Operational Upgrades on Qantas.
 

Ive read a lot of posts on here, and pretty much all ideas, thoughts, examples on Operational Upgrades are geared towards US carriers which is great, however.... :confused:

This post regards Qantas both domestically and internationally. Ive read in the past that Qantas doesnt give upgrades.. but then ive had friends who have said they have had Operational Upgrades with QF. Is it impossible with Qantas for those flying Economy to get a free upgrade? I'd love to hear from people who work in check in with Qantas on this if possible. :cool:

So a few questions,

• Does Qantas overbook economy?
• When are the best times and days does this happen? Both Domestic and International.
• If Qantas does overbook and they dont upgrade, what do they do?

Thanks guys,

Adam

This appears to be a specific Quantas question, so I'm moving the thread there. I'm sure you'll get more answers in the Qunatas forum.

From sunny South Beach,

EmailKid
Budget Travel Moderator

Of course there are opups on QF -- all airlines do this, though a few (e.g. SQ) have a policy of no op-ups to F and will pay for a downgrade instead. Internationally the chances for opups on QF to F and J is slim to none as on some routes J and F sell out sooner than Y ... so there simply are no empty J or F seats to upgrade to. When some are available, they are snapped up by paid upgrades, further reducing the chance for an opup. Even WP status is usually not enough to get an opup, so as Bronze your chances are zero -- there will be a hundred pax with higher status ahead of you to get an opup. This status problem would also apply on QF domestic routes; I doubt a Bronze has ever gotten an opup except as compensation for some other problem.

As for what does QF do when Y is oversold and J/F are full? They reroute (with varying levels of convenience and compensation). Again not unique to QF, but QF pays a lot less compensation than AA or UA for example.

SQ do have op-ups, its just they are fairly rare like with QF.

Overstating things a bit. Op-ups are possible for anyone. If there's a last minute need for an op-up anyone could get it in theory. I agree that in practice there is no point in hoping for an op-up on QF, especially if not top tier.

As an example, my one and only international op-up on QF was as an AA Plat. I'm sure there must have been some CLs, WPs, SGs or non-QF oneworld Emeralds in Y who "should" have been ahead of me in the op-up queue, but I was the lucky one.

Wow! That takes misspelling of the airline's name to a whole new level. :D

I have been lucky enough to have a few OpUps on QF, but all of them bar one (a domestic SYD-MEL Up) were from Y to J on totally jam packed, way over-booked flights. But have also been on such flights where I was not Upped though others were (despite being a WP... they must have been even bigger W's than me ! :eek: ;) )

I was gonna let that one go, but seeing as you mentioned it Alan... yep, that is the best one I have seen yet !!! :p ;)

I think the chance of getting an op-up via Qantas is the same as winning a lotto ticket.

I've probably had half a dozen or so op-ups on QF domestically.

I have also won a lotto ticket - but I have not won lotto :(

In over 11½ year of frequent flying and over 500 flights I have had a sum total of four Operational Upgrades.

• Y-J SYD-MEL, 1994
• J-F MEL-PER, 1996 (Upgraded to J using comp. certificate)
• Y-J LHR-BKK, 1999
• Y-J MEL-BNE, 2005

I've never had one, but my wife had one a few years back flying Gold Coast - Perth. She had no status at all, not even bronze. Baffling.

Steve

The best chance for a low-status person getting an op-up on QF is if their specific allocated seat is needed to seat a group/family together and the Y cabin is full. Sometimes it is easier to move one person to make room for a group, and in such a situation the status of the person seems to play less of a roll than the location of the allocated seat. But its impossible to predict which seat location might help in this regard.

Never plan on getting an op-up on a QF flight. If you want an upgrade, best try for an ODU at the Qantas Club for domestic flights, or waitlist for an upgrade for international flights - and expect to pay with points or UCs.

On domestic flights in Australia I often like to do on departure upgrades. But I sometimes wonder if on doing this I ever miss on the (albeit rare) chance to be op-up'd.

I'm lucky that usually the u/g comes thru on both DOM and INT flights. A couple of weeks ago SYD-MEL I left it just as an experiment. Well, you can guess what happened... I was sitting back in Y. And why :confused: I asked myself as I thought of the chicken salad I was missing out on? :p

My experience:

MEL/LAX Jan 04 - Received an op-upgrade from Y to J upon check-in (thought that I had won the lottery).

Return trip, boarding pass rejected upon boarding and given a nice new J BP. Nearly fainted and had to be revived by champagne as soon as I found my seat.

This was all as a lowly PS/QP.

Goes to show that miracles can happen :)

The voodoo that Qantas does so well. In 5 years i've had around 200 odd flights and not one single opup. I know NB's that have have several and have probably only had 20 flights in the past 5 years, all of them on routes i have flown on regularly and nadda for me.

The only real reason I can think of for the upgrades being lucky is as some have mentiooned, moving you to seat a group together. It seems the only constant in the equation cause lets face it, groups travel often and don't want to be broken up.

Drew

I've only ever had 2 op-ups (both times with Mrs og). First time was BA WT+ to J (SIN-MEL) and the other was CX J (D) to F (HKG-FCO). The CX upgrade was the million to one chance and absolutely unexpected. We only have status with QF (but I'm really wondering why I persist with it).