Hi- I've been a Plat with CO for years and now I guess am no longer the upper tier with only 75K this year but I did notice I have something on my page called "regional upgrades". Can anyone share with me what these are and when I can use them?

I'm leaving for Punta Cana next week and it's a mixture of CO and UA flights. I'm used to flying from DTW-IAH or EWR and then on to my destination. Often it is a Caribbean destination, so most of my trips are considered International. Now the flights to Houston from DTW are mostly gone (from what I can tell) and are no longer big planes but the smaller ERJ's. Same for EWR.

Can these regional upgrades help me in my flights? I'm seeing that my flights back from PC are all UA, which makes me pretty sure I won't be upgraded. I've flown UA once since this merger began and my name was SO far down the upgrade list it actually made me Laugh! And as this year I only made the 75K and not the 100K, I'm not counting on upgrades. I'd use miles but there must be new rules b/c although both return flights are empty in 1st class (so far) they're not allowing upgrades by miles or even money. Oddly, the CO flight had only 3 and 1 seats left on seatmap and offered upgrades for $250. I've never seen CO offer these so low before!

So I upgraded my CO flights (the trip TO Punta Cana) but can't do a thing with my return flights which are both UA. As the cabins are so much smaller, I'd love to use miles to UG, or if these regional upgrades would work, but I've never heard of them. Any constructive advice would be greatly appreciated, especially as I have no idea if we've merged yet, if there's a difference between CO and UA still (other than aircraft), etc. I'd love to fly 1st both ways, but my UA flights won't budge. I was wondering if the regional upgrade was something I could use to actually UG, or if they're something else.

Thanks!