ThreeGreen

I'm booked on an itin departing tomorrow that I applied a GPU against at time of booking. Two segments, segment #1 upgrade cleared a few weeks back, the second saw the F cabin book full about a week ago, so I'm relegated to the waitlist.

Fast forward to T-24, I check in online and find that my name is not showing up anywhere on the upgrade list for the second segment. Figuring it to be a fluke, I watch it throughout the day to see if it appears, still nothing. I have upgraded family members with instruments before and have watched them move to the upgrade standby list when they did not clear before T-24, so I know this is unusual behavior.

Given that, I called the 1K line, spoke first with reservations and then with their "web team." After several minutes, the guy on the other end tells me that he doesn't have a way to put me on the public-visible waitlist, but to rest assured I have been "placed on the priority waitlist even though it won't show up on the monitor." He seems surprised that he can't get me to show up on the list either, though.

Was the phone agent accurate in his claim, or did I just get bumped off the upgrade list for this flight? Since the GPU cleared segment #1 it's already burned, so I'd really like to make sure that it gets applied to all segments.

Anyone else ever have this experience? I just want to know if this is a HUCA situation, or if I should just let the chips fall where they may...

mherdeg

The list visible online is only valid for at-the-gate upgrades handled by an agent. Be at the gate when it opens (T-60min) and make sure the gate agent can see that you're on the upgrade list (for a laugh, if you do not appear on the list but gate agent assures you that you are there, ask what position you're in).

It *is* possible that within T-24hr and T-60min more confirmable upgrade space might open up. You'll have to detect that and phone it in; good luck…

PushingTin

Are you fully checked in, or do you have to show some documents at the counter? That is the only time I've had that happen.

ThreeGreen

Definitely fully checked in, confirmed seats and electronic boarding passes already in hand. This is the first time I've had it happen to myself or anyone else I've upgraded.


Thanks for the advice. I've taken this flight before, and it seems to have pretty terrible on-time numbers, which opens up the field for upgrades considerably. Last year on this leg, the aircraft was delayed over 3 hours due to MX, which meant a ton of people bailed on the flight and rebooked -- leaving me to pick up the last seat in F on a CPU Hoping for something similar this year, slim as those odds may be.

QBK

+1. Personally, I'd HUACA. The only times that I've checked in for a reservation with an outstanding GPU and not appeared on the waitlist, it turned out that I wasn't actually checked in for the segment in question.

This happened to me last week -- I checked in online, got my boarding passes, but didn't show up on the list for the international segment (#2 of 3 segments). I called in and found out that I'd been checked in for the domestic segment, but not the international segment. Apparently it needed to see my passport.

No harm done -- the agent reassured me that I still had my place in line, and when I finally checked in at the counter, my name showed up at #2 and I cleared at the gate.

There might be a situation in which you legitimately are checked in and on the upgrade waitlist, but don't appear on it... but I've never encountered it.

hookthem

Interesting! I have NEVER seen this happen before. I would totally HUACA, but sounds like the scenario could be legit?

notquiteaff

I had what appears to be the same or similar problem happen with an RPU last week.

Singapore_Schwing

I've had this happen to me several times (though not for a while- perhaps because I fly UA less now).

Definitely HUACA. Similar to an earlier suggestion for the gate agents, I would start the conversation with the agent on the phone by asking where you are on the wait list. If they say you're not on it, then you can explain the situation.

It's unfortunate, but sometimes you have to back them into a corner preemptively too avoid lies to get you off the phone.

I have also had the web team successfully get me back on the list. Interestingly, when that happens, you typically end up either at the dead top or dead bottom of the list. They must make up some sort of priority level for you.

username

I think there is a thread that talks about this. I ran into this last year on LAX-NRT. The airport agent had to call support to get me back on the list. Since that is a competitive route for an upgrade, no one cleared anyway. Still, it was frustrating.

weero

Waste of time - as you allude to - no chance in hell a 1K will be elected ahead of a GS, colleague, or TOD on a full flight.

ThreeGreen

Thought I'd provide an update to this thread after having taken the flight. When I checked in at the counter, the GA originally told me that I appeared not to be upgrade eligible for the flight. If there is a non-public waitlist that exists at T-24 (which I seriously doubt), then he couldn't see me on it. More likely is that the web team phone agent from my earlier post was confused about the internal instrument / miles upgrade list before day-of-departure vs. the day-of list that shows on the screens.

I showed the GA the automated e-mail I received from the system stating that I was on the upgrade waitlist, which prompted him to dig deeper into the PNR history. At no time during this process did my upgrade show on the monitors.

After some digging, this is what the GA told me, and here's what I think he meant:

What I was told: "The system originally had you in R space, but then demoted you back to your original fare class, which is why it was showing as ineligible for upgrade."

What I think he meant: There were two "reservations" for this segment -- my originally-booked segment, and the additional one that is created when waitlisted for an upgrade. I take his response to mean that the system chose to select only my non-R space reservation as the valid one. The only problem with this is that it still doesn't make sense -- even the economy fare buckets should've made me eligible to at least show up on the list as CPU-eligible for the flight.

Long story short, he sorted it out after about 5-7 minutes and cleared me into F at the gate. I also saw at least 4 people clear upgrades on what the flight status page was claiming to be a completely booked F cabin as far back as two weeks ago, so I can only conclude that the system is totally FUBARed for instruments that don't cleanly clear in advance.

I am actually more confused after the fact than when I started asking this question, but the one takeaway for me here is that HUACA is probably your best bet within T-24 (with the right agent). This is clearly a system error, and if the GA is able to fix it then I assume that a competent phone person can as well. Just keep in mind that as far as I'm aware, not once did I show up on the upgrade list until I was handed the upgraded boarding pass, so it's possible that the fix isn't to get put back on the list, but to be manually cleared, which is something I'd bet they're only going to allow at gate control.

Kacee

Glad it all worked out for you in the end. There are occasional reports of this happening, it seems to be a glitch whereby instrument supported upgrade requests sometimes do not transfer to the gate standby list upon check-in.

There is.

Again, this is an occasionally reported glitch. Much more frequently it processes as it is supposed to.

Well that was 100% wrong.

weero

Bah - he already had the ug confirmed. Same outcome of he just boarded and would have been buzzed then.

Still a waste of time.

ThreeGreen

Thanks, I didn't know that such a thing existed after check-in started. I wonder, though, once you're down to OLCI, what's the point of having a non-public upgrade list so close to departure? The board showed my flight's F cabin as fully booked, even though there ended up being space for me to get confirmed in F. In retrospect, it seems likely that I was in one of those filled seats, but not showing as a confirmed upgrade on the public list. Since I had to talk to the GA to resolve the discrepancy, that just made more work for everyone in that instance.

WineCountryUA

The list you see is the gate list and it isn't used until the last 20-30 minutes prior to departure by the GA. However the pre-gate upgrade process (computer processed) will continue to work and clear folks until a few hours prior to departure.