Originally Posted by
mad_atta
Is there any point in calling the Elite line some time before I drop to Gold and seeing whether an upgrade can be requested manually? Does that ever happen? (I know that the auto-waitlisting is known to be buggy if R class comes available but at some date after submitting your request but before revenue management is actively monitoring the flight, so just thinking about how to maximise our chances. Though at the end of the day, PE is perfectly fine for a trans-Tasman hop.)
Booked AKL-SYD return recently for travel in October (before the sale was announced) and as I was pretty flexi with dates, I called to confirm R class availability and the agent was quite confident that my SHRU for the outbound and APD upgrade for the inbound for the dates I provided would clear and she said "these flights would be good to use your upgrades on". I asked if I could complete my booking online while on hold, give her my booking reference and have her manually clear my upgrade and she said that process would take longer. Instead she told me to make the booking and lodge the upgrade online as per normal and going via the robot would be much quicker in this instance. So I completed the booking straight away, applied the upgrades online and it cleared straight away.
Now I'm just hoping that there is no aircraft downgauge.