanted to fly, in UC which there were - but that was trying to charge me 140,000 miles, hence my confusion.

So looks like I have to give them a call to do this anyway.

Thanks for your help!

you need to click the little 'radio button' for 'spend miles' just under the place you enter route and dates and travel class.

If you wanted to upgrade from PE to UC then choose UC as that will tell you if there are any reward seats available. If there are no UC rewards then you can't upgrade. Upgrades from Y and PE into UC come from the same inventory of seats

But to upgrade from PE you also need to be in either the W or S fare buckets

You can do this search under the 'spend miles' tab then the 'upgrade/companion flights' tab in the flying club section of the website.

But you might as well phone VS as you would need to phone them anyway to process the miles upgrade and they will be able to check if there are any seats in UC that you can upgrade into

When I try that, I just get a message saying 'You do not have enough miles' and that I need 100k miles to book the UC ticket.

Just wanted to say thanks again for your help. I now have two UC returns to Vegas booked for our anniversary - Mrs Lem thinks we're flying in Premium Economy, so many brownie points to be received I reckon!

Andy - you may not have the miles to book but it does still tell you if any reward seats are available on your chosen dates.


Just wanted to say thanks again for your help. I now have two UC returns to Vegas booked for our anniversary - Mrs Lem thinks we're flying in Premium Economy, so many brownie points to be received I reckon!

^^^

Have fun keeping the secret so it will be a total surprise for Mrs Lem until the day you travel.!

Andy - you may not have the miles to book but it does still tell you if any reward seats are available on your chosen dates.



It does show the route, with a radio button to select which route/times I want. Does this mean there is availability?

It does show the route, with a radio button to select which route/times I want. Does this mean there is availability?

If it is showing actual flight numbers with a price at the bottom XX miles and YY cash for VS fuel surcharge and taxes that means there is availability.

If you are getting a calender with radio buttons that means at least one of your dates is not available- but don't use the radio buttons to select the dates you want make a note of them and go back to the flight search page and enter those dates - otherwise it comes up with an error message (VS know of this error yet don't appear to want to solve it!)

If it is showing actual flight numbers with a price at the bottom XX miles and YY cash for VS fuel surcharge and taxes that means there is availability.

If you are getting a calender with radio buttons that means at least one of your dates is not available- but don't use the radio buttons to select the dates you want make a note of them and go back to the flight search page and enter those dates - otherwise it comes up with an error message (VS know of this error yet don't appear to want to solve it!)

This is what I get:

http://i851.photobucket.com/albums/ab74/andy_w1/vs.jpg

No price, but it does show the fuel surcharge.

Yes that means there are reward flights available on those dates at a price of 100k miles plus the surcharge.

Yes that means there are reward flights available on those dates at a price of 100k miles plus the surcharge.

Excellent, thank you.

Is there a way of working out how much the extra tax/surcharge would be for using miles to upgrade from PE to UC? Or will the total surcharge etc still come to £536?

Excellent, thank you.

Is there a way of working out how much the extra tax/surcharge would be for using miles to upgrade from PE to UC? Or will the total surcharge etc still come to £536?

In total it would still be £536 but you will have paid a good chunk of those already in your PE ticket e.g. the airport fees are the same as is APD so it's really just the addtional VS fuel surcharge.

Easiest way would be to do a dummy booking for PE and the difference is the extra you would have to pay. I'd say about £ 100 but could be less.

This does assume that you have a S or W PE fare. If it is a K fare then you would have to pay to change your K to S or W which would be a couple of hundred £

In total it would still be £536 but you will have paid a good chunk of those already in your PE ticket e.g. the airport fees are the same as is APD so it's really just the addtional VS fuel surcharge.

Easiest way would be to do a dummy booking for PE and the difference is the extra you would have to pay. I'd say about £ 100 but could be less.

This does assume that you have a S or W PE fare. If it is a K fare then you would have to pay to change your K to S or W which would be a couple of hundred £

Excellent, that clears up a lot of uncertainty I had. Thank you.