sjharte

Is this easy to do? How many points are required?

irishguy28

Yes - all you have to do is pick up the phone and call Flying Blue.

Whether you can upgrade or not depends on the availability of business class award seats.

From the sticky:

Miles needed for upgrades: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/17175607-post3.html

sjharte

many thanks.

sjharte

alas I couldn't upgrade as I was only A class in Premium economy and I would have to have been W class to upgrade. BA would have allowed this.

cityflyer369

BA has other upgrade restrictions though. So in the end it's all about choosing your FFP wisely according to your needs.

brunos

What do you have in mind?
I find BA very attractive in terms of upgrades with miles (MFU) or cash.

irishguy28

It seems that the restriction on only being able to upgrade bookings made directly with BA was removed last year (http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/briti...-bookings.html)

Another restriction that still exists is that, in order to use Avios to upgrade, the booking has to be issued/ticketed in the same country as your BA Executive Club account is registered. (And the website will default to issuing the ticket in whatever country the first flight leaves from, regardless of where your account is based).

So, for the OP who is based in Britain, and having a CDG-(LHR)-SIN booking on BA they would not be able to upgrade that booking.

brunos

I suddenly remember that I once upgraded a HKG-LHR flight on a ticket originating in France and had no problem by telephone. What I had to do was to call my BAEC center (Bremen), but that did not mean that I could not upgrade.
Also, this thread seems to provide a different answer:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/briti...are-miles.html

irishguy28

It doesn't, if you read all the way through.

But if you rang Bremen, then it seems to indicate that your BAEC account was based in France at the time? It certainly wasn't based in Hong Kong - as Bremen does not handle countries outside of Europe (It certainly would have been worth your while basing your account in France rather than in Hong Kong - you would have had far lower qualification thresholds). As such, that the ticket originated in/was issued in France and your account was also based in France means that you COULD upgrade it - it doesn't matter which sector(s) you upgrade, only the ticket itself has to be issued in the country where your account is based - the flight in question doesn't have to originate in that country.

(What you wouldn't have been able to do was to upgrade the ticket if it commenced in/was issued in Hong Kong, or if instead your BAEC account was based in Hong Kong at the time [and Bremen would not have dealt with you if it was]).

All I can say is that it is specifically excluded in the T&Cs:

brunos

This is not the proper thread for discussing BA., so best to continue in the BA forum.

I criticized you "main restriction" regarding bookings made through travel agents. As you quote BA T&C, I think that they clearly state that TA tickets can be upgraded with miles (though not through website). But you edited your post recently, so you are now aware of it.
Regarding the other restriction, the T&C wording is open to interpretation. One possible interpretation is simply that when you do a booking under your BAEC number, you need to call your local BAEC office. But it could be that the rules have indeed changed. Until I hear of someone who has bought say a HKG-LHR-HKG ticket with a British account and cannot upgrade with miles by calling the UK number, then I will be in doubt.

irishguy28

I disagree. There is only one possible interpretation.

First off - you ALWAYS have to call your local BAEC office. Ringing any other number will result in you being told "sorry, you have to ring your own office, even though they are closed now and won't be open again until Monday".

Secondly, the rule clearly states that if the country of your BAEC account registration is different to the country where the ticket was issued, upgrading is a no-go.

I bought an LHR-JFK-LHR last year, with a Dutch account, and could not upgrade by calling the Dutch number. I can not call the UK number, as they will see that my account is based in the Netherlands and they direct you to ring your own local number.

(The problem can be avoided by upgrading the booking at the same time as buying the ticket, while logged into your BAEC account. When logged into your BAEC account, the ticket will be automatically issued by your local BAEC centre, regardless of where the ticket departs from. But it still remains impossible to buy a ticket for cash departing from a different country, and then at a later time upgrading it with Avios).