Originally Posted by
Francine123
Hi all
I have a flight booked in Y JFK - DXB return in July/August. I've managed to upgrade the return.
Both flights seem to be empty (according to my brother's expertflyer), but the DXB-JFK segment is showing no upgrade availability. I have 2 questions.
1 - Someone told me upgrades are being released closer to the departure date now, do you think that's right? As in the flight was booked too far in advance (December)?
2 - Reading on here, people keep recommending trying to upgrade at the airport (I'm a Gold already on the waiting list) - if there is a free seat in business and I have the miles to do so, will they do this if I ask? Or does it have to be a free AWARD seat that's available?
Thanks in advance
Francine
Francine,
Welcome to FT and the EK Forum.
EK's Inventory Management system works in weird and mysterious ways. The best advice I have for you is to ask your brother to set up a seat alert for you via his EF account. You're looking for "D" inventory on EK (ie Business Class Upgrade, which is also the same bucket as a Saver Award seat).
If there is space available and you're at the airport, the system should release the seat to you being Gold. But it may very well clear prior.
That's why an EF seat alert is valuable as their system will constantly monitor availability and as soon as something becomes available, it will ping you an email.