Two empty seats in F on my BOS-DFW flight last week, I was first on the upgrade list and sitting in 21B. I was a bit miffed. Other than that, I've only missed 3 upgrades in the past 3 months.

Cheers,

-Andrew

I've seen that when paid F flyers are expected and missed the connection due to IRROPS. I suspect AA is generally unwilling to tick them off by giving away their seats for upgrades, and a gate upgrade is less likely to occur as the door is closing.

For me the most important perk of being exp is the evips (domestic fc is not that much better, in many cases, than an exit aisle seat), so if an intl flight goes out with empty bc seats(and I'm in y), this makes being exp less interesting.
[PS: If you can book some intl flights far out, there are plenty of "c" seats available; I had a flght jfk-zrh-jfk, booked for jan 09 and there were 6 c seats available zhr-jfk--less for jfk-zrh.]

yeah, I really resent those paid F lawyers, drug salesmen, stockbroker types who keep me from getting my rightful upgrade!
oh wait, i've never missed an upgrade in the past 12 months or so, even as a PLT... well, I resent it anyway!!
;)

I'm going to put on the "Sarcasm isn't helpful" hat, too: I've looked for upgrades, and for actual flights for free, over the last few weeks, and it looks to me like AA is substantially tightening up on the availability. Silly stuff like the west coast to NYC, any airport, is difficult to book for any flight that has a reasonable arrival time. I think this is the eventual result of the decline in capacity, and I think we better get used to it.

On routes I've been interested in, I certainly find that stuff is tighter in every category, both upgrades and free. I don't have to like it, and I don't appreciate hearing "they're doing it to save the airline". Of course they are. And we'll hear this same line when they make the miles totally unable to use, duh. But it's news, and I'm glad to hear that my own anecdotal observations aren't just my own perceptions, or my own routing/upgrade problems.

OP: get used to the sarcasm around here, it's part of the charm. Check the other boards too (BA is a classic): it can be worse. And then get a thick skin, ignore half what you read, and plan on hearing how your concerns are misplaced, wrong, irrelevant or whining from about half your thread's posters. Welcome to the net.

I was pleasantly surprised last week when I bought a ticket to FCO for next March because I was able to be confirmed MIA-LHR and FCO-JFK. I also could not believe when the agent told me there 5 available seats from FCO-JFK when at least 2 were already sold. Little does AA know that because of the conference I am going to J will definetely be sold out. I have never been confirmed on a 767 when I have purchased a ticket. Going to Asia seem to be strictly standby upgrades that may be confirmed 7 days in advance.

and now some fares book into "O" on this route which are non-upgradeable using miles/evip.

*shrug* at 6:00AM, if there are spare seats, what's so hard about processing the upgrade? Maybe it's sour grapes, but I was still miffed.

Cheers,

-Andrew

Not sour grapes at all, and I'd be miffed as well. If I don't get an upgrade because people bought seats, or had priority over me, so be it- if I really want to sit there, I should buy it myself. However, if viable seats go out empty for whatever reason (lazy GA, short catering, whatever), I'd be less than happy. Upgrades are supposed to be based on available seats. Well, there are two of them!

Cheers.

C Availability has always been tight on LAX-LHR, but future confirmable upgrades have almost disappeared. Same goes on LAX-NRT. I did recently have some clear for next week, but it didn't happen until about a week before flight (submitted them 3 months ago).

I picked some random dates in January (8 out, 12 back) and found C1 out and C2 back. Just depends upon what dates one chooses. Yes, this is just one sample, but it's the first set of dates I tried. And I agree that LAX-LHR, and back, are deucedly difficult, but far from "disappeared."

Cheers.

Had a weird one this morning - gate agent said 5 F seats would be going out empty b/c of cargo weight. AC agents were also chatting about being perplexed by "only 11 F seats" on my flight and another flight.

So dates doesn't really matter. I searched EF for "C" upgrades from November 1 2008 though the end of the schedule. I saw zero "C" fares from any hub to NRT.

Are you looking at the "award availability section" and specifically requesting C. For example, on 10/28 AA 153 ORD-NRT shows C5 and AA 175 DFW-NRT shows C7. Going a month later [11/25], AA 61DFW-NRT shows C5 and there are many more examples I could provide.

Hmmm. I just checked, and DFW-NRT on 175 or 61 on 1/16/09 has C (C4 for both), and the return NRT-DFW 176/60 has C on 1/26/09 and beyond (C7 some days), but nothing prior to that.

I just threw a dart at the wall for the dates, FWIW.

Cheers,

-Andrew