Originally Posted by
anabolism
Our corporate travel agency always puts reservations on hold for 24 hours (to allow for various approvals before ticketing). However, I have learned the hard way not to request an upgrade before the ticket is issued. If my upgrade clears while the itinerary is still pending, the travel agency is unable to ticket me because I am suddenly booked in x rather than s or q or whatever. The agency has no way to issue a ticket booked in x. They had to cancel and rebook me, and the flight I had been booked on no longer had the cheap seats, so I had to take a less convenient flight.
I occasionally have this issue with government tickets bought through the DTS system (CWT is the provider for me). CWT will hold the ticket when travel is approved which could be weeks in advance. They won't purchase the ticket, however, until 90-96 hours before travel. There is a risk that my upgrade clears in that window and, when it does, it causes problems. I'm always in the quandary of whether to request the upgrade upfront so I have better priority or to wait to avoid complications.
This is never a problem for tickets purchased through AA.com. But some of us don't always have that option.