Billy Mumphrey

My wife is traveling CDG-IAD today. I booked her flight in premium economy with my FB miles (60k round-trip + taxes) and later called FB to insert her Delta SkyMiles number (Platinum status / STE+) so she could use the lounge. She told me the gate agent gave her an operational upgrade (OpUp) to J right before boarding. The seating chart looked has completely full for several months, so I'm not surprised the PE cabin was overbooked. But I'm curious why she was chosen for the OpUp? Wouldn't AF normally pick one of its own FB elites, especially a revenue passenger, rather than a Delta elite to upgrade (or perhaps there were none)? Very happy she got a free upgrade, but curious what formula AF uses to pick the passengers to OpUp?

irishguy28

Congratulations.

Perhaps there were no status passengers that outranked her Delta Diamond status in PE?

The upgrade logic is a closely guarded secret.

Fabo.sk

The upgrade logic is not status based, it's a tie breaker, but the booking class and upgrade history both also play a role. a FB award probably trumped cheaper PE tickets on the day in combination with Delta status.

AnaTFN

I have wondered about the upgrade history recently because I got a silly OpUp on an embraer full flight (so not even extra space, just moved forward 2 rows and given a wonderbox) and I often fly long haul and now I'm wondering if that was my upgrade for the next two years of OpUp opportunities....
(it had been easily 2 years since my last OpUp)

irishguy28

My first ever upgrade on a "long" haul flight - an LHR-DTW flight in V class which would have been my first and only Northwest Airlines flight, except that this flight had been "converted" to Delta between the time I booked it and the date of travel 8 months later. It also got switched to LHR; at the time I booked, it was to run from LGW.

I paid a pittance for this LON-CHI-LON ticket; $430.35, which at the time was €293 (the Euro being close to its all-time high against the USD at the time of purchase in the summer of 2008).

I got an op-up at the gate upon boarding at LHR; I had FB Gold status at the time.

The absolutely crazy thing is that, as I was waiting in the AF lounge at ORD for boarding on the way home on the same trip, I got paged to go to the front desk...and I was handed a new boarding pass for seat 2D on AF51, despite being booked in Q class.

Sometimes the logic is...there is no logic

Fabo.sk

15 years ago, the world was quite different.

flyertalker00143

is there an existing chart somewhere to determine the priority list by status or booking class ?

Fabo.sk

No.ㅤㅤㅤㅤ

brunos

Some years ago, there was a thread suggesting that AF was trying to attract DL Frequent flyers to AF by upgrading them to show the greatness of AF J compared to DL.
I wonder whether the current JV terms make this relevant anymore.
Anyway, that is a well kept secret, assuming there is some obeyed logic.

vic.d

I concur, never figured out the DL upgrade strategy on TATL either.
STE+ are clearly lowest on the list compared to Medallion members but no clue if they give Opup to some or rather go with empty Delta One seats, it seems completely random

Maestro Ramen

The only time I was ever op-uped was recently in a short haul Y flight I had spent quite an obnoxious amount of money on (something around Ł400 rtn), and Y was also completely full so it probably takes both.

All that for a pancake wanderbox, and a gin with no tonic (ran out)

orbitmic

Ah, the good old "who will get upgraded?" At least, it's nice to see a "why were we upgraded?" rather than a "why were we not upgraded?" version of it though!!

As others have mentioned, the op up algorithm moves in mysterious ways, and any attempt to simple concepts like "but my status is higher", "but I have status with AF, not a partner", "but my ticket was more expensive/in a higher class", "but my ticket was purchased earlier/later", "but I checked in when OLCI first opened/at the last minute" is bound to fail miserably.

For all practical purposes, it all happens: sometimes award ticket will be upgraded rather than full fare, sometimes silver will be upgraded rather than ulti, sometimes you'll be upgraded on a flight that looked empty or not on one that looked full, etc. Assume you won't be and be delighted if it's your lucky day. A couple of things we do know:

1) asking (whether nicely or righteously) doesn't improve your chances in the slightest. A whole mythology exists which is based on the old times when airport agents (then always working for an actual airline) were controlling the magic "suitable for upgrade" button. Those days have expired decades ago. Upgrade lists are controlled by a central algorithm written into the Altea airport management system.

2) Oh and the same goes for dressing nicely, having some title or other in your booking, claiming you are on a honeymoon/flying on your birthday/about to die tomorrow/have never flown before/fly all the time and are really important etc.

3) All airlines overbook in (almost) all classes (AF normally doesn't overbook P but that is an exception) and upgrades can follow a domino effect. At times, your W or J cabin may look empty but if Y (when flying W) or Y or W (when flying J) are overbooked, airlines will normally prefer to upgrade someone from Y to W and then someone else from W to J rather than upgrade from Y to J and please only one person when they could please two. In some ways, this makes the W cabin a sweet spot because it is quite small and you get a "double" chance of upgrade if W is overbooked or if Y is and this requires moving people from Y to W. I have had family members with zero status upgraded from W in some mid-summer flights where Y was vastly overbooked and J was largely empty. J should be a sweet spot, but of course for upgrades, you also need empty seats in the class above, and because it's larger, it typically is more robust too (sadly for those of us who often fly J) plus there are of course fewer seats to upgrade into (as P is so small except on the 388).

4) Even though it may sound paradoxical, sometimes, airlines will make overbooking worse on purpose. Imagine that W is already oversold and AF "know" they will need to move some people up, and J is almost empty (not a frequent occurrence of course). The "seat in bum" logic would be for AF to stop selling tickets in W but continue selling e.g. discounted Z in J. However, a full fare W will typically be more expensive than discounted Z so in that case, AF will likely continue to sell even more full fare W seats even if it knows it doesn't have the space as it knows demand for W on that flight is likely still big and demand in J not so much, and it will make greater income by selling a "pretend" additional full fare W even if it knows from the start they will need to seat them (or another) in J. Same goes if and when Y is oversold and can be sold at full fare whilst W is quite empty and could only be sold for discounted and cheaper fares;

5) Look out for equipment changes, which can make upgrades more or less likely. A few weeks ago, I was on a clearly overbooked flight but a switch to a larger aircraft sadly meant no upgrade for anyone!

6) There is such a thing as jinxing it. Well, no actually, there isn't and it isn't a fact, but still, I still think that people who are convinced that they will be upgraded are seeding the seeds of certain disappointment...

brunos

I agree with you as usual. Let me just add two pinches of salt regarding outstations like HKG.
On a very full flight the station manager (or flight manager) closely follows the loading. They get the opup list from the algorithm, but they ultimately decide who gets opup.
A lot of things can happen shortly (from a few hours to minutes) before departure.
A locally-important client might decide to fly at the last minute, some guys get transferred last minute from other airlines (like their connecting flight from China is delayed and they miss their original flight), some airline staff are waitlisted (from AFKL or other airlines), some connecting pax barely make it or miss the flight, etc.. I know from a station manager stories where there it is chaotic at the counter shortly before departure, while many pax have already boarded.. Then the flight manager does not (cannot) follow the algorithm and opup whoever is easier.

orbitmic

That's a good point on station managers, they certainly can - at least in principle - override the opup list. My guess is that in most cases, they won't bother too unless there is someone they really want to op up (for good or bad reason). Having said that, in my view, station managers would probably be more likely to use discretionary upgrades (they can do that too) if they really want someone upgraded and can indeed do that even where no op up is needed (assuming they don't do it too often or at some point, someone might ask them to explain...)

Fabo.sk

"Locally important client" though is, IMHO, a measurable parameter. So is, for the better or worse, F&F, whether on part of ground crew or flight crew.
It's just another unknown variable that enters into the machine...