Originally Posted by
channa
UPGRADES - Reduced Upgrade Visibility/Transparency -- no more "Upgrade: Pending," "Upgrade: Waitlisted," or "Upgrade: Confirmed" to display upgrade status. Phone agents also have no visibility into the upgrade system to help troubleshoot if there is a problem.
Or increased visibility inside the OLCI window, particularly if you're not at the airport or at the gate with the GIDS. And I'm not particularly clear what the "no visibility" bit means.
UDU Waitlisting -- CO uses a sweep methodology to process upgrades, while UA waitlists when you're within your window. This means that with CO's sytems, when upgrade space is available, it is not immediately allocated inside the window (must wait until the next upgrade sweep).
This is certainly different but not necessarily an upgrade or a downgrade, just different.
Authoritative Upgrade List within a Cutoff -- United stops clearing upgrades at about 4 hours out, creating a single, authoritative gate upgrade list that is followed and cleared at the gate. CO runs upgrades up until checkin cutoff, which means that the gate can be open, and there are two (2) competing upgrade mechanisms using different upgrade ordering priorities -- the EUA ordering scheme and the airport upgrade list (e.g., #7 got upgraded before #1 because EUA did it not the gate, and #7 was really #1 with the EUA system, even though he was #7 on the gate display and PDA site).
See above. Different, but there is no point at which two mechanisms are "competing" to upgarade you.
Change Fees -- CO's systems charge change fees as new money, whereas UA debits change fees from the ticket value (e.g., a $500 ticket on UA with a $150 change fee changed to a $350 ticket will be $0 out of pocket; on CO it would be $150 out of pocket and leave you with a $150 residual voucher).
This is a policy choice, not tied to any particular technology and it is not clear what future policy will be AFAIK.
Airport "Battlefield" Upgrades -- CO's system requires that passengers be on their own PNR when listing for an upgrade at the airport. UA can list pax without splitting the record and upgrade any or all of them without a split.
This policy is changing in the new program as I understand it.
History -- CO's systems do not provide gate agents with detailed history on various aspects such as seat or schedule changes.
The history is absolutely there.
BP Scanning when Entering a Club -- UA scans your BP and if you're a club member or *G with int'l flight, they enter you that way. CO must swipe your card and manually enter flight details if applicable.
Once again, not necessarily intrinsically tied to the Shares/Apollo decision.