whimike

I didn't see this route posted with an upgrade discussion, so considering what I experienced today figured I would start the thread.

I booked my flight SFO-DFW-PEK about a month ago, the flight is tomorrow on th 27th of October. I was very careful to choose a Tuesday departure to maximize the chance of upgrade and also looked at the MCE seat-map to help determine which flights looked best. (Yes, I know seat maps don't tell the whole story, but EXP's upgrading with SWU's are quite likely to choose a good MCE seat just in case the SWU doesn't clear.)

The flight I chose a month out had only 2 seats in J with seats selected and both MCE and the main cabin were just about completely empty.

I checked loads ever so often and just did last night and J was still a ghost town with only a few taken and MCE was also a relative ghost town with about 15 seats taken.

This morning, about 24 hours before the flight, I get my EF alert that "C" opened, but was in a meeting. An hour later I looked at J was now full except for 2 seats, I was not upgraded, and MCE still has 13 people in it.

I called AA and the agent told me that the automated upgrade system did upgrade who it could, and when it got to my name there were no seats left to upgrade but that I am first on the list. I told him that MCE was just about empty and was J and there must have been 20 people ahead of me for me to not get upgraded. His response was that was accurate.

I am not here to complain, but more to find out what happened. Is this the new norm where we select empty-looking mid-week flights and still can't clear? Is it possible the the list was skipped? I.E. If people know that C opens up 24 hours before the flight, can one call in to have theirs processed? Or, are PLT and GOLDS that use SWU's or miles+copay now able to be ahead of EXP on SWU?

I know there were some people here that can get visibility into the upgrade list, is that an avenue looking into to see if everything looked normal?

It would be great to hear of others experience with upgrading on the new 788 routes.

davef139

You can upgrade before C opens and you get an alert. Saturday I got an upgrade before C space opened by searching and the EF alert came through about 5 hours later from me noticing my upgrade

kalendil

What were you searching for if C was not yet open?

AwardBee

My experience having flown this route last week is that once C opens up, it's best to call and manually process. And it's hard to do that from within China if you're using a VPN. But you have to. Because when C is available, it seems to be open season for anyone wanting to score an upgrade. I could be wrong, but that's how it seems to me.

EF alerts can be delayed by hours. Whether that's a pivotal issue depends on the specific day, I suppose.

I suppose moral of the story is, if you know C is open, drop everything and jump on it immediately. Use whatever excuse you need to step out of the room - i.e. desperately need to use the restroom now because a big one's coming and it's not waiting. Your body will thank you for the duration of the 14 hr flight, and this is a fairly nice J product too

whimike

So is it the case that people can leapfrog the upgrade list by calling in when C becomes available?

brewdog11

That is correct, although some AAgents will police the process more than others.

869

I called last week to process when I received a C alert from EF. Agent told me that there was C available but the upgrade list would just have to process in order. Oh, ok, Thanks!

Called back for another agent and was done within 8 minutes.

AwardBee

We know that the upgrade list doesn't process instantaneously when C space opens, and it's also a fact that agents can/may manually process upgrades as long as C exists. Ergo, I would call in (and HUCA if necessary) whenever you see C open.

brewdog11

On my recent DFW-HKG jaunt, I got unlucky and got the policing agent when the flight was C1.

Did the obligatory HUCA and got a willing agent, but I was too late.

whimike

This would even let non-status people jump over EXP? I wish there was some way to look at the upgrade list to determine what happened.

brewdog11

I don't know if it's like that 100% because I've only called to have them processed manually as EXP, but theoretically anyone could call and request a SWU/Miles+Copay upgrade once the space is open.

whimike

Gah.... Was checking EF 10 minutes ago and C = 2, so I call EXP line right away and by the time I got through C was back to 0.

I took screenshots of the seat map and 1 MCE and 1 main cabin seat was moved up to J.

I assume if they were traveling on one PNR that the companion inherits the others status for upgrade?

bmchris

So what do you do? Manually ping the EF system for C availability?

grrizzli

You can check my experience below.
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/25239663-post681.html

And here
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/25496250-post837.html

whimike

Just talked to an agent who told me I am the only person now on the upgrade list. So, position #1 of a total of 1 on the list. Everybody else who had been on the list has been upgraded, including non-EXPs.