lushwave

I've been looking for PS flights out of EWR (to SFO) to use my RPUs on, as I have to take a trip out there in November. I cannot find a single flight with any R Class availability, so I booked one in Y and and waitlisted.

My question is...is there ever R class on these routes? There are 18 seats available (agent confirmed 18 seats in J) on the flight, yet 0 in R. Do they just open up at the last minute to confirm the RPUs?

Other question...I'm current Plat but will hit 1K in a few weeks (before this flight). Will my upgrade priority reflect my newly earned 1K status once I reach it, or will it be "stuck" at Platinum since that's the level I was at when I was waitlisted for the upgrades?

Thanks everyone!

transportbiz

There isn't any. I've looked for a trip in March, saw nothing, booked on AA.

EnvoyBoy

Even once you become a 1K, R space is nearly impossible. You can sometimes find it on the overnight coming back from SFO.

Good luck!

lushwave

So the seats fill up with paid BF? Just find it odd that no one is ever able to upgrade the route. Or would they fly it with seats empty, rather than use RPUs?

Kacee

Yes. It's highly variable depending on date and flight. The ps flights have become a very challenging upgrade.

Note that you can now typically buy BF for around $1100 RT.

The upgrades go to GS or they sell the seats at check in for $129-299 rather than upgrade non-GS.

aacharya

For all the new site's bugginess, this is really easy to search for and find.

For example, a flexible day search and a random date (November 11th) shows it directly in the F column with a note including the economy fare and the 1 RPU needed.

JVPhoto

If you book in advance there is.
I applied & confined my GPU with R space at booking for SFO-EWR in Nov (booked June) and LAX-EWR-SFO in Feb (booked July).

I have the benefit of being a leisure 1K and booking far out as I'd like so YMMV.

CO_Nonrev_elite

Ha, what actually happens is that despite their being 19 GS/1K members waiting for upgrades, United will reach out to more or less anyone on the flight other than the GS/1K members and offer them really cheap buyup upgrades. Thus meaning that a guy with zero status will pass all the people spendings 10,20,30,40, 50+ thousand dollars per year for sometimes low low prices of $129 dollars for a lay flat seat across the country.

The same offers are not extended to the GS/1K members.

United would rather than get that few extra dollars from someone with no loyalty, than keep the folks that pay the bills happy.

They are now finding out that this strategy has failed and HVF are leaving in droves

Kacee

GS almost always clear ps. There is a huge disparity between PN availability (lots) and R availability (very little).

Sydneyair

Without the appropriate context, the "$129" sensationalist figure isn't useful at all other than driving an agenda.

• If someone is already on a B fare, $129 is a very fair price to upgrade to BF. With fares as low as $599 one way, it's actually very plausible that $129 is the true price differential between paid Y and lowest -UP fare for J.
  
• If it's a Tuesday redeye flight with a mostly empty BF cabin and elite light, what's wrong with attempting to monetize it ?
  
• Just because someone self-declared their status, how do we know this person has anywhere close to "10,20,30,40, 50+ thousand dollars per year" spending as you allege ?
  
• How do we know the $129 wasn't merely a small scale test (like 0.5% sample) instead of BAU policy ? And if the 1K/GS failed to obtain the same offer, how do we know they weren't part of the "Control" cohort ?
  
• Why does a mileage runner using a potentially illegitimate foreign address be prioritized ahead of a customer willing to pay the market price ?

LarkSFO

Can you post a screen shot of this offer?

CO_Nonrev_elite

The $129 buyup was my direct context. Me (1K) from memory was 10 or 11 on the list, my mother with zero status was not on the list at all. At the 2hr checkin, there were around 12-14 seats available. Remember I have employee access, so I am NOT just looking at a seat map to determine availability. I did not get the upgrade, nor did anyone above me. I know that number 3 on the list was a GS, but I cannot speak for the others. That means that at least 12 people that were lower than us in status passed everyone on the list. My mother was on a cheap sub $150 fare, and her offer was $129, my offer was I believe $599 or $659.

Sorry, but there is no way to dance around this, United is offering a better deal to non elite members than they are to their elite members.

Kacee

I don't get buy-up offers on ps. I've several times watched the cabin fill (eg, 18/28 to 28/28) with no pax upgraded.

Sydneyair

So you're using a one-time anecdotal event to generalize against a whole company, and publicly speak about your employer in bad faith ?


ps : when was this event? if it's back in 2012-13 it's no longer relevant to the present.

aacharya

I agree with Kacee. Although the TODs gets thrown around a lot for every issue, it is still a true issue/occurrence. I saw it myself on EWR-DEN. $99 for my non-status friend, $300-something for me. (It was a 752, swapped to a 763 the night before).

However - I can't speak to whether this is a major issue on p.s. - or if that's why R out of EWR is supposedly non-existent.