seaside65

Hi all. I searched for this and found one thread but no conclusion under the title "first-class-upgrade-award-vs-straight-redemption"

I am silver MPC and have a premium economy upgradeable fare ticket which I booked yesterday via the CX website.
The upgrade to biz was showing as available after booking but when I tried to take it though the website it gave me a weird error message. I had already checked the full award redemption availability and the biz class award showed as available so I called the MPC desk. The agent I was connected with told me that upgrade awards are different inventory to full award but they would waitlist me and put me on priority, whatever that means. I spoke to 3 different agents between last night and today and they all basically said the same thing.. upgrade is different to full award!
This is the first time I have seen or heard this and wonder if anyone on here actually has a definitive answer so that I can either keep calling MPC until I get someone that knows better or count it as a lesson learned and make sure I check the upgrade availability with an agent directly before buying the ticket.

iansh

From what I've experienced, as long as an outright U is available, a W/R->U should be available. Can be just another of those CX IT glitches.
How's the load looking at W? They may be more keen to move you if it's critical.

seaside65

Thanks for the reply. That is what I figured but it's the first time I have encountered this situation. I tend to plan well ahead, as in this case, so loading is wide open right now... 9s for all classes. Looks like I am the only one booked in W/R right now based on the seat map and only 4 seats assigned in the business cabin.

Guess I will keep bugging MPC agents!

cxfan1960

Yes, upgrade is actually different from full redemption, and is supposed to be easier. However, I encountered many times in the past when I booked any redemption (or even discounted business fares), everything looked good in the beginning until I started the ticketing process, then there came errors... I don't think checking availability is good enough unless you goes through the entire booking process.

sscywong

From my experience, when you see redemption availability (even only available in priority award basket) you can ticket companion U. For upgrade, most of the time I'll need to wait for a day or two to get the waitlist clear for one of the two legs, but they get cleared fast if seats are wide open. OP can try wait a day or two to see if they clear your waitlist

p.s. If you don't mind calling ticketing hotline you can actually ask reservation to hold your revenue ticket (i.e. set a later ticketing deadline) and then call MPC to waitlist upgrade at the same time, and ticket both only when your upgrade is cleared. Do pay attention to the ticketing deadline to avoid your revenue seat get released

seaside65

Thanks for the all of the feedback advice. It is all very much appreciated. Have to admit that while being a seasoned flyer I am relatively new to CX.
Going forward I will be calling the desk first to hold the bookings and check availability before issuing.

So, anyway, I finally managed to speak to an agent that seemed somewhat more knowledgeable.
Perhaps I should have stated at the outset that the flight that isn't being upgraded is the 2nd leg from HKG to TLV of 2 legs with the 1st leg being from HND to HKG (both legs on CX).
She explained that although the redemption is available it is only available if the flight originates in HKG rather than being a connecting flight. I don't fully understand why the availability would be different, or why the website initially showed availability when upgrading and then errored out, but I suppose it makes more sense than any of the other explanations I received.
I did just check and I guess what I find odd is that both legs have award availability for redemption in business but the combined itinerary shows wait list.
Is this usual?

I will of course keep calling quite regularly to see if something changes but as of now I guess I am on wait list and hoping it clears!

TiredDoc

Can anyone help? Is there a definitive answer?

FlyPointyEnd

Married segments have different availability than individual flights...same way they are priced differently. Just put yourself on the waitlist and pray to all the gods to help you....calling every few days helps also