London Dude

In terms of free upgrades... When I lived in Chicago about 25 years ago I once had a seating issue at check-in for a flight to LHR. BA's head of station at the time came over to the desk and resolved it, and then we had a chat as she kindly walked me through security and on to the lounge. I was a lowly Silver at the time. Since the time I met her I've been upgraded about 95% of the time when flying out of ORD, mostly from paid J or award J to F (compare that with less than 5% of the time when flying out of LHR.) Often I had already been upgraded to F when I OLCIed for the flight the previous day, and several of the times this happened J was not even oversold, as I often remember noticing a few empty seats in the J cabin after take-off. So I suspect that BA's management at certain outstations used to have a great deal of leeway in terms of dishing out free upgrades to "local" frequent flyers and kept some kind of local list of flyers flagged for preferential treatment, which would explain the advance upgrades and the high upgrade success rate. BTW I said "used to" as I've now mostly switched to AA out of the US because of the better lounges and of the consistent 1-2-1 seating in the J cabin.

bubbashow

How could an agent trust an "I'm on my honeymoon?" If that worked, everyone would be on a honeymoon. It is like flying domestically in the US, the majority of the "extra time needed" passengers are the first to pop up an bound up the jetway upon landing. Midwest USA (anywhere) to Florida (anywhere) are miracle flights.

BA6948

Going back to the Comair topic. I have flown with them a lot while on Business in SA. Our travel policy is Y only. However, if there are empty C seats on domestics, they usually are willing to upgrade you if you pay for it. I paid once €40 for a JNB-DUR and I think €60 for a JNB-CPT. This was done at check in. The price was reasonable but I had to ask. So my assumption here is that they were not planning to operate the C cabin hence the « no ».

RichieMc

I think the OP said he was offered a paid upgrade.

Fraser

I've never quite understood the honeymoon upgrade request, or frankly anyone who thinks their personal "special" circumstances (birthday, celebration etc.) justify an upgrade. If you don't think a honeymoon is a special enough occasion to warrant paying for Business/First then why should the airline?

Hotels are a different animal.

99% of my hotel stays are either with a chain where I have loyalty status that should provide upgrades as a published benefit, or I book through Virtuoso/Amex FHR or similar where space available upgrades are usually part of the benefits. I will often ask at check-in to ensure published benefits get honoured. BA don't have an equivalent...

Indeed, as someone has been upgraded by airlines a decent number of times I can count on the number of fingers on my left knee the number of times I've asked for an upgrade....zero.

In fact the opposite has been the case. On one occasion a long time ago my father and I were flying BD Y together, (LHR-BRU if I recall). We both had *A Gold status but were on different reservations. In the lounge he was paged and upgraded (as a BD Gold). He rejected the upgrade on the basis he was flying with me but they asked to see my boarding pass and as I was *G they said they could upgrade me too so we could still sit together. Obviously not the most exciting of upgrades but rejecting one ended up with two....

Pretty sure most airlines have staff dedicated to service in the premium cabin.

firstlight

I've never asked for an upgrade but have got to know when they might happen. It's a pleasant surprise when it happens when there's no obvious operational reason (e.g. overbooked cabin on plane or a configuration change)
BA originally gave me a CW upgrade when I was exec blue as a marketing ploy about 10 years ago as I'd never flow in CW before, and then more recently a double upgrade for Mrs Firstlight and me from CW to F. I suspect that BA bean counters and marketing would regard it as money very well spent in terms of the return they have got back !

JD1905

Yeap my one and only upgrade at the age of 22/23 from WT to WTP as BA Blue. Ticket was booked by the company I worked for at the time and in hindsight it ticked alot of the boxes for an upgrade.

6 Years later i’m BA Gold and they’ve done alright out of me to be fair. My days of Trans-Atlantic flying are now gone for the foreseeable though so my preferred airline heading East unfortunately can’t be BA.

testycal

Received lounge passes for the entire family once in YVR ..did not ask....I had been discussing how the taxi did not show and we had to cobble together family who could run us to the airport (I took the subway because there was insuffiicent room in the vehicle)...it was a welcome suprise and started our trip off with a good vibe.

As a Silver who normally flies transatlantic frequently...never received an upgrade.

woodey

I've never asked for an upgrade but have been lucky enough to get an operational upgrade on several occasions, for me being silver and travelling in the W cabin was the sweet spot. I've been silver or gold since the late 90s, most of the 00's I was gold and received very few upgrades, in the 10's I flip flopped between silver and gold several times. I can still remember all of the upgrades:

Silver
LHR - ORD Y > J (before the W cabin existed)
LHR - MRU J > F
IAD - LHR Y > W
LHR - DXB Y > W
LGW - MAD Y > J
LOS - LHR W > J
MIA - LHR Y > J (substitute Low J 747 with high J)
LHR - JNB W > J
MCO - LGW W > J

Gold
LHR - ORD J > F
ORD - OMA Y > F (AA domestic)

This represents less than 2% of my flights and all of these were on occasions where the cabin I was booked in was oversold. So the moral of the story is book the cabin you want to travel in, don't expect anything different and very occasionally you'll be pleasantly surprised.

gingerlucy

Same kind of thing here, in my 20s as a Blue, I went on two business trips to the USA. My boss and I were both upgraded from WTP to CW on three out of four of those flights. I can only think that it was something to do with the corporate travel agent. It did make flight number 4 with no upgrade a little disappointing though.

Have to say the best bit of those upgrades was not the food, drink, service or flat bed. It was that I absolutely hated that boss and the upgrades always meant we were not seated together any more. Bliss!

Never happened to me since on any of the flights I've paid for myself, at any status level.

PAL62V

And here. Lowly Blue in my late thirties some years back. LHR-CPT in Y and upgraded at the gate to J. Ascended the 747 stairs to experience my first ever lie flat bed and on an overnight flight too. Pure bliss and a great treat.

Smid

I've seen VS do this a couple of times with people with a leg in a cast, but they usually do it after the meal service, so it's only a seat upgrade into a spare seat

Will100

I get the spirit in which the question is asked but would you expect a steak if you ordered (and paid for) chips in a restaurant just because they weren’t busy?

12d121

Not sure I'm following the analogy because nobody has expected anything. But to take your analogy...

I was perfectly happy with the economy seat (or the chips). Asked if there were any upgrades to business (or the steak). They said no (or the restaurant said no). The economy seat was then enjoyed perfectly happily with complete understanding that this was what was paid for (or perfectly happy to receive and eat the chips because that was what was ordered).


While eating the chips I would still be thinking about the operational considerations airlines go through when offering upgrades

msm2000uk

As the OP has said they'd be willing to pay something for the upgrade, I don't begrudge them for asking.

I'd imagine, looking at Comairs current financial hole, catering & staffing etc would have proven difficult at the last minute for a flight which was evidently empty in J.

Anyway, welcome to married life to the OP, and get used to being told off for asking a seemingly innocuous question

M