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Premium Economy Upgrade Request for EXP & CK [$0 for a limited time]

Premium Economy Upgrade Request for EXP & CK [$0 for a limited time]

Old Jul 20, 2018, 9:38 pm
  #16  
 
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Any information on whether this would apply with other One World Emeralds?

Happy wandering
Fred
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Old Oct 7, 2018, 7:01 am
  #17  
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Nice one!
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Old Oct 7, 2018, 12:24 pm
  #18  
 
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I'm not sure I would want to accept an upgrade should one be offered judging by the available seats on an upcoming flight.
I've got a nice enough MCE seat with aisle access and legroom and an upgrade could be deemed nothing of the sort to some.
At least you get the option to accept the upgrade rather than finding out you've been moved into some really crap seat and your original seat is now occupied.


Last edited by xenole; Oct 7, 2018 at 12:50 pm
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 12:06 pm
  #19  
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Programs: AA EXP (owe), BA Silver (ows), AB Silver (owr), WN A+/CP, IHG Spire AMB, Avis First
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Premium Economy upgrades: SWU interaction and NonRevs

From a friend on the LAX-HKG flight yesterday, it looks like either nonrevs are clearing directly into PE, or GAs are skipping EPs/CKs requesting SWUs and upgrading other (random, since there is no defined PE upgrade path?) people into PE. I suspect the former. This is a problem, because you would expect rev pax to be upgraded first.

To break down what happened on this flight, before upgrades were processed, there were 0 F seats, 3J seats and 13PE seats unassigned. After upgrades were processed, there were 0 F seats, 2J seats (presumably INOP), 0 PE seats and 11Y seats unassigned. From this information, we know that the Y cabin was at least oversold by 2.

This is the final upgrade list for AA 193 on 10/27/18:



Final UPG List LAX-HKG 10/27/18

#1 was called and cleared into J. #22-33, #36 appeared to clear into PE, as they cleared, we observed that the seats slowly became assigned on the seat map. #34-35 were traveling together and didn't want to separate. #22-33, #36 account for all 13 previously unassigned seats in PE, so we can infer from there that they were upgraded into the PE cabin. #22-41, I assume are NRs traveling on Dx or Zed pass requesting a class higher than economy (note that these are still STANDBY passengers, so they technically should be accommodated in their desired class of travel after upgrades are cleared). Either that or, this group of passengers somehow all made a PE upgrade request.

This is the final seat map:


Final Seat map LAX-HKG 10/27/18

Based on all of this, it would appear that even when Y is oversold (where they are now required to move some Y pax into PE), the GA apparently has the discretion to upgrade NRs or other pax Y->PE ahead of EPs/CKs requesting SWU upgrades. You would think that they should move EPs/CKs in Y up to PE first, then accommodate NR in whatever space is remaining, but that appears to not be happening here. Overall, this ends up not looking great, since a bunch of elite passengers (#2-21) now all feel cheated because they can see these PE seats magically getting taken by other people (as reported in this thread).

While there is no defined upgrade path into PE, it's been reported by JonNYC and others that among other things, LFBU / same day upgrades should be available (see:
, https://thepointsguy.com/news/succesful-upgrade-aa-business-new-zealand/ and other reports on FT) to EPs/CK - but a SWU request apparently causes problems with that system. My friend apparently inquired multiple times about the possibility of an upgrade (even paid?) into one of the 13 seats and was shot down multiple times, at checkin, at the lounge and at the gate all the way up until boarding.

Unfortunately, it seems that there is completely inconsistent training and information about the status of upgrades into PE. Lounge agents either (1) believe it's initially possible, but have the computer reject the seat assignment (obviously because a Y passenger can't be assigned a PE seat) and only the GA can clear upgrades (2) tell people that PE space will be assigned on a space-available basis at the gate. The kiosk/app will never prompt for a LFBU, because it will just say that you already requested an upgrade (the SWU). Check-in agents, especially at outstations, will have no clue what you're talking about. Finally, it seems to be at the GAs discretion to either process NRs first into PE, or to move EPs/CK into PE, even in the case of an oversold Y cabin. In this particular case, the GA chose to process NRs, despite multiple EPs/CK inquiring about PE upgrades.

I guess this appears to be a new gap created by the lack of an upgrade instrument into PE, and some weird interaction with SWU requests and kiosk upgrades. Probably AA needs to fix its upgrade list so its more transparent, and my guess is eventually this will cause enough complaints that a PE upgrade instrument is created (hopefully without devaluing SWUs).

;tl;dr; It appears that NR pax can clear directly into an empty PE cabin ahead of elite pax, even when Y is oversold (and therefore some people must be pushed into PE).
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Last edited by no2chem; Oct 27, 2018 at 6:00 pm
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 12:22 pm
  #20  
 
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I am sure the moment they deal with the PE upgrade anomaly is the moment they start doing a E-PE and PE-J upgrade path which then will make the E-J path disappear except for full fare Y passengers.

So as much as this annoys you, be very careful what you wish for. I have no skin in this anymore as i'm now moving up status in JAL
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 12:34 pm
  #21  
 
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Originally Posted by MIAman3
I am sure the moment they deal with the PE upgrade anomaly is the moment they start doing a E-PE and PE-J upgrade path which then will make the E-J path disappear except for full fare Y passengers.

