Originally Posted by ijgordon
Ugh. What an abuse of the companion upgrade benefit.
All of a sudden it's your prerogative to determine who is more deserving of an upgrade -- the charity case or whoever was "rightly" next on the standby list (perhaps a gold such as myself
)? ...
I guess I have to agree here. If I am traveling with someone, I will try to get them the companion upgrade regardless of who else is on the list. If I am going to offer my benefit to a stranger (which I have done a couple times), I will check with the agent to make sure no other elite members are standing by for an upgrade who would be displaced by my 'companion'. If I was a gold or silver and someone with higher status upgraded a stranger that bumped me down the list, I would be quite ticked off.
The intent of the companion upgrade is to permit two people traveling together to sit together, where one is an upgraded elite and the other is not (or has lower status). I don't think CO intended the benefit to be used for charitable purposes, or as a dating tool (no reference intended to any posters here). Just my opinion
