briansilverstein

I am on AA 55 today from ORD - LAX. The flight is showing F7A7P4Y7. I called AA and she agreed that the flight was wide open and sent a request to revenue management that was denied. She told me that a lot of the calls she has been getting this week and last were due to similar situations where AA was holding seats. Has this been the recent case with others? Anything you did to get them to clear?

Cofyknsult

Yes, it is getting more and more aggravating but the upgrades eventually clear... just later. You can't blame them for hoping they will sell the seats... delusions of grandeur ?

Apparently, they are building more availability for missed connections out of hubs by F paying passengers, but obviously delayed pax now lose their guaranteed seat on their originally scheduled flight quicker (even when they have a BP), so it's a zero sum game.

deflyer

While I agree that the delays are frustrating, on the occasions when I fly paid first class, it's very often a trip with little advance notice. From that perspective, it's also frustrating when AA has no limited availability up front due to upgrades. So it's always a balance for the carrier - and as long as the upgrades clear in the correct order and there is no game playing on the airport check in list, I can see why AA might hold a few seats until close to departure. Holding 7 or more seats, though, does seem to be excessive.

Roadrunner2

Yes, absolutely. This has been going on for a year or so, seems to me. I understand AA's logic, but it is very frustrating. Perhaps they could have sent an e-mail to their Elites explaining their "new policy."

brp

My SJC-AUS return (Sat/Sun) cleared in both directions at about 100 hours, for two of us. That doesn't suck. Overall, though, it does seem to be closer to departure, IME.

Cheers.

dfwexpx5

On AA 242 today LAX-JFK, showing 6J D5.
AAngel at the AC said they have been holding JFK seats until 4 hours before departure to accomodate last minute flyers willing to spend the money and in case there is a flight irregularity on another LAX-JFK.

She said most/all are released at the 4 hour point.
Have had good luck from home - DFW - this year - 90% clear at 100 hours, but always seems to be last minute at LAX, MIA, JFK. Seems they have a higher "threshold" number of seats that are protected.

dfwexpx5

And they just cancelled AA 242 LAX-JFK.
I guess that's why they protect seats - now they can roll those on paid J or F to the next flight and accomodate some/most of them.

FWAAA

An EXP-heavy flight if ever there was one.

Right now, 2.5 hours before departure, the front cabin is zeroed out.

Did your upgrade clear?

shadesofgrey1x

I have been seeing alot of posts on UG clearing way after the start of the window. I can not figure out the new formulae. I flew FLL-LAX-FLL on the busy labour day weekend and my Plat upgrades cleared at 72 hours on the dot.

ijgordon

Between my partner and I (both Plats), we've had 4 flights in the last 2-3 weeks all clear at the 72-hour mark.

• ORD-LGA (surprising, I'll admit)
• LGA-FLL (went out 14 of 16 anyway)
• MCO-MIA (went out 9 of 22 but was worth the 1 sticker for me as it was 2 hours total on the plane due to very heavy rain in MCO and resulting take-off delays)
• MIA-LGA

markdkc

I'm seeing more flights clearing at the last pre-gate clearance (3 hours) than last year...

But importantly, I'm still clearing at >90% of my flights.

briansilverstein

My upgrade did clear 4 hrs 5 min before the flight. I looked on line and all of the flights were zeroed out in all classes so I do not know if they canceled one or what the situation was. when I looked at the seat map all of a sudden they were all taken. Flight was full. New business class seats.

My upgrade for my return tomorrow cleared 24 hrs out.

2 other unrelated items of note that are off-topic but follow up to my trip.
1. When I printed my first BP, it showed me checked-in and reprinting where before it would be similar to a new check-in. This is an improvement as I got burned before where they gave away my seat.

2. The security lines at ORD were a mess - no one was checking status at the priority checkpoints. One of the ops supervisors told me that the TSA took over the whole thing and there were no longer going to be any elite lanes.

unitedPSbusiness

Keeping the 4 hour rule in mind, I'd imagine that this actually makes it easier for plats and golds to upgrade (if they [we] request the upgrade exactly four hours prior)

DataPlumber

Fantastic news.

I'll have to build more time into my morning routine for my day trip on Friday.

badjuju

No elite lines at ORD?! The nightmare begins.