FullFare

My wife and I are both Delta DM status. Booked Premium Economy SFO-CDG for about $2200 each RT. The business class fare is $9000 RT each.

I don't mind paying about $5k per ticket RT and have often gotten that fare in business on this route. The discrepancy here is just too much.

I looked at the seating chart and half of the 42 business seats are not taken (although could be ticketed and not assigned seats, I know). Entire cabin in premium economy is booked.

I was hoping to see if they would let me use global upgrades from DL (which we have and which, according to the website, are usable on this route (except that the website says it is up to the discretion of the airline.

My query is: Anybody have any experience on this situation? Is it totally hopeless? Would AF let a big 777ER go out with the business seats unfilled, or would they relent and let an upgrader get at them? Should I keep calling? They won't even put us on a waiting list. Just curious.

Stewart J. Wolfenson

Didn't you get the option to updgrade for a fee ($500) last week I was allowed for one leg.

orbitmic

From my understanding, 'totally hopeless' indeed, but you can call DL SM to check. AF will be totally uninterested. The loads in J are very good on that route and they will quite certainly leave with a full J cabin, but even if it were not, AF would have no qualm leaving with empty seats and will enforce its rules. As mentioned by Stewart, a promotional upgrade might be your best shot but there is no guarantee it will come and there is no way to request it, you just have to wait and see if it is offered at/before check in or not.

FullFare

Thanks to orbitmic and Stewart for comments. I didn't get an offer to pony up $500 for any of the legs (I certainly would have done it). As to whether AF cares---it's understandable that they would hold strong for a full fare paying customer, seeing as they are the dominant carrier (non-stop) on the route. They have their flight every day at 3:40PM. United seems to do this route some of the time, perhaps every other day.

I'll wait and hope. Maybe AF will do some promo and we'll luck out. They still have 19 seats on the chart in business cabin for grabbing (not sure if ticketed pax haven't designated a seat, though). We're fine with premium economy seats. We truly didn't want to have to make a connection.

ijgordon

You don't say when the flight is. The passengers buying those $9k fares (often at a discount, though), are usually booking 1-3 weeks before departure, in some cases less. AF "knows" how many of those seats they typically sell, and at what fare they can sell them for, and they're clearly trying to maximize their revenues.
But if lots of J seats remain and PE is full/overbooked a few days beforehand, the calculus may change and you could perhaps see a discounted cash upgrade offer as they look to avoid free op-ups.

FullFare

ijgordon: Thanks for giving me hope. The $9K fare has been out there for over the past several weeks. It started as $8400 per ticket 2 month ago. I don't begrudge any airline that can get a customer to pony up a lot of money for its product (that's business).

It is AF's non-stop (the only one on the SFO-CDG route) for departure March 22. I look every day and there are still 19 of 42 seats not taken (agree there could be ticketed, but not seat-assigned pax).

I would add that most of the transatlantic fares on that date, in J, on fairly competitive routes, like JFK-LHR and ORD-LHR, are all over $8k. Premium economy fares seem to vary between $2000 - $2300.

Keeping fingers crossed, although I have found premium economy, as a cabin I have used on BA and VA, very reasonable and comfortable for the price. Glad the int'l carriers have come up with it. DL is starting to do it on some of its European flights now, I believe.

ijgordon

No problem! So you're still 3 weeks away, which means there will probably be quite a bit more business travel being booked before departure. That said, it's a Wednesday departure which is a pretty light day for business travel, so my best guess is they sell 10-15 more seats, which leaves a good handful still unsold prior to departure, but not a particularly empty cabin.

Others can perhaps chime in with more details on AF's willingness to sell discounted day-of-departure upgrades (I'm sure there's a thread about it?); I'm just not that familiar with the specifics for AF--every airline considers these differently.

bennos

DL only sells partner W, though their A350s will have it later this year (but probably be mostly TPAC).

Of course there's a thread about it

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/air-f...s-cash-af.html

Jump to the end for recent experiences.

knit-in

I have almost always gotten a day of departure offer (usually ~$400) for day of departure upgrade. Most recently, on the the JFK-CDG A380 on the sunday 7pm flight. However, by 'almost always', I mean about eight segments a year, so not a very large sample size.

wuzziduzziman

That's what I was thinking, considering the significant number of J seats which still seem to be available. However, I don't know how this works with Delta skymiles.

Certainly, for an FB member it would be an interesting option to upgrade with miles on the day of departure. An upgrade from PE (W/S) to bizz (O) on that route should be around 22.500 miles, but again, no clue for a Delta SM member.

mimil9

I was quite in the same situation last week on a IAD-CDG. Very expensive business so I booked premium eco.

When I checked in (online), I was proposed a 360€ upgrade and in the plane before take off I was proposed the same upgrade for 15000 miles.

Keyser

i've upgraded a premier economy to business ticket a few years ago using skymiles on a cdg-jfk sector....if i remember correctly there had to be availability in 'o' class & it set me back 15k miles....

trying to do that again for an upcoming flight but there seems to be no 'o' class availability despite the entire business class cabin being empty at the moment....

Sjondorn

Except the pricing is now much worse nowadays: New policy for paid and miles upgrades (AF/KL) - sept 2017