Grrrr ... I'm angry (just lost upgrade due to slow BA)
I had a reservation made for October in business class (with 'domestic First' for the internal flights in the USA):
TLV-LHR-JFK-CLT-LAX-CLT-JFK-LHR-TLV
Last week, I noticed that there was reward availability in First from LHR-BOS at approximately the same time as I was meant to fly to JFK (in fact, it was 45 mins later, which was even better for me).
Before booking the upgrade to First, though, I needed to change the itinerary.
Off I went to the phone and contacted BAEC. No problem in changing the LHR-JFK-CLT-LAX to LHR-BOS-PHX-LAX and I had done my homework on the Matrix so I knew it would work on exactly the same fare basis as before. But... "we will need to send it to 'back office' to calculate the fare. That could take up to 2 days".
Based on past experience I was sure that it would take less time. The last time they told me something could take up to two days they phoned me back 10 minutes later!
Yesterday (after one day) I phoned to check. Still in 'back office'. So I told the guy that I was worried that the two reward seats showing as being available in First may disappear by then and then the whole exercise will have proved pointless. "Don't worry, you'll soon hear from us" I was told.
Well, this evening, guess what? Those two seats did indeed disappear!
Of course, there was "nothing we can do, sir" ...
If I would have known at the time that it would take so long I would have just cancelled the booking and rebooked the new one immediately, which would have gone through pretty quickly but would have cost me an extra $125 (the change fee on my booking is $75 and the cancellation fee is $200).
Now, apart from letting off steam, what is the point of all this?
What I would like to know is, is there any possibility in such situations to get BA to reserve the upgrade (even charge the Avios) before they have completed their fare calculations? Is there any 'magic formula' I need to recite to the person at the other end of the phone line to achieve this? I have already managed to get complex itineraries via the Matrix fed into their system by following the rules carefully, but this seems a step too far!