Originally Posted by
CO Insider
Hi Everyone, before you start marching down to Smith Street with your pitchforks and torches,
Too late.
Originally Posted by
CO Insider
Then there's our 'buy-up' offer, which proactively offers the difference between the fare paid and the lowest available front cabin fare with the change fee waived. The key difference between the two is that the day-of-departure offer factors in Elites who haven't yet been upgraded, while the buy-up, which is simply us selling a First Class fare, does not.
Yeah, we all figured this one out, and I think that this is the one that most people are seeing and are upset about.
Originally Posted by
CO Insider
It's not perfect, but more accurate that you might think. When we introduced the day-of-departure segment upgrade program, we were sensitive about Elite member displacement resulting from unknown variables such as higher-ranking Elite members switching flights at the last minute and companion upgrades. While it does happen, the number of times this actually results in Elite member displacement continues to be extremely low, as anticipated. That said, we do know this makes our companion upgrade benefit somewhat of a wildcard for everyone involved. Without spilling the beans, I'll at least say that we're aware and working on a better solution to this.
I believe that the non-Elite buy-up isn't really displacing all that many people.
But anecdotal evidence here suggests that the fare-difference to F approach actually is, or at least is visible much more than makes the elites (self included) comfortable. Y'all clearly need the money but it sucks for the platinum to know that a silver with $100 can beat them out for an upgrade. Of course, it is good news for the silver so ther must be some balance struck, but perception is a big part of reality here. The fact that it appears that you are selling upgrades out from under your top elites, combined with the fact that you sortof are, albeit at the price of the fare difference without a change fee, doesn't really look so good.
But, as long as you're doing it and owning up to it, a couple questions about the process:
- Will it always be available for everyone, or only sometimes? If the latter, how do you decide?
- Does the buy-up actually change the booking class for purposes of mileage accrual and IRROPs handling (and anything else that might affect)?
- Is it always a buy up to an F fare or does it take into account elite status, AN/B/M inventory, etc.?
- Has there been a wholesale change in policy to permit buying up to a higher fare class on the same itinerary with no change fee?
Originally Posted by
CO Insider
We have identified the solution that will ensure Elites in reservations with non-Elite customers will be considered in our Elite counts. It is in development and should be loaded very soon.
Good news.^
Thanks, as always, for chiming in.