Hi, my question is... If a flight is full and they need to upgrade E/SE customers to make room in coach, how do they differentiate between E customers (say there are 5 E customers on the flight, how do they decide who gets the upgrade). What about on partner airlines (say a similar scenario while traveling on LH or UA, and I have my AP/E on file???

Fare classes and then I believe it is time of check-in...

Can't speak to AC specifically, but most airlines also use fare class as a differentiator as well, with the highest fare class on top of the list. Others include time of checkin as a last minute tie breaker - say those 5 E's were all flying the same class of fare and there was one op up needed to be given out, then the one that checked in first would likely get it.

As for partner airlines like UA or LH, they will always upgrade their own elites before even their partners, so UA would do 1K's, followed by Premier Exec's, then Premier and then start with the *G's from other carriers. And honestly, probably not worth thinking about too much, since the chance of it happening on a partner carrier is very low. At UA, the exception will probably be E+ upgrades, which will usually be doled out to *G's and *S's for free when they there aren't enough UA elites/buy ups and too many in E-.

Interesting though -- I've had an opup on 4 of my last 11 flights. Mostly YYZ-BOS so nothing dramatic, but the YYZ-YVR was nice to fly business.

It's rare, but I frankly appreciate it a ton when it happens. In addition the gate agent told me there would be no meal, which was fine but recommended I go and buy something -- went and bought something and ended with a meal nonetheless.

I do think that there should be discretion for the gate agent or the flight attendant to move people up to business class one the flight has closed. I've seen a number of flights take off with unsold or unfilled seats, which seems relatively pointless to me.

1. Certificates
2. Status (SE, E, P)
3. Booking Class
4. Number of Passengers / Time of Check In

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/air-c...ir-canada.html

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/air-c...d-example.html

I've had as many op-ups on partner carriers as AC over the last few years (and AC gets 80% of my travel).

I guess I'm an outlier then. I have flown less UA metal than AC metal, but have been opup'd on UA more than AC in the last 8 years.

My last Star Gold "op-up" on a Star partner was a downgrade on UA from E+ to last row E- due to an equipment change.

Does anyone know where someone with an exec. class Aeroplan booking but no confirmed business seat would show up on this list?

Also, I had always assumed your point total might also be used to break a tie (SE with 250k beats SE with 100k), but it sounds like that's not a factor?

Aeroplan at the bottom.

And no, I do not believe they use mileage. Nor type of cert BTW (which would largely be redundant to fare class BTW).

Is this a case where you have a confirmed business leg but no seat, or where you are sitting in economy on an overall business aeroplan booking? In the 2nd you have a pretty small chance now due to rule changes.

If you have a confirmed Aeroplan exec class booking, nobody can bump you and get upgraded into your seat. It's as good as a rev purchase and comes from a different inventory than that of upgraders.

I believe the poster is referring to an Aeroplan exec class booking with the segment in question to be confirmed in Economy.

In that case, you are at the bottom of the certificate upgraders, but above the op-up people.

If you have a confirmed AP exec reward ticket in business, it comes out of "I" fare bucket, and is separate.

I think Air Koryo is right in this case. Sometimes you can book an AE biz seat with no specific seat assignment. You are at the front. The poster in #10 was not referring to this.