Sean Peever

Maybe someone should try calling AP and calling them on their that there is priority space available but they're not letting us book it. See if the Agent pushes through the booking.

krayZpaving

Believe the technical rule of thumb is positive R and positive Z space must both be there for IKK, but it's not an absolute rule (so therefore you can't actually hold them to it...)

ridefar

There does seem to be some bigger issue. EF currently shows positive R space on some routes that AC.com shows no upgrade availability for. If I select a different Flex fare, I get upgrades for 2 eUp credits (should be 4 under current promotion). AC117 on January 27th for anybody interested. My guess is that either a) somebody screwed up and R has become delinked to IKK and eUps (by mistake); or b) there are some big changes coming!

canadiancow

I've booked IKK on a flight that was something like J2 C2 D0 Z0 P0 R1.

BlondeBomber

and just to confirm that ExpertFlyer wasn't out to lunch, my daughter noted that AC117 (a 767) went out half full in J and fairly empty in the back on January 7th. No J availability showed in Priority Rewards for that day for a week before that flight or other flights similarly empty that day. AC is checking into why. Hopefully I will hear a good explanation.

The stupid thing is AC was the loser here. They would have received more revenue (more from Aeroplan since more points would have been used).

On the SCL-YYZ portion, my no status son-in-law was upgraded from premium economy to J for no charge, no extra points since the flight was full. I am guessing since my Aeroplan number/status is on the file, this helped in addition to the premium economy, but just a guess.

On the YYZ-YYC portion, my no status son-in-law sat in the Premium Economy section with a whole bank of 4 to himself and the granddaughter. I thought these only went to status passengers? Again can only guess that my Aeroplan status helped in some way as it was bookable in that section from day 1 for just regular econo points. Bottom line, AC got no extra points or cash on the YYZ-YYC portion either. I would have happily surrendered way more points to accomplish all this but AC got nothing.

The system is definitely broken IMHO

As noted earlier, something seems amiss--in the past, even with reduced IKK, many of us have easily gotten flights when that many cheap fares were still available:

Sean Peever

From everything I've checked this seems to be across the board. As if reward space is no longer taken from R for priority rewards.

BlondeBomber

Confirmed by Ben Lipsey in an email this week and reported on another thread:

"I should also mention that many of the consumer tools used to check inventory (e.g. ExpertFlyer) are not actually able to search for true IKK availability, assuming you are simply searching for R class, as Aeroplan uses a different system that checks based on different criteria, so I might be careful about drawing conclusions based on that alone."

Availability has indeed shrunk dramatically recently.

Sean Peever

Wow. Well nice to have that confirmed. But yes, there's been a MASSIVE reduction in available award seats (for priority option)

PB53x11

"dramatically" might even be an understatement. Would be nice if they would communicate what the policy change is. Seems like a dramatic (there's that understatement again) reduction in a stated benefit.

ridefar

Thats awesome. Even aside from the huge reduction in benefit (hurray for Altitude 2017... anybody who thought this years program is the same, or wasn't enhanced, can think again) it is so nice that they went from a system that was working and relatively transparent to one that isn't and isn't. Do they actually think it is a good thing that we are now forced to use AE website, with the worst search engine on the planet? Crikey, what a bunch of morons. Why do they have to be such a bunch of self satisfied pricks? Why not just say IKK > 0 if R > 0 + P > 0 + C > 0 (or whatever the criteria is)? What possible purpose do your deliberate attempts to pi$$ off your best customers serve, AC? Answer that Ben.

With something other than a press release. Oh right. Never have, never will.

philelite

So I'm looking at flight on Mon Mar 6 AC34 SYD-YVR:
J9 C9 D9 Z9 P9 R8 O9 E6 N0 Y9 B9 M9 U9 H9 Q9 V9 W9 G9 S9 T9 L9 A9 K9 F0

Reward Availability:
No IKK Business
Yes PE
Yes IKK Econ

I thought IKK for Business was based on R-availability, but it seems like I'm starting to see this a lot where there is R but no IKK. Anyone else know what's happening? Are they pulling it back more?

Sean Peever

See the other thread about R and IKK. Looks like a massive program devaluation if not an IT glitch.

yvr76

Did he mention if the reduced availability is an IT glitch or tightening control from revenue management?

Also makes it quite difficult to search for seats now. It's no longer R space, and when it's zeroed out 29 days out of 30, you have to select each day!

Diabeetus

Wow. I was looking for some IKK availability for my wife to travel with me and the options are abysmal.

nearly all direct flight options gone from YYC-YYZ on the dates I'm a looking for (May 2017).

The "priority rewards" left: most of them make me connect backwards via YVR or YOW.

Diabeetus

Being YYC based myself, the connecting priority YYZ-YYC flights seem to route through YOW, YUL, and YVR a lot. Half of them, the long segment are in economy (I.e. YVR-YYZ) and the short segment is in business (YYC-YVR).