Mileage Upgrade Waitlist - what priority?
 

How do EUA and waitlisted mileage upgrades interact?

(1) If F seats are released prior to the Plat EUA run, does a waitlisted Silver paying with miles get the upgrade before a Plat waiting for EUA gets the chance?

(2) At the 3-hour dump, does a waitlisted Silver paying with miles trump higher level elites?

yes to both, because you are "paying" for the upgrade....

I don't know about that at all. EUA doesn't handle mileage upgrades, agents have to do this.

And availability in F doesn't mean available in an award class.

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daniel baker -- [email protected]
Reliable, fast, and unmoderated forums at ITYT.

it's a different waitlist system. when i've used miles for QANTAS awards, you never get your CO FC seat right away, it's a courtesy you know.... But you are put at the front of the WL, and they slowly clear, either b4 the EUA, or you are ahead of the elites who are not "paying" for the upgrade in some way.

Speaking from first-hand knowledge, and maybe RA86 can confirm this, but the upgrade is only confirmed if there is a seat in F available. If there are no seats in F, then you are added to a waitlist. However, this waitlist is manually (or automatically after certain human review of the load factor of the flight) processed. In short, if seats are dumped to F during EUA, unless you catch this and call in to claim your seat, it will be awarded to Elites above you, regardless of your status. However, presumably, your elite status would get the upgrade for free, and hence you would not want to use a cert in order to upgrade.

In short, although your flights might be WL'd, don't hold your breath, and definitely do not assume the process is automatic.

Be diligent, and the seat is yours.

Actually, for mileage upgrades, this is the correct availability class. FC awards are booked in E class, which is much more restrictive than F.

I truly believe that a mileage upgrade waitlist is usually ignored.. Our experience (much more often than not) has been Plat on waitlist for mileage upgrade is trumped at airport by early check-in Silver with no miles.. Haven't tried since T-3.0 EUA, so really don't know how it would bw handled now... Have also never had a waitlist automatically clear for mileage upgrades; have called in a few times when F appeared and had it processed, but never had it done automatically.. In the past year, we have never had a waitlist clear AT ALL, and therefore look for any flt where F is already open when we book...

Robin

I am (plat) two for two in the last twelve months on having a waitlist clear for an u/g

I was WL'd for a mileage upgrade on one segment, and it cleared at the 30 day window exactly. Don't expect any email or notification of such, just check eso.continental.com for seat info.

Hi Y'all,

I "bought" 3 Air France Concorde award tickets in January (for an April departure) for 200,000 miles each.

After the 3 day "give AF a chance to respond to your request", I called in and learned all flights were confirmed on the requesteddates. AF confirmed 3 seats on their most prestigious flights as well as Business class on European connecting flights. CO gave me 1st on DFW-IAH. IAH-EWR-IAH-DFW were waitlisted (as well as Mom's ABQ-IAH-EWR-IAH-ABQ legs).

The waitlists never cleared. As the 5 day Platinum elite upgrade window came up, I noticed ITN still had "F" seats (elite upgrades) avail but "E" seats (1st class awards) stayed at zero. As different elite upgrade windos came along, I watched F decrease down to zero. So eilte were getting complimentary upgrades ahead of the person (and I'm a Plat) who "paid" something for the seats.

On check-in at DFW