Originally Posted by
anabolism
The agent was either flat-out lying for unknown reasons (it's not like the EL is a secret) or woefully untrained and unknowledgeable. Unfortunately, far too many ACS agents have been one, the other, or both the past couple of years. I've had ACS agents tell me there was no such thing as EQM, or that EQM and RDM were the same thing and earned the same way. Call again or ask for a supervisor.
Thanks for the help with that I finally was able to get this done!
I'd booked in the fall for a cheap RT in premium economy LAX-Beijiing and didn't have SWUs at that point available. So, I'd waitlisted for miles and copay upgrade and actually cleared outbound two days later for that. Late in December I reached EXP and got my SWUs. My thinking then was I'd be using the four SWUs anyway. But given the difficulty in clearing in advance I decided I'd rather use 2 of my SWUs on this trip, then see what happens for the others. Better to get out of the way early rather than last minute. I'd made a number of calls and each agent told me, can't do and get the miles redeposited and the copay back for the upgrade already cleared. Some said miles yes, copay no. Yet you anabolism said I should be able to so I'd continued to pursue this. Thank you.
My experience was that ACS still did not know about an "Executive Laison" and insisted that they don't see this information and can't help with my request. So that part of which you stated I still could not confirm. However, I spoke with an excellent agent at the EXP desk who immediately said yes she can do this and she did it for me, miles redeposited, copay reimbursement coming in a few days and attached my SWUs, one confirmed and one waitlisted on the inbound.
It's so frustrating that some few agents even at the EXP desk don't understand what they can and cannot do! Moral of the story is hang up and call again, repeatedly if necessary, this can be done.