Originally Posted by
Cathay Dragon 666
Another anecdote experience to share. 3 men team going on a trip to Indonesia. On SFO - HKG I was in C class and my two teammates are both in Y+ class. One DM, and the other is OWS (AA PLT). Upon boarding, one of my teammate gets the surprise red-light, and promptly handed a C class boarding pass. No it's not the DM, but it is the OWS.
I have observed this "out of order" upgrades too often in my multi-personnel trips on Cathay that I am (myself, my anecdotal experiences) firmly in the belief that Cathay has a multi-variable system for upgrading people and not just the logical order of: DM, GO, OWE, OWS, SL... that is commonly believed in this forum.
It's common on BA for them to upgrade first time Y+ flyers to J, possibly as some sort of enticement that if you will pay more for Y+ lets see if you'll pay even more if we show you what J is like.
Given how frequently CX upgraded me from Y+ to J when i first started flying them, and how they have copied so many other elements of BA's business, it wouldn't surprise me if they followed that too.