Cathay Pacific Asia Miles - Upgrade on Qualiflyer mileage ?

Hi all,

I upgraded an AMS-HKG-SYD-CNS-HKG-AMS ticket from Y to C using Swiss miles. The Qualiflyer agent told me that Swiss needs to stick 'upgrade stickers' on my Y-tickets before I go to the check-in. He claimed this could happen at the airport, right before check-in...

But...Qualiflyer is being stopped as program on 12/31/02, so what is my best move ?

1) Go for the sticker at a Swiss counter on the day of departure (Feb 23 03) right before checking in with CX

2) Or go to the airport before year-end to get the sticker in advance on my tickets ?

Any person experienced trouble with the upgrade stickers right before a flight ? What does CX do if the stickers are NOT there ?

cheers !

Jan

You MUST get the ticket stickered with a special sticker from SWISS airlines ticket desk. Either at the airport or at their ticket office. Doesn't matter if QUALIFLYER terminates at the end of the year, the programme will continue to continue as SWISS TRAVEL CLUB.

CX will NOT upgrade you without the sticker as the sticker carries the special approval code from SWISS. It's not just the 'miles' but each approval code is different and that differentiates with each passenger/member, and with each upgrade request. SO better get to the airport early and call SWISS to find out if their counter is open at that time your CX flight is leaving.

Plus, CX will require a ticket number to be sent to them via SWISS's reservation otherwise they will infamously cancel the reservation!

Please note too that your economy class mileage will probably not get credited automatically. So remember to keep your boarding passes and copy of ticket to send into SWISS TRAVEL CLUB for mileage credit.

[This message has been edited by Guy Betsy (edited 12-26-2002).]

Thanks for this useful information !

But I still don't really understand why they need the sticker on the ticket,

Firstly, when the upgrade was confirmed (my miles were deducted), they automatically created a J-reservation on my CX flights. At the same time, they cancelled my original ticketed Y-reservation. I could check this out because my Amadeus-booking reference did not work anymore to retrieve the details just minutes after calling Qualiflyer.

Secondly, I made a seat reservation 2 weeks ago, and the CX-agent clearly found all my flights in J-class...looks like everything is ok.

The only remaining thing: The sticker could be used to double-check that my miles were deducted from my account. I heard this go wrong before, where people got free flights and never lost miles !

Anyway, I will go to the airport this weekend to a Swiss-counter to get my stickers, to avoid taking any risk on the day of departure !

I really cannot afford to loose this precious upgrade, it took my 3 years to collect all the requird miles !

I have always found CX quite efficient in posting Qualiflyer miles. For my own CX upgrade PER-HKG, I will get my ticket stickered before leaving HKG for PER, as I imagine there is no SWISS office anywhere near Perth. I believe that turning up without a sticker would be risky.

As for mileage refunds, Qualiflyer was very helpful. My mother couldn't get a CX upgrade for the HKG-PER from Asia Miles (oddly), but my Qualiflyer upgrade came through. Rather than leave her alone in Y, I asked Qualiflyer to cancel my upgrade and they refunded the miles instantly. I am presuming that operational upgrades with CX are non-existent and don't expect them, even though the rest of the family will be in C.