Originally Posted by
Zorak
1. Mileage upgrades require inventory available in OP/RP. It's possible the segment that cleared is the only one that had immediately available inventory and you're waitlisted on the other segments (you should see "Upgrade Waitlisted" in that case). You might also have a broken fare in which case the other segments would unfortunately require a separate upgrade payment.
2. They won't be deducted until the ticket is actually reissued (you will nearly, but not always, get a new email saying "your flight receipt" with a different ticket number ending in 006)
Thanks for the quick reply! Since I figured the miles would be coming out anyway I went ahead and called to claim my seats on the connecting flights....
WHOOPS. Turns out my thesis was correct; the CSR yesterday had upgraded that one seat but never completed the booking, so no new receipt would have been issued and no miles debited. Naturally today's CSR "fixed" the problem and e-mailed me the new receipt. Oh well, at least I get to spend all day in F now...
I'm curious if I would have gotten away clean had I not called again. On the first call I only requested that specific flight, not the whole trip. I'm definitely going to try this again when there's a worthwhile opportunity and see what happens.