I'm surprised by this -- US carriers normally waive everything if you are buying to a higher class of service... maybe it is a calculated guess on the agent's part that OP was not interested in plunking down thousands of dollars to move up. Or a jump to conclusions, given how many people must ask for a cheap cash upgrade.

Me thinks the OP did not want to pay the cash difference....and the check-in agent had a good read on the situation. I've done the exact procedure a few times and never, ever have had any issues. You just have to wait while they recalculate the (entire) fare difference and then have to pay up. Many people are used to the "let's make a deal" game and don't understand that CX doesn't play along. I suspect CX check-in agents see that all the time. So unless you are serious and say "hey, I want to upgrade my ticket to F, do it for me" they just assume you're not serious, especially if you're on some ridiculously discounted Y fare. If you're flying cheapo $800 round-trip S class to North America and are asking to upgrade to J, let's say there is only J or C left, you could be looking at a $3-$4k USD difference for that sector if flying to North America, which would literally be 10x the value of that one segment. That's an extreme example but I could see how the check-in agent wouldn't take you seriously, especially if the flight was full and there were a line of people behind you.

I meant the same day upgrades that they discount at check in for extra revenue. I was assuming the OP was not talking about paying full fare and yes I would be shocked if any airline would turn down full fare upgrades to higher class of tickets.

I didn't want to get something I didn't pay for.

I plunked down hkd $11000 for HKG to LHR on economy.

Now they had biz class available and I didn't sleep all night, I wanted to pay the difference between full fare business ticket and my ticket.

If that difference was say 20k and they have a seat available it makes full business sense to sell the ticket.

She replied to me as if I was some second class citizen for even holding a lower fare economy ticket (my existing ticket allowed mileage to be accrued but no upgrade using miles)

If I owned the business and there was a diamond member in business class who paid, and someone wants to pay full fare to up my ticket I'd op up the DM member and sell his seat to the guy who wants to pay full fare.

Just makes sense to me. I am just nOt seeing any benefit of flying CX and spending 15-20k usd.

This is not meant to be a rant, other than lounge access op up on long haul HKG to JFK or HKG to lhr just doesn't happen. I wait hours to purchase a ticket over the phone or call the MPC. Am rudely treated by the staff, loss of duty free, etc. emrites takes longer to go to these destinations but many people get op uped a lot.

Are you the OP?

Other than the name change I assume this is the guy who started this.

Switching to US$ for ease of comparison, you paid $1,375 (round trip I suspect, so each way under $700) and you think the add-on to London is $2,500?

This is after you sort of recognize the fare (round trip I am guessing) is $15,000 (I doubt $20,000) , yet you should be able to stump up at the last minute a total of $3,200 for $7,500 worth of goods, hence the complaint and CX not wanting to play the same game?,

No, I am the OP.

I was flying HKG-TPE.

I had a discounted economy ticket, and enquirer about upgrading to business. I didn't expect the difference to be too big.

She looked on the screen, and said as I had a discounted ticket, no option to upgrade, so I left.

The flight was 20% full at best.

Any chance she misunderstood you and thought you meant to upgrade with miles?

I don't think so.

"Hi, please can you tell me how much it would cost to upgrade my flight to business please?"

Don't over estimate people's understanding of English... especially in HK.

And my answer to this question would be, no you can't upgrade your ticket as its non refundable. I don't think it's the obligation of the agent to say you can buy a new J ticket, if you were asking about upgrades.

No, not the OP. Just someone with a similar experience.

It wasn't about the fare, I was in the Pier lounge waiting for my flight so I went up to the desk and asked if I could pay to upgrade my ticket from my existing class to a business class seat. Price was never mentioned, she looked at my ticket and said you are not allowed to even pay to upgrade this seat. Was rather cold and the 4 woman behind the desk proceeded to look like they had to attend to more important matters.

My point is flying these days is not cheap. Since 2003 I have flown every long haul flight with CX mostly consisting of CAN-HKG-JFK, CAN-HKG-LAX, or CAN-HKG-LHR. When I am back stateside and I fly super cheap airlines which I find on expedia I can say I get better service from the FA and agents on the ground. Policies of these airlines are another story, but I just don't understand the business sense of not allowing someone to pay to upgrade their seat.

I wonder if catering could be the issue close to departure time. Also, some lounges cannot do complicated ticketing procedures and there might not have been time to send you to the airline's ticketing counter at the airport or an airside service counted that can take care of complicated ticketing. Given these logistical constraints, the answer could be no but perhaps the agent thought it would be easier/faster to tell you that the ticket cannot be upgraded.

The people in the lounge suck at doing anything helpful. On at least two occasions they were unwilling to help me get on an earlier flight. I think it was because they just don't want to deal with it, which is unfortunate. But yea I've never had success doing anything complicated with them.

CX in general is not eager to turn away revenue. Look at how desperate they are to get new MPC members (Amex offers, giving away SFO lounge access), diluting the rest of us (and premium pax) in the process. I just think it's a somewhat poorly managed company and the whole team isn't on board with the mission.

There is a simple reason why they would "turn away revenue": to maintain the integrity of the premium classes. Sure, could every CX flight today earn more revenue by offering people discounted biz and F upgrades? Yes. They could easily fill up a half-full J class by doing some type of auction mechanism for Y pax. The problem, obviously is what that does to your long-term premium revenue generation - do loyal cash pax quit flying premium, or start buying cheaper fares? The answer is a most definite "yes", which causes a downward spiral in the premium class. So they "turn away revenue" today to maintain pricing tomorrow. US mainline carriers have decimated the value of their "First" class because any enterprising FF members can figure out a way to get it for free, or much cheaper than the list price.

Yet to the above point, seeing how CX lately doesn't mind eroding the value of their premium services, maybe they will start playing "let's make a deal" for cheaper premium seats soon.