Originally Posted by whiteknuckles
I'm not sure I would spend precious miles on an upgrade if I knew that I was to be assigned an E (center) seat in business class, but by the time I find out, it will be too late.... I will have already lost my nice aisle coach seat so I wouldn't really be able to decline the upgrade.
My only suggestion would be to check your reservation online at least twice a day. In my experience, intl upgrades seem to clear mid-morning Dallas time, so keep a close eye on it. That way, if you get upgraded and are given an undesirable seat, you've got a better chance to switch, or at least decline the upgrade and get your original seat back.
On a side note, my LHR-BOS leg cleared sometime yesterday, 11 days before the flight. This is the closest to flight time an intl upgrade has cleared since I've become ExP. And a near-miracle occured: I was assigned exactly the seat I would have chosen.