keyboardwarrior

I have a credit on file. It's a return portion of an economy KIX-YVR trip. So I have to use the credit to fly from YVR to KIX.

Fortunately if I want to upgrade and fly Premium Economy I don't have to pay anything out of pocket since my original economy ticket was a bit pricey.

I would like to upgrade from Premium to Business. Price difference is $1600.00 Naturally I want to use my Aeroplan Miles for that difference.

They said first I have to book that Premium Economy ticket with AC then after contact Aeroplan to use my miles for the upgrade to Business.

Will Aeroplan be looking at the same system? Meaning they will also see that the price difference is $1600.00 right?

Do you have any tips or advice? Should I book Economy first then upgrade using miles? Or doesn't matter?

canadiancow

You can't use miles to pay a price difference on a revenue ticket.

keyboardwarrior

Oooh fancy. So they're called revenue tickets. How come no one at AC knows I cannot use miles to pay a price difference?

Anyway, seems odd. I paid for my ticket. Why can't I upgrade like everyone else using miles? I also paid for those miles. What's the logic?

EDIT: So I reserved my premium ticket for $0.00. There's no way even at the ticket counter when I check-in to upgrade via miles? Can only upgrade by credit card? w.t.f. Who's the brainiac who thought of that one.

canadiancow

If you're on a "cheap" PY ticket, no one could upgrade that using miles.

Miles can only be used to upgrade full-fare tickets.

keyboardwarrior

What does PY mean? My original economy ticket was more expensive than normal because I had to purchase it last minute. Oh well, at least I found out I could get Premium without having to upgrade instead of booking economy again. Would've been a total waste!

RangerNS

https://www.aeroplan.com/saua/Upgrad...entLanguage=en may be possible. I've never heard of anyone actually doing it that way, though.

Note there would have to be specific awards space available for that flight. Not just any space in the [next highest] cabin.

canadiancow

PY is Premium Economy.

The price of the original economy ticket is irrelevant because you'll have rebooked the return to something new. And the price isn't relevant, just the fare class. And I can guarantee you're booked in E or N, not O, which would be required to upgrade with miles.

RangerNS

Ah, never mind me. You can only upgrade from Y (economy cabin) or PY (Premium Economy cabin) to J (Business), not from economy cabin to PY cabin. And only in the every highest fare buckets.

You did say "very pricey". I suppose you might have a full Y ticket, but if it wasn't within a couple of days of the flight happening, that much coin would have paid for a PY seat right off the hop.

keyboardwarrior

I understand your explanation but I do not understand why I cannot upgrade via miles. If I want to upgrade from PY to J the quote is $1600.

It's simple. I should be able to simply trade $1600 worth of Aeroplan miles. Why did I fly all of these years on AC and make all those purchases on Amex etc for miles if I cannot use the miles?

So if I call Aeroplan how will they know it was a revenue ticket and not a standard upgrade request? They can tell by the booking reference I guess?

I noticed on the Aeroplan site that you can't even upgrade from PY to J via the menu. It only has "from Y or J" options not "from PY". What's up with that?

Nitehawk

Upgrading via miles is possible but it has two very specific rules...

1) fare class. You need to be ticketed in Y, B, or O class. If your ticket is not in one of those classes you can pay to be put in them. They are the most expensive economy and premium economy fare classes.

2) availability. Just because there is a seat open in business that does not make it available for upgrade. In general there must be I class available. I class is the fare bucket that business class redemptions come from. Generally there are not many I class seats available on any given flight.

​​​​​​Aeroplan miles usually aren't convertible into cash, the only exception I have seen is that you can pay the taxes and fees on an aeroplan booking with more aeroplan points. AMEX member rewards are more easily converted to cash. If you have a bunch of AMEX MR points you could pay the $1600 and call Amex for to apply your points against it. Not the best value, but still value.

for more info:

Aeroplan upgrade rules

RangerNS

OP, you might be able to convert miles to nearly cash, buy buying a gift card.

​​​​​​But the biggest denomination seems to be $1000, and there are strange limitations (based somewhat on your luck of agent) on how many distinct forms of payments may be used per ticket. Or transaction. Or something else

They are generally considered poor value for miles. Your $1600 upgrade (assuming you could pay for it with 3 gift cards of $1000, $500, $100, which per above you can't) would cost 160,000aeropesos, enough to get you from Canada to eastern Europe in "first" class.

As for "why dont they let you"? Because they don't.

skywardhunter

Should you be able to pay in barrels of maple syrup, too? AC is quoting you a price in $, why would they then accept a different currency?

FWIW the fact you need to be in a high rate bucket to upgrade is ridiculously stupid, most airlines let you upgrade from most fares (perhaps not deep discount though) amusing miles (inventory requirements apply)

yyznomad

Others here have provided a very thorough explanation regarding the rules to this.
It's something you'll just have to accept, otherwise, you'll go insane.

SparseFlyer

For ticket changes it's always always always 1 FOP with AC.

Unless you pay the change fee with one FOP, and the ADCOL on another (since they are two distinct transactions). But since OP talks about Y -> PY, we know there's no change fee. So a bit SOL as far as splitting goes...

dr_torch

I find this unlikely because if the OP had a Y or B ticket booked into Latitude could they not have just gotten a full refund on the unflown segments?