Hi there all, I'm having trouble finding a good answer to my question... hopefully someone can help me out

I'm currently living in Australia with my wife, and have just gotten *G with star alliance with aeroplan. I am wanting to use my new 'eupgrade' points for my wife's return flight to Calgary in March/Apr 2011, as I already have business class booked via my company.

My question is, what is the best way to go about doing this? I've been reading that it is really difficult to book a business seat on the SYD-YVR route unless you book way ahead in time. However, we plan to leave in Mar/Apr.

She doesn't have enough AP miles to book business. So I want to use my new upgrade points to give her business seats. I'm sure she won't mind using an alternate route to go home if it gives her business seats. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Basically you don�t have many options.

The upgrade credits are only valid on AC operated flights, and the only flight operated by AC to Australia/NZ is YVR-SYD, and upgrading on this route indeed isn�t easy.

Basically you have two options:

-buy a Latitude fare which has upgrade availability and upgrade instantly at time of booking
- buy the lowest fare available (Tango Plus) and hope for an upgrade at the 4/7 days window (depending on whether you�re a E/SE) - of course this assumes that you have 20 upgrade credits for a one-way upgrade
If you go for the second option, I guess getting an upgrade is more likely on a Tuesday/Wednesday

PS - you cannot buy a ticket on Aeroplan points and then upgrade. Sorry.

There is only one AC flight everyday that comes to and departs from any point in the South Pacific Region which happens to be one of the most difficult ones to secure upgrades. So basically the options are very limited, unlike say if you are originiating from Asia where you options ex-PEK, PVG, NRT, ICN which in general have better chances of successfully upgrading. The difficult Asian route to upgrade are mainly the one between HKG and YYZ.

that's good to know... so it's not possible to book a flight from BNE - PEK/PVG etc - YVR? where i would get a better chance for an upgrade?

i'll probably buy a tango+ flight, and use my upgrade credits to try and secure a business class seat.

Thanks all for the tips, very helpful info!

Unless you plan on buying business class to get to PEK/PVG ex-BNE (which I assume you likely won't), it would be better to just stick with coach on a more direct routing.