Have Cathay changed their upgrade priority
 

I was wondering if CX had changed the upgrade priority as someone I knew flying to Paris on 4th Jan was upgraded.

She has a silver MPO, checked in online - her B/N was 195, and she was on a B class ticket.

My understanding was that an upgrade was determined on status, then B/N. As her check in number was way down and only a silver, i would have thought her chances were slim - especially as the flight was full

This is a little OT, but BN 195 sounds too high for a customer on-line check in.. that is like more than 50% of the customers have online checked in.

I am also a little surprised to see Silvers being op-up as well on a B74A.

My wife who has silver had an op-up on Dec 29 HKG to LAX o nthe 4pm flight. We were travelling the same day but not on the same flights. We adjusted her to coincide with mine on CX883 and both of us were op-uped. ^

Probably because of the B class ticket? I think B class is a full fare ticket?

One thing is clear - Any MPC status trumps any OW status when it comes to OP upgrades. This was not always the case. I've just converted from AA to MPC and am now 1/1 on op-upgrades wheras I'd had none in a few years using my AA Emerald card.

Well, I was not surprised since I was the recipient of similar op-ups for the route HKG-LAX when I was a Silver last Summer. Flight was full in all-classes, lots of up-ups from Y-J and J-F. My ticket-class was M.

In another case, I saw that a Gold member in front of me wasn't upgraded but I was upgraded because I was travelling during my birthday. That could happen too.

i got upgraded from J-F when i was on HKG-YYZ on jan 5, and i was only MPC green. i was quite surprised when the ground staff reached for a pass on the counter when i was standing at the boarding gate. thank you op up fairies! =)

My son was op-upped on the incredibly difficult to upgrade JFK-HKG route on May 15th last year as a Silver. They had oversold economy though and there were lots of op-ups. Just no J-F ones according to ISM.

Cathay do upgrade for birthday's I was upgraded J-F on a U class ticket on my birthday on an empty flight. Definitely a good perk to keep us suckers loyal.

It was definitely a B/N in the 190's - we only did online check-in about 8 hrs before the flight. I too was surprised at the high number.

Interestingly, when I was in London I asked to use my miles to be upgraded - she said there was a long waiting list for upgrades - so I asked if I could join anyway. She then took my gold card and looked at the computer (I was B/N 3) and upgraded me straight away. I wonder if the B/N made a difference in this case. She told me that I had got the only avaliable seat in business.

BN should not play any role on mileage upgrades.

I was under the impression that BN was the order of check in - and that if there were say 10 Gold Members on a flight that was oversold in economy but say had 5 seats avaliable in business - then the first 5 who checked in would get upgraded.

That's the conclusion I got from several discussions on this forum

That's correct. However, in your previous post (#10) it seems you are talking about an upgrade using miles.

Yes you are correct, but that has nothing to do with Mileage Upgrade (MFU).
From my experience CX generally are quite ethical in the sense that if the will opup people on the day they will not ODU, unless of course you are desperate and wanted to get the confirm upgrade straight away.

But wouldn't it be the same with MFU's - they would choose the upgrade on who checked in online first - otherwise how do you choose between 5 golds requesting an upgrade on a K class ticket

I was on CX 110 from Sydney and J class was full. I'm not sure how busy Y was was though I wondered what percentage of J had been 'op -upped'. I had used points the week before, ringing the MPC hotline. I was very surprised that there was space available.

MFU and ODU are slightly different in the sense that MFU will be based on the WL priority and ODU will be based on when you turn up at the airport as you have to be present to process it. So I guess in one sense, yes BN can play a part for ODU, but you have to physically be at the airport first (and not just based on BN on OLCI). For MFU, you should get the confirm pretty much when the flight is open for check in.

Also slightly OT, I am not sure whether the agent I spoke to is 100% correct, but she claimed that if you have an upgrade MFU award issued and decide not to use it, it is not possible to just turn up to the airport and use it on another flight even if space is available (ie, u can't treat a MFU award coupon into ODU).

The main advantage in using a MFU is the savings in miles if you claim a return award or 2 sector upgrade award vs an oneway, one sector ODU.

did they deduct your miles finally or was it a courtesy upgrade (operational).

It was a miles upgrade - so the deducted the miles.

The problem was that business was booked as 99% full - ie there was one space left. In London, they get a take down a list of people who want to upgrade for the flight - it seems there are usually more people requesting one way upgrades than seats avaliable - then allocate the seats once check-in has finished. That way they know how many seats there are left and how many want to upgrade. I assume they then allocate seats due to status.

Now the thing this time - was that I was allocated a seat immediately on a one-way upgrade, even though the woman initially said that there was a waiting list. I can only assume that the fact I was BN 3 helped and that there were no diamonds wanting an upgrade.

Can somebody please clarify what does "BN" stand for? And what does it mean?

BN is the boarding number, in CX terms, it represent your are the X-th flyer to check-in for that flight (including OLCI)

wow I got a boarding number 1 on my previous flight. =P
Had no idea what it stand for at that time.

I have another question. Let's say I use my miles to upgrade to J. And the day on my flight it's my birthday. Will I be upgraded to F? Because CX upgrade people on their birthdays.

This is not a certainty.

Well, I recently got upgraded from Y to J three times (over the past month)

1. HKG - Kaohsiung : on a very cheap (? HK$1000 round trip) fare
2. Kaohsiung - HKG : on the way back
3. HKG - Taipei : on CX, but this time on a redemption ticket!

And I'm only a lowly Green member! I didn't know they upgraded on redemption tickets for Green members.

:) I'm not complaining !

wow you are lucky :p

i have been on the YYZ route for 4 times since i have been green, and the flights are always full when i fly, but i never got a chance for op-up. we dun get lots of DMs on the YYZ route i believe (although i saw one last flight). maybe we just have many silvers/greens.

anyway after 4 YYZ flight i am up to silver now (that's how i like this route :D) 4 Y flights a year and i can have Priority baggages/lounge access

Same here! I got my Silver just flying 4 times on this route. I have never seen any baggage with Gold or DM tags when i receive my luggage. There were only a few Silver tags. However I got one op-up once.

i saw a DM in the baggage area and a CX customer service woman was chatting with the DM. The DM had a slow baggage (one of his baggages was not out yet after all the priority baggages were out). But ya I rarely see GD/DM on this route.

as my friend once said, there are more students flying in these flights than the working force. since students usually just fly twice a yr (xmas and summer), it explains the lack of GO and Diamonds.

I mean the day i got the op up on 826, i knew half the cabin (one of my frds bought an F ticket, and the other got op up as well, and myself, all students). there were also 5 students out of the in the mini J cabin behind me (they looked to be about 14-17). it really gives you an idea of who travels on these flights

exactly. and that would also explain how silver is attainable for students. we just need to fly twice a year to get silver on the yyz route. provided that they are aware that by joining MPC and fly on the route for twice a year they can get all those benefits

Re: Have Cathay changed their upgrade priority
 

My wife and I will take a flight to Singapore on her birthday next week, is CX op-up her/us from Y to J when she is MPO Green?

@:-)

there is no 100% for it. it's been rumoured that people do get op-uped on their birthday occasionally, but this of course, does not ALWAYS have to happen. also, if you booked two tickets, i believe it does reduce your chances because it's harder to op up two people instead of one.

I was either Silver member or Gold member for the last few years.

Yes, I did fly CX on my birthdays (for a few times already).

But no, I did not get any upgrade on my birthdays.

I flew either AKL or SYD.

Maybe the class above yours was full on each occasion?