Originally Posted by
ashill
Does AS consider someone seated in coach on a paid (award) first class ticket to be needing an upgrade to first or just a reassignment (whatever the correct terminology is)? Are they really just upgrading like someone on a coach ticket? I know that on AA, this wouldn't be considered an upgrade but would be cleared into F before upgrades clear. It seems unreasonable me to consider someone who has paid for first class but is seated in economy to be treated like a coach upgrader.
With AS, you're at the mercy of the upgrade waitlist with everyone else, even if all your other segments are in premium cabins. One thing that
can help is that AS seems to have an unpublicized policy of allowing a free change into the higher cabin when space opens up as long as the ticket is booked at that level, even for non-Golds/75Ks; I just had this happen to me a couple of months ago on a JL J award, where I moved SFO-HND from Y to J after having already booked another JL segment in J. But you have to watch the award space yourself.