San Gottardo

• Will they be able to make an offer, even for someone who had not been targeted? Or will they merely re-price the ticket?
• Are the people on the phone able to do the same things as those at the check-in counter?

Fabo.sk

I do believe that's very much on purpose

carnarvon

You are 100% right. More than a belief, it is a certainty.

A fact that most here seem to forget, is that AF is genetically adverse to the idea of non-operational upgrades (other than for F&F).

Management and market realities have forced the "system" to introduce the concept of paid upgrades, but like in a human body, antibodies fight this "infection" in all possible ways. They cannot fight the idea outright, so they make it the way it is: clear as mud so they keep the upper hand and make sure that even their best customers don't know what to expect; as a result they cannot plan anything and this is exactly what AF wants.

DrMimosa

I had a conversation with someone about this on the platinum service line the other day. Here is what I was told:

1/ Up until more than 30 hours before the (KLM) flight, there are two options for an upgrade.
a) Sometimes, but not always, there is a discounted upgrade availability, but on none of the four flights I happen to have coming up there was any such availability. I am not sure whether this availability would be to everyone, or only to platinum members, and whether you could only pay with cash or also with miles.
b) More generally, in all cases (with available seats), there is the option to rebook a flight, which can be done for each flight segment separately. However, these prices would not be discounted, and can be very expensive (e.g. for an AMS-LAX flight, the cost was ~8,000 euro).

2/ From 30 hours before departure onward, discounted upgrades may become available. I was told this would be the case if at least four business class seats were still empty at that point, although I assume the details depend on the kind of flight (my typical route is something like AMS-JFK). Those kind of upgrades can be paid with either X miles or Y cash, or combinations of e.g. 25%, 50%, or 75% miles with 75%, 50%, or 25% cash. This is the kind of upgrade you can typically book online at check in, but you can also do them on the phone, although I was told that for flights out of Amsterdam this would be no problem whereas for flights out of the US, this may need to be done at the airport. I see that a lot of people here are suggesting that the pricing of this depends on a lot of factors, but in my experience I have often seen the exact same offers: for example, on AMS-JFK, which I fly regularly, sometimes there is no availability, but when there is I have multiple times, both online and at the airport gate, been offered an economy to business upgrade for 499 euro or 62400 miles, or a combination of these two, so at least to me this has seemed to be independent of other factors.

NickB

The latter, AIUI. There simply is no guarantee that you will get an offer whether online or by calling.

BobTL

carnarvon

Flight crews are as clew-less as we are about the offers for upgrade. The purser you spoke with "believes", "thinks" that AF behaves this or that way for this and that reason, but in fact does not know.

Think about it again. How can one reasonably think that offering an upgrade to NEV4 to a frequent flyer bloke (the kind who can afford business class but buys economy because he has no clue how good business class is ) will make him/her buy full fare biz the next time he/she flies?

BobTL

Klems

OK, I think I just got my most ridiculous OLCI upgrade offers ever. JFK to CDG tomorrow in economy on the A380:
$659.43 to Premium Economy and...
$1932.61 to Business .

What. The. Hell. I'll go ask at the airport as well to see what they have in store and maybe get another good laugh.

BobTL

wuzziduzziman

Well, this is becoming pathetic.

SDQBound

Got the equivalent in Euros for the same route last year.

carnarvon

Point made and taken. KL is a different airline from AF. And KL 777 biz seats are 1 to even 2 worlds apart from NEV4.

San Gottardo

But this is the confusing bit. I read through the OP again, which to me reads as if any passenger can request a quote (cash/miles) for an upgrade. The randomness does exist for the selection of passengers who get proactively targeted - but if I understand the OP correctly also people that are not targeted can make the request. Or did I misunderstand the OP and all the explanations only relate to the pro-active offers that go out to selected people?

NickB

Maybe I misunderstood what you mean by offer. I thought you meant a discounted upgrade offer. If what you are asking is: can I get a non-discounted upgrade (other than a full reprice according to fare rules) If I ask at check-in on the day, then, AIUI, anybody can get such an upgrade as long as there is miles upgrade availability but it seems to me these are different processes, are they not?

If you translate it to the BA world, the first one is what BA would call a pro-active upgrade (if offered online) or an airport upgrade (if offered at check-in). This is the one which is targeted.

The second is what in the BA world would be an ordinary miles upgrade (therefore always available at standard upgrade awards rate as long as there is award upgrade availability) but with the added twist in the AF world, that the price in miles in the AF world is not a set universal amount as in the BA world but instead varies dynamically and that it can also be converted (albeit only at check-in time) to a cash sum instead of a miles amount.

That is how I understand it but perhaps I am cognitively biased and my understanding is too coloured by BA processes.