Originally Posted by
syrahnose
REgardless of class, as 1K/MM, I've never had complementary upgrade on United international flight. However, I was upgraded to business twice for free on 2 Star carriers, Lufthansa and Singapore. Both far superior in all respects, seat, bed, food, wine, music and service. Perhaps this done to entice me over from UA..
You know, I got a very similar experience.
I got bumped from Y to F without any instruments on a SFO->ICN run. Never understood why. It was years ago though.
More recently, Air China and Asiana sent me to C from Y. Many times. And in the case of Asiana, they lured me to purchase C from them for East Asia <-> India, it worked pretty well. I can also confirm that if I can get the budget for it, Asiana is likely to get my business on TPAC C. I also splurged a few times on Air China and its little brother, Shenzhen Airlines (albeit in their case it is less convincing)
Heck, BA even did this, and I had ZERO status with them. Second flight in 20 years only. I just bought premium economy, I guess that was why.
Seatwise, I don't dislike UA. 2-4-2 doesn't bother me, in fact from a strictly selfish standpoint, it augments my chances to get my GPU honored, and that seat is flat, which is really nice. And sometimes, I get great crews. But usually, my experience on Asiana was superior.
All of this to say, GPUs are really what is keeping me at United. E+ is losing credibility as other companies introduce real premium economy. Service-wise, the advantage is definitely not UA most of the time. Management-wise, frankly I don't think Asiana's big boss spends his time telling his passengers that he is managing a business, or treats first checked bag free as something that unreasonable elites ask for (everyone gets a free bag).