<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Efrem:
There are four ways you can get into J, not counting an occasional pleasant surprise such as an operational upgrade:
4. Get an economy award and pay the difference between full Y and J.
If you're paying for your own ticket, that pretty much eliminates #1. #4 is usually prohibitively expensive too. The choice between #2 and #3 depends on how many miles you now have and how much you value getting more. I usually opt for #3.</font>
#4 is surprisingly cheap from Canada to Chicago, Mexico, or the Caribbean & reasonably priced USA to Caribbean. Also remember that you can often get an upgrade cost based on a fare from A to C if the stopover in B is on the routing. If the rate desk breaks the fare at the stopover city, try again in a week.
E.G.: YVR--CLE stopover--SXM (ST. MAARTEN.)
The first price I got for a OW upgrade + taxes = US$1086. A week later a better rate desk employee said US$190.50!