EUA Games
 

I am an EWR Plat travelling to IAH tomorrow on a U fare.

Of course I have not gotten n EUA yet. Yesterday there were 6 seats in first open on the outbound flight. Today there are 3.

I am beginning to wonder what kind of tricks CO is working behind the scenes.

Would a Gold on a B fare be upgraded at their 5 day window while a Plat on a U gets passed over? Does anyone have any factual information on how this works?

I understand the new rules do take fare class into account very heavily, however, I never understood the rules to allow Golds to be upgraded ahead of Plats. I obviously have no basis for this comment except to think the flight is not loaded with Plats, which is certainly could be. This just seems to be standard these days, regardless of the route.

I know the EWR-IAH route is very difficult to score an upgrade, so maybe 3 Plats ended up ahead of me since they purchase higher faires.

I heard CO claim all of the upgrades are more difficult because of their extremely high load factor, but my Plat status is lmost becoming useless for upgrades. If I weren't held hostage flying out of EWR I would have comped over to another airline by now. This sucks.

You put it perfectly!! Couldn't have said it better myself.....

Hey -- this boat's getting full. Okay -- I'll move back over to the gold corner :D

No.

The truth of the matter is no one really knows. We on FT have not (yet:)) gotten access to the algorithmn use to asssign FC upgrade seats. Some feel that CO severly limits "R" inventory so no matter what fare basis you are on, if there are no "R" sets, you can't be upgraded. Others (like me) feel that there are other things at play. I think that on the 5 day and 3 day (at least) EUA runs, CO severely limits any upgrades from any but high yield fares. What is high yield? YHK???? No one really knows. In truth, I think, it is probably some combination of both and for certain city pairs (EWR-IAH, EWR-transcons, etc) it is probably more complicated still.
The only thing sure is that whatever is going on, upgrades are down, and down substantially.

keep in mind that regardless of elite level, if you do OLCI and a seat has become available since the previous nights EUA run, that elite will get it, even if an elite who check'd in earlier (before any additional R seats became available) is on the already on the standby list. once you are added to the standby list, the only way your getting the upgrade is at the midnight or 3 hour EUA run or at the gate.

my theory.... check in on the afternoon after the previous days EUA's. even though EUA runs at midnight, rev managment works 8-5 and adjusts fare buckets at those times.

Over all our collective dead bodies would a GOLD get an EUA before a Plat!

The fare rule issue has alwasy applied to EUAs, the application of it to day of departure upgrades is newer, but just an attempt to be more fair.

It's possible people are buying tickets and that there may have been more plats ahead of you on the high fare classes, and they got the few "R" class seats released. People are buying first class these days. I buy it when ever I's under 600 dollars fairly advanced or last minute. (my trips to ATL and MDW this year have been paid first, as well a couple trips where I mixed coach (paid) and first (paid)...) Not to mention depending on the market, some last minute fares for first are still affordable.

I also think Continental has figured out the online checkin thing... and thats why many many more of them are being done at the gate, after all people should have checked in ... in order to prevent silvers getting an upgrade before a possible plat...

I think perhaps they are looking at all the elites for a flight... if plats and golds all get done at the 5 an 3 days out then a silver will prolly get a 1 day or something released at check in. If they are still holding seats for sale and there are plats still waiting after the 5 days etc... they hold those seats until all have check in then let EUA run at the gate to ensure Plats are getting the upgrades (what few seats are left).

-Vincent

You should check in at 24 hours exactly as they are unlikely to release R seats after an EUA run. Getting the best Seq # helps when you have several plats at the same fare level (this happened on the way back from IAH last weekend).

But it would not surprise me if the computer looks for H fare plats and upgrades them, if it doesn't see any, it waits until 3 hour EUA or battlefield.
I wonder if it looks at H golds and figures out if it can 'waste' the upgrades on the non-H plats to get the gold up....

hmmmmmmm To be a fly on the wall in the IT department...

My observation has been that a few EUA seats are released to Plat at the 5 day EUA (you can check the seat maps after 9pm) and likely only to the point of the higher fare codes. Afterwards I have not seen any EUA's at all, even though there may be 8 of out 12 FC seats still available.

Prior to March 16th, it would be possible for a silver to check in (I have seen it first hand) and get an OLCI up, even though a Plat did not get EUA'ed the night before. The OLCI had to occur in the afternoon, not 24 hours before.

Now after March 16th, it appears the OLCI up has gone away. All seats are held and processed at the gate. On a flight IAH-SNA a few week ago (after 3/16), Galileo showed A7 - six hours before departure. Then at the gate, it looks like 7 people were called up for new F boarding passes. The agents had a list of the sorted elite ups.

Last month on a EWR-LAS flight on a 752, on day of travel the seating chart showed 7 open FC seats. I had duly checked in on line 24 hrs ahead, and been placed on the waitlist. At the PC I was told there were now 9 available F seats, and I shouldn't have a problem-- but was still not assigned one (obviously this Plat did not get one at the 5 day EUA mark), I was told to check at the gate. Sure enough at the gate I was given my F seat, and low & behold even after everyone had boarded and the FA's went back to coach and brought up a couple more elites to F there were still 3 empty seats!

EUA at CO solved!
 

I think I've finally figured out how EUA on CO works. Do you remember those chickens who could play tic-tac-toe at the State Fare? Well, CO got a great deal on these, and they now peck out the passengers who get the EUA. One problem is that a few of the chickens have passed on, and no one at CO has notice it. :)

i believe you are incorrect re OLCI.

say your flight leaves friday at 6pm. you checkin thursday at 6pm. no upgrade. then at midnight, the EUA runs. no upgrades awarded because there is no R availability. then, the rev managemtn people get to the office and run their daily reports on available fare buckets and whatever else they do. they make their changes on your flight and release 3 R seats. let's say they do this around lunch time on friday (the day of your flight). upon arriving back from lunch, i check in for the your same flight using OLCI. i get the upgrade. let's say two more elites check in. they get the upgrades. then whatever seats are left get EUA'd at the 3 hour mark.

once you go on the waitlist, the only way you get up'd is through the nightly EUA, the 3 hour EUA or at the gate.

DO you actually think the rev management people look at 600 flights a couple times a day and manually adjust the buckets?

Its all computerized.

Channa:

I would tend to agree with you, but even on the flights back I was stuck in the back ... only a few seats away from you! I was in 16F and you were C. I wonder just how many Plats were with us this morning. Misery loves company.

I think we should have Cigarman pitch that CO gives him a contact and once a week we get to audit the upgrade process on a flight of our choice. It would give the process some much needed integrity on this board.

After the Houston meeting, I got the impression that CO was not deceptive as much as catering to higher fare pax, which is a good business move.

It just always seems that when you are on the outside looking in it doesn't smell kosher.

We can speculate about EUA all we want but the changes seem to be before March 16 Plats were upgraded at the 5 day window and after that date we are riding in the back.

So could it be possible that instead of releasing R seats and upgrading the old fashtion way that are assigning the upgrades (without reguard to status level) to the higher fare elites so the upgrade just happens to hit when you checkin. Any unused R's are given out as battlefields. This could be CO way of putting the rif-raf Plats in their place and reward the higher fares with the caress of leather and since everything is done at the last minute by the computer who would know (are any silvers being upgraded these days).

I was flying on a B fare IAH to BWI (737-300) and was in the back so the lack of upgades is even hitting the higher fare buckets. :(