Originally Posted by
RobOnLI
You have a lot of threads to read up on to get the answers to every question you have. In a nutshell (and Google search "Flyertalk United xxxxx" to get the exact threads):
- United will oversell Premium Plus on just about every route. When they do this they will block Polaris seats to cover for those who don't have a seat in PremPlus. They never downgrade them to economy but rather OpUp them to Polaris...IF needed. But usually upgrade requests using PlusPionts from PremPlus to Polaris will cover them just fine.
- Zeroed out means the flight is J0O0Y0 meaning United will not sell a single seat in ANY cabin on that flight
- The web site is notoriously bad at displaying the upgrade list info. The capacity and checked-in numbers are the only thing that's correct. The "booked" number is wrong basically 100% of the time. Do not use this as any measure for the flight.
- The seat map is always up to date but does not take into account those who are booked in the cabin but haven't selected a seat. Or, as you likely figured out, the four seats you show open relate to the four seats United has blocked for the 4 oversold in PremPlus.
- The mobile app will show "Booked: Full" whenever the cabin is literally booked full. Even though it's likely booked to 42 + 4 blocked the app won't display that if it's full.
Your chances of an upgrade...nearly 0% unless you are already confirmed in PremPlus and your PlusPoints are applied correctly. But I assure you...the system is not skipping over you and upgrading others as United process zero upgrades on that flight given the loads.
-RM
Thanks! I actually did try to search this but wasn't sure what keywords to use on the search terms. Found a lot of threads that ended up being unrelated, so I posted.
You've basically answered my question except it seems the website is showing availability when the mobile app is showing full, but the logic is the same it seems. I think you're right, there are 4 oversold seats in Prem Plus. And yes, I'm in Prem Plus and, yes, I believe the "new" upgrade request on my PNR was properly put in as I show in both the flight status screen as waiting for an upgrade and now my itinerary shows the upgrade request, too (after my last little trick to change to the same flight heh). The My Trips / PlusPoints screen also shows that I've requested an upgrade for 30 points (in addition to the old request for skip-the-waitlist). So, I'm hopeful that I'll get the upgrade as opposed to people who bought PremPlus and aren't even trying to upgrade with an instrument.
Crossing fingers.
Thanks for the reply. I think I'll leave the flight alone for now.