RPUs worked as they were supposed to, mostly, for me this morning. I was still annoyed that they had never cleared in advance, but chalk that up to stingy R inventory + aggressive P fares.
Once we hit 24 hours, the message about the RPU having not cleared yet but carrying over when we checked-in was much more clear than it was last time I experienced it (the old infamous "waitlist expired" e-mail).
Originally Posted by UA
We are not yet able to confirm your request for an upgrade on your flight from XXX to YYY. While your upgrade request will no longer appear in your reservation, you will automatically be added to the upgrade standby list after you complete check-in and receive your boarding pass for this flight.
Rest assured that your position on the upgrade standby list will be preserved, even during the period before you check in and are added to the lists shown online and at the airport.
On the app, we were #1 and #2 the entire time up until about T-1, where we fell to #2 and #3. At the gate, we did not appear on the waitlist at all, oddly enough, but the GA paged us and said that there were 2 pax who hadn't checked in yet and had 6 minutes before she was giving away their seats.
I don't know what happened to the new-#1--maybe he/she was a NRSA; I didn't double-check the standby list--but as boarding began, 2 of the 3 prior upgrades for the flight disappeared, and we got the seats. Only 3 upgrades on an A320 on a leisure route seems "light" to me, but hey, I will take it every time over a long flight in Y.