GBadger

I am on UA936 on 2/16 and am waitlisted to use a GPU. The seat map is showing 7 seats open in J and 3 in F. At the same time, the flight is zeroed out in all fare buckets.

My question for those with insight into this sort of thing is:
Will UA ever zero out J and F inventory if Y is significantly oversold, in the anticipation of upgrading folks from J to F and Y to J in order to make room in back?

I realize that the seatmap is not an accurate indication of how full a flight is, just seems like 7 J and 3 F open is kind of high for having all of those seats be sold.

aacharya

They do sometimes zero out inventory due to oversells in Y.
How many folks are already upgraded? A lot of times, those upgraded pax aren't given seat assignments.

mherdeg

According to mobile.united.com, your flight is sold full in every cabin class:
I would not trust the number of empty seats shown on the seat map here.

No guarantee that you'll clear. Pretty good odds that if you show up early you can be VDB'd and rebooked on another flight, possibly one where there's upgrade inventory.

https://mobile.united.com/FlightStat...creen=business

GBadger

When I look at the mobile site, the "upgrade" section says: "No customers currently standing by", which to me indicates that no one has been upgraded. I was on the waitlist from mid-December until early January, and then again from mid-January until now (somehow my reservation was "cleaned up" after a schedule change and my upgrade request was dropped for a few days...). I don't believe that they've processed any upgrades since I booked back in December.

GBadger

That's an interesting possibility -- at the moment I'm booked: DEN-EWR-IAD-ZRH-PMI. Since LX seems to be the only *A carrier with regular flights to PMI, I guess I need to go through ZRH, and if I want an option to upgrade using GPU that means via EWR or IAD... I guess since my PMI flight leaves ZRH in the evening, there's also the option of LH connecting through FRA, though I wouldn't necessarily have a paper GPU in hand to use on the long-haul flight...

Interestingly, UA936 is now showing up as bookable in Y when searching on UA.com. UA988 (EWR-ZRH) is only showing up as bookable in J (J3, JN3, C2, D1, Z0, ZN0, P0, PN0, R0, RN0).

It's going to be tough to show up early given the connections involved, though I'd be all ears for something like DEN-SFO/LAX-ZRH-PMI, with SFO-ZRH or LAX-ZRH in LX J (I know -- not going to happen!).

mherdeg

Wow, yeah. Lufthansa operates once weekly service MUC-PMI…

MSPeconomist

Can you get a paper GPU from someone who has some GPUs about to expire?

aacharya

Rare nowadays for someone to have short-expiring GPUs, unless they were extended again from 1/31/2013.

GBadger

Well, I can get one from UA if I call in and have them FedEX one to me (flight is 5 days from now...). In my opinion it just seems silly to carry one around with you just in case of VDB/IROPS. Do other FTers do this?

Also, the other legs mentioned above (DEN-EWR and EWR-IAD) have already cleared under the GPU that is waitlisted to support IAD-ZRH. It is my understanding that I would get that GPU back if IAD-ZRH didn't clear, but is that also the case under a VDB scenario?

LH from IAD is certainly an interesting possibility... IAD-FRA on the 748, and then there are numerous options for FRA-ZRH that get in to ZRH well before my flight to PMI... The tricky thing here is that I'm not scheduled to arrive at IAD until 415, and the LH IAD-FRA flight departs at 540. IAD-ZRH (936) departs at 545, so it is very unlikely that UA would process the VDB to LH within that time frame, IMO. Could be wrong...

For all I know, I may end up misconnecting and helping UA out, given the 1.5 hour window that I have in my itinerary.

malgudi

On a related note, I'm waitlisted for a Y -> C upgrade on a H fare using GPU for LHR-SFO, UA 931 (02/24).

Seatmap shows 2 available seats in C, while the fare class info is:

F7, FN7, A7, ON3, O2, J6, JN6, C5, D5, Z4, ZN4, P3, PN3, R0, RN0, IN0, I0, Y9, YN9, B9, M9, E9, U9, H9, HN9, Q9, V9, W9, S9, T9, L9, K9, G0, N0, XN9, X9

What are the chances of my upgrade clearing? Only if the C -> F upgrades happen (assuming there are a few)?

GBadger

Since it's showing Z4, it seems like there is still quite a bit of J availability. Can't say what your odds are without knowing who else is on the list, but at this moment it does appear as though there will be plenty of upgrades processed.

PTahCha

The answer is yes - and they include upgrade waitlist as part of the consideration as well.

The upgrade list is not active until check-in starts.

Agree that carrying a paper GPU for IRROP "just in case" is a poor use of the cert.

GBadger

Ok -- thanks. That's good to know.

I didn't realize that cleared pax would not show up. Though I did confirm that this is in fact the case using a future reservation that has cleared via GPU. Thanks for pointing that out.


Yeah, though in this instance I'm certainly tempted to get one, just in case. Seems like the worst case scenario there would be that I don't get onto a LH flight, don't use it, and I ask UA to redeposit when I return -- I'd still have plenty of time to use it before the 2014 expiration date, and would still have 3 others in the bank for use between now and redeposit...

malgudi

Thanks! Will monitor Z availability.

CDKing

I wonder if domestic and international is different? my BOS-ORD on Thursday shows me on the cleared list and ORD-NRT shows no one on the cleared list. Both flights were upgraded at booking with GPU