I'm looking at a RT flight HKG-SIN and there are of course no awards despite plenty of seats open. Thinking of booking PE. Upgrading to J is only possible with R/W booking class, but the cheapest PE is in E class.

Will CX clear the upgrade if the seat is available at the gate, or does it not work like that?

You will need to book in R class. You can do an airport upgrade using Asiamiles- can be processed in the lounge. Some extra taxes to be paid as well, I think.

These days, I don't think there's any guarantee that an instant upgrade would clear. Seems logical that it should, seats available, customer willing to burn miles, etc. but logic is in short quantity lately.

That being said, you should also check in the days leading up to the flight. It's common for awards to become available in the last few days. If you don't clear, ask for instant upgrade a check-in counter. They may make you wait until check-in is closed and complete the transaction in the lounge.

Have we had any reports that Instant Upgrade did not clear and flight left with empty J seats? If so that would have a huge implications...

Thankfully most times I get my upgrade cleared prior to departure and rarely do I have to rely on Instant Upgrade.

[MENTION=328838]helvetic[/MENTION] - I concur to what synthkeys says. Very often they release upgrade inventory the last few days (up to last few hours I have seen). This is on YYZ-HKG route and I have seen quite a few times where upgrade U inventory becomes available despite I showing 0. (e.g. J3 C2 D2 I0).

I ended up booking E and deciding it wasn't worth $500 USD + 24k miles to upgrade the round trip HKG-SIN… and guess what, I got op-up'd from W to J anyways on the way there. Perfect.

Flying Thursday - no upgrade offer :(

Hey All,

Not sure if this is the right forum to post this but I hit the 1600 point mid-tier diamond benefit which is 4 bookable upgrades. Can anyone share any experience with how easy it is to get the upgrades approved/processed? I had several gold mid tier upgrade passes expire cause I was never able to get the upgrade approved before the flight...

Upgraded on the return too. Woah. Is it that common to get op-up booked in W on HKG-SIN? Seems like they oversell Y/W and there's not much competition as emerald in W for the op-up. I'm not even Marco Polo elite.

What’s the chances of op up with this situation.

J9 C9 D9 I9 U Y4 B0 H0 K0 M0 L0 V0S0 N0 Q0 O0

ticket book in B class and MPC GO

I still need to buy J to YYZ at least once or twice a year for me to maintain Gold, however what's your success rate from buying upgradeable PEY fares and using Asia Miles to upgrade?

I don't recall mine exactly, however on my most recent flight back in August, I was waitlisted for both outbound and return. My return ended up being confirmed almost a month out, whilst the outbound never cleared (didn't know about checking closer to the date trick, until just a few days ago as I was able to upgrade from J to F to LAX), I was eventually upgraded at the gate.

I have been doing this for the past 4 years at least, totalling at least 12+ roundtrips, and only once (this Jan) that I missed out on the Mileage Upgrade (both ways!).

Most of the time I clear anywhere between T-3day to T-12hours, occasionally I get lucky and they clear earlier.

Not YYZ<->HKG, but for JFK/EWR<->HKG, I'm 100% for the last 3 years, avg. about 7 trips per year. I pick flights and dates that I'm confident I can get an upgrade or waitlist confirmed. I'm only DM this past year, and getting confirmed is easier and I can roll the dice a bit and choose more popular flights and times. Before that as GO, I was waitlisted more often and maybe 25% of the time I didn't get confirmed at booking or clear waitlist but managed to get instant upgrade or confirmed 2-3 days before the flight.

My co-workers won't pay the up-charge for R fares if they can't get confirmed at booking but I'm willing to take the risk. If you plan wisely and watch the loads it can be an effective strategy. But you need to choose less popular times where loads are a bit lighter. I usually arrive HKG on Saturday mornings and depart on Sunday afternoons and I'm willing to take a midweek flight if I think its necessary. Whereas my co-workers are less flexible and want to arrive HKG on Monday mornings and depart on Friday afternoons which are popular arrival and departure days and thus harder to get an upgrade.

Also it helps working with my travel agent, she has access to more information than I can get on EF and is willing to call MPC several times on my behalf (and speaks Canto) to see if the flights I choose can get confirmed immediately plus her fares a better than what CX publishes online.

Has cheap AM upgrade replaced op-up?
 

My family (Both OWR) came back from HND on CX549 a few days ago. They faced an interesting situation and I'm not sure if I heard it before. Since I didn't travel with them so I may miss some details.
Background: Y class is overbooked, PEY and J are not full.
What happened is: Most (or all) PEY passengers were op-uped to J. All Y class passengers during my fam's check-in (They had to deal with overweight luggage so it took them a lot of time) were offered a cheap AM upgrade (1k or 2k miles, not sure) to PEY, and most passengers took the offer. They are definitely not OW/MPC silver or above because they are in the Y/PEY check-in counter. However, my family (BA/OWR, but travelled on CX metal mostly) on revenue ticket were not offered anything including an op-up or cheap upgrade. I understand avios cannot be used for upgrade, but should they be offered an op-up or something ahead of cheap AM upgrade for non status members? Also, I don't think I've heard of a cheap upgrade in the past, so is this a new policy? Thanks!

News to me

i wonder were AM Y redemptions also offered a further opportunity to opup? Or was it revenue pax only?

Unfortunately I have no idea. Maybe someone else faced a similar situation can share here? But a side note I guess CX549 won't have many Y class redemptions due to the popularity of the route?