In mid July I am flying economy from SIN to BNE on Qantas metal.

The booking is in a class eligable for upgrade from discount economy to business at 40k miles one way, and I have the required 40k miles in my account.

However, when calling Qantas they said that because my booking was showing the flight with the BA flight number (BA7352) rather than the Qantas one (QF52) they could not list me for an upgrade using points. They know that it was "really" a Qantas flight, operated by them.

Is this correct? Anyone know a way around this?