Originally Posted by
GTITAN
Hey DAArksiders!
Having an old issue with AA and going round and round and round with it and wanted some guidance., forgive long post I am EP and my wife or daughter often fly with me (just talking about a total of 2 folks in the PNR here). Each one of them is a PLT. When we fly, I want the 500-mile upgrades to come out of my account and not the account of my wife or daughter (whomever is flying with me). The 500-mile upgrades always pull from the other lower tier and not mine. I know that this is a flaw in the AA system that has existed forever and a day.
Now, in the old days prior to merger, there was one of two ways to fix this, either (A) have a Gate Agent/Ticketing Agent do it at the airport if the upgrade confirmed prior, or (B) have the EP desk prior to the upgrade being confirmed tinker with the reservation to assure that they pull from the elite with the higher tier account.
At CLT this weekend, I was told by the Ticketing Agent at the Priority Checkin Desk and by an AC AAngel that they could not help me without stripping the frequent flyer no. out for my wife and having her request credit for the flight later. They went on to tell me I needed to call the EP desk prior to upgrade confirmation and have the EP Agent tinker with the reservation as set forth in (B). EP desk while on the phone at the airport insisted that the Ticketing Desk could do it, the Ticketing Agent said no they could not talked to their help desk and was adamant and rude.
Ok, I have a reservation this weekend coming up with my daughter and called the EP desk to tinker with the reservation since we have not cleared yet as described in (B). The EP Agent said she could not do (B) and I would need to do (A) notwithstanding that CLT Ticketing Agent insisted it could not be done. So neither (A) nor (B) seems to work.
Stripping the frequent flyer no and asking for credit after the flight seems silly and stupid. Would love some guidance from y'all on how to proceed so I can get around this issue this weekend and in the future.
TIA and Safe Travels
I'm EXP and my girlfriend is PLT and we run into these issues all the time. Like everything AA these days it comes down to getting a well trained agent (either over the phone or at the airport) that knows what they're doing and is willing to help to set up the upgrade requests how you want. It's ridiculous that both agents at CLT would not remove her number in the instance above.
My understanding is that the companion's AA # doesn't need to be removed completely, just at the time of the upgrade request, so that its set up that they will inherit your status and pull stickers from your account.
My girlfriend has plenty of stickers, however when the waitlist goes to airport control each pax is sorted based on their own status (even on same PNR), so I will be
#1 and she will be
#10. In order to fix it a (good) agent has to essentially remove her AA #, re-request the upgrade as if she was a no-status companion (she inherits my EXP status on the waitlist and stickers are pulled my account), then add back her AA #. This can be accomplished all at once, you don't need to leave their AA # until after the flight then request retro credit.
In all of the instances where we've been through this gyration she goes from
#10 to
#2 on the waitlist, and if we do clear the stickers are pulled from my account.
For future reference, when speaking with agents, rather than tell them you want the stickers pulled from your account, tell them you'd like to set up the request so that your companion will inherit your EXP status if it goes to airport control (pulling stickers from your account is an automatic byproduct of setting it up this way). You can also just leave out their AA # till the very last minute. Once your upgrades clear and you're checked in and have boarding passes, then ask an airport agent to add her number back.