Originally Posted by
Hussman
Fair enough it's talked about, but of the dozen or so threads I've read, most people over-react and say they are leaving (not practical for me) or just accept it. This upsell was today, and last week, and two weeks before that. Before 3/3 I was upgraded about 35-40% of the time and was always near the top of the list, now I'm number 5 or 6 and have had them taken away at the last second by an upsell. I believe my upgrade positions have been lost to a re-ordering of priority based on individual fare when my annual revenue to the company far exceeds the silvers splurging an extra 50 dollars.
You're assuming that it is being shuffled off to a silver for $50 (or a gold, or a plat, or another 1k). Yes, if your annual spend is high because you flight a lot and someone, say another 1k (who coincidentally also would fly a lot) happens to spend more on a flight because theirs was more "last minute" than yours, yeah, you're going to get bumped down because, quite frankly something has to be the tie breaker. UA chose revenue to be the tie breaker on the CPU list.
For the record, I was clearing 35-40% of upgrades as a 2P a few years back, last year as a 1P it was closer to 60, and this year as a plat it has been pretty close to 95%. You might be flying on a lot of elite heavy routes (such as IAD-SFO) where upgrades are just tough to use in general. I'm not saying that it is right, but it could just be the case.