onobond

Edit: NeverFirst beat me to it while I was writing. Good advice in her/his post^

simons1

Yes - just get the TA to put your BAEC number on the booking. Any TA will know what to do here.

Or you can do it online or at check-in.

LondonElite

Don't stress yourself out about upgrades! A gold card almost prevents them!

Phil the Flyer

This thread makes me realise that I never, ever, approach a check-in desk in the hope/expectation of an upgrade. I’ve found that, ‘something for nothing’ culture notwithstanding, generally in life you get what you pay for. Accordingly I don’t lose any sleep over the fact that BAEC Gold (and, on occasions, GUF2s) for my wife and I is earned annually predominantly (ie 90%) through flying QR J. I wouldn’t know what a CIV score was if it hit me in the face; if we are ‘lesser’ BAEC Golds I couldn’t give a monkey’s.

ScruttonStreet

My only upgrade came before I was LTG and was a 'treble'. Y to Y+(two days before flight). Y+ to J (at check in). J to F (in the lounge). Most of my travel has been BA, and apart from that single time, not once in more than 20 years' flying.

Petrus

There are so many factors the algorithm will have to take into account when processing upgrades so predicting/hoping for it is pointless.

- How many?
- move solo PAX or more?
- Then status comes into play, Prem > GGL > G > S > B > BL.
- And within each tier (except Prem presumably as they are exalted) CIV comes into play
- But then recent upgrades also come into the equation. Algo might opt to move a lesser CIV for business reasons

Fact: ordering a special meal = forget about upgrades.
Anectodal evidence; running Solo increases the chances.

So really who knows (and cares)?

As for if Gold are created equal, yeah. We all start at 35. But the more revenue you spend with BA, the higher your number and importance.

PETER01

Gold's now start at 52 but really who cares apart from a few FTr's.

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/26586103-post13.html

Petrus

Well that makes us more important already at vanilla level!!

"Claps hands. Pops Champagne. Looks with pity at Silver card holder with his tags hanging of his back pack. I am superior being"

Wozza2404

The long and short of it is that your Gold card will likely get you more attention on airlines other than BA. For example QR are quite proactive at seeking out Emeralds on board and going into this awful robotic speech about how valuable you are. Similarly, on mH you'll likely find the Purser (or whatever they're called on MH) will approach you on long haul flights and tell you that because you are Elite they are taking your food order first to ensure you get your first choice.

As for upgrades, I find as a GGL I have a very good hit rate of being op-upped into F from paid CW when flying on leisure-heavy routes (AUH and DXB being good examples). On these routes there will be fewer GGL or GCHs, and a lot of families and couples, so as a solo traveller with status the probability of an upgrade shoots up. Flying to HKG or SIN, which are status and business pax heavy routes, forget it.

Sixth Freedom

Not so. A passenger who always buys seats that would otherwise go unsold is worth much more to the airline than a passenger who pays full fare for a seat that could be sold three times over, especially if there are substantial back-end incentives to the full fare passenger's employer. This is why airlines who move to revenue based FFP are unwise.

Phil the Flyer

cosmo74

I've had two Short Haul upgrades since turning Gold, one while travelling on ComAir with a fellow gold on the same PNR who wasn't upgraded - I tend to avoid long haul with BA unless I'm using avios, which is probably a good reason why upgrades there haven't been forthcoming

simons1

But if the seat was going unsold then the airline would be happy for the passenger to book last minute and pay the highest fare possible.

Frequent flyer 101

I do sometimes wonder if BA are really as scientific as we tend to think about it. I'm sure status + CIV plays a role, but if I imagine the check-in manager/gate agent type person trying to handle overbooking. If there are 2 people that need to be upgraded, surely it would be easier for them to just upgrade a party of 2 silvers vs two individual golds.

gingerlucy

The only upgrade I've had in recent years was as a Silver on a flight from Glasgow to London City, moved up in the lounge to CE. Since the previous flight was cancelled and this one the last flight to London of the day we were completely full. I can't imagine there were no Golds at all on this plane or the cancelled one before it, so I doubt I was the "highest ranking" person there, nor do I make that trip more than a couple of times a year at most. Perhaps they wanted to tempt me in to booking CE for future Glasgow trips - pointless as it's one of the few flights I take for work and they won't allow that. My take-home was only that it's not entirely based on status.

Before that, my last upgrades were back in about 2009/2010 where my boss and I were both upgraded together from WTP to CW on three out of four LHR-JFK flights. It did make number four with no upgrade a little disappointing! Back then I was only a Blue and she had whatever the lowest achieved status level was with Qantas. I was thrilled each time primarily because she was a horrible person and a weird travel companion and it was always a blessed relief when the seats in CW were never next to each other. But I have no idea why our strike rate was so high. Again there must have been people on the plane with higher status than us as I was the lowest of the low and she wasn't far above.

(When I say "weird", she wouldn't entertain herself at all. We would have the travel time from the office, time in the airport before the first flight, the TATL leg, a layover in a US airport, a US domestic flight and travel time the other end, and not once did she ever look at a book, magazine, any IFE, any work, nothing, not even much talking. She'd just stare into space the entire time as if waiting to be beamed up to the mothership. It was extremely disconcerting.)