So as much as this annoys you, be very careful what you wish for. I have no skin in this anymore as i'm now moving up status in JAL
I don't think it will be up to me really. I think that enough people will get ticked off at the upgrade list that something happens - I mean out of the 20 people requesting upgrades on this flight certainly many of them noticed lots of people below them getting upgraded! Hopefully AA does something sensible and either publishes same-day PE upgrades as a benefit (as they did previously and retracted it) or doubling the number of SWUs available, with the option to use 2 for Y->J, but we'll see.
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 12:45 pm
  #22  
 
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How do you know that 2-21 had higher priority for PE than 22-33? I'm assuming here that you're correct in inferring that 1-21 all requested a Y->J upgrade and 22-3X only requested Y->PE. In other words, if #2 had not requested a Y->J upgrade, who is to say they would have been #22? They might have been #40 . The upgrade list is weird. It frequently displays J->F upgrades somewhere way down the list, for instance.
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 12:57 pm
  #23  
 
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Originally Posted by wetrat0
How do you know that 2-21 had higher priority for PE than 22-33? I'm assuming here that you're correct in inferring that 1-21 all requested a Y->J upgrade and 22-3X only requested Y->PE. In other words, if #2 had not requested a Y->J upgrade, who is to say they would have been #22? They might have been #40 . The upgrade list is weird. It frequently displays J->F upgrades somewhere way down the list, for instance.
There is no way to request Y->PE. For regular passengers, there are only TWO ways you can use a SWU: Y->J and J->F.
I believe LFBU clears instantly, in which case there would not have been any of these passengers on the upgrade list.
While it certainly is possible that #22-41 might have been ahead of #2-21, based on the information I have, this is _extremely_ unlikely.

The only thing that is left is Dx and ZED passengers requesting a class other than Y. Which is what 22-41 probably are. They may have requested F, J or PE. We don't know.

The upgrade list may be weird, but it doesn't display passengers in some random order on the list. It just isn't exactly transparent, as it combines several classes of upgrades together.

Last edited by no2chem; Oct 27, 2018 at 1:13 pm
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 1:56 pm
  #24  
 
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Non-revs get whatever is left which can be really good or really bad. That's part of their compensation package and I don't begrudge them.

Looking at an upcoming LAX-HKG flight for a long weekend that I'm only taking because the fare is decent and I have plenty of SWU's. I'm only taking the trip because (well-if) I have the SWU's and see lots of J availability. I have over 30k in annualized spend so assume I'll be near the top of the upgrade list but ...never know who is buying at the last minute.

As to revs, can someone clarify whether an EXP booked in Y with a SWU pending can get upgraded to a vacant PE seat if the SWU doesn't clear?
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 2:03 pm
  #25  
 
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is your friend exex plat? there are also miles + copay for non status passenger. or SWU gifted to non-exec plat too.
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 2:11 pm
  #26  
 
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Originally Posted by pbd456
is your friend exex plat? there are also miles + copay for non status passenger. or SWU gifted to non-exec plat too.
But not to PEY; miles plus copays is still only offered Y to J or J to F. Something definitely seems off. I would not be happy if this happened to me, but it's unlikely that AA cares. Overall it seems AA would much rather accommodate nonrevs than release saaver awards.
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 2:19 pm
  #27  
 
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Originally Posted by no1cub17
But not to PEY; miles plus copays is still only offered Y to J or J to F. Something definitely seems off. I would not be happy if this happened to me, but it's unlikely that AA cares. Overall it seems AA would much rather accommodate nonrevs than release saaver awards.
is your friend ex plat on the list that was skipped over?
it is possible that all the people in the list before 21 are non exec plat.
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 3:28 pm
  #28  
 
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I don't really get what the problem is here...

Pax #2-#21 requested an upgrade from Y to J, and since there is no space in J and they are not eligible to be upgraded into PE with SWU, so they stay in Y. Now non-revs comes, gets whatever best seats left, so they are cleared into PE.
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 4:38 pm
  #29  
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For CK/EP to get the comp upgrade to PE, they -must- make the request specifically and at the gate and basically would be best to stay in the gate area once requested.

No specific request, no PE upgrade. And staying in the lounge 'aint gonna work either, for this.
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Old Oct 27, 2018, 4:48 pm
  #30  
 
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Originally Posted by shd9
I don't really get what the problem is here...

Pax #2-#21 requested an upgrade from Y to J, and since there is no space in J and they are not eligible to be upgraded into PE with SWU, so they stay in Y. Now non-revs comes, gets whatever best seats left, so they are cleared into PE.
It might not be strictly wrong, but my point is that this clears up what I -think- was speculation in other threads and that it sort of reflects poorly, I'm sure the 20 or so people who didn't have their upgrades clear were annoyed at the people who quite obviously cleared into PE... and if they were ALL NRs... Well, I don't think those people are going to be happy about it. Which leads me to speculate that AA is going to have to formalize an upgrade route to PE.

And Edit: if what JonNYC is saying is right, then something wrong definitely is happening with upgrades, because the GA should have acknowledged the upgrade request

Originally Posted by pbd456
is your friend ex plat on the list that was skipped over?
it is possible that all the people in the list before 21 are non exec plat.
Yes, he was. No, at least 2-15 were CK/EXP.

I guess there is one other explanation for this group other than being NR, it could be a bunch of passengers displaced from some other cancelled flight. But I checked all asia bound flights in AA yesterday, none of them were seriously delayed or cancelled.

Last edited by no2chem; Oct 27, 2018 at 5:34 pm
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