Cathay Pacific Asia Miles - Please Help - completely confused about upgrade cert.

I recently booked a flight from yvr to jfk and just called to upgrade to business with asiamiles. After what seemed like an hour of us both trying to understand each other's language I was told that my wife and I were waitlisted. Did my miles just go to un upgrade coupon that I may not be able to use or do the miles only come out if it clears? Also, will they only clear it if both go through? Will we sit together? Getting answers was truly like pulling teeth. Many other things that were required of me in order to get my upgrade simply went over my head. By the end of the conversation I felt that transferring my miles into the asiamiles program may lead to premature hair loss. If anyone could outline the steps that I need to take I'd appreciate it.

The miles are only pulled when the upgrade is ticketed. If they opened one record for both the upgrades then it will normally be "both or neither" and they would then call you again if/when the upgrade reservations are confirmed and confirm that you want to proceed to ticketing.

Seat allocations are a separate thing which must follow when the reservations have been confirmed, but I wouldn't imagine there would be any difficulty getting two seats together on YVR-JFK.

That's how it works for me anyway, but it may be different for no status people. I've never had any difficulty communicating with MPC in English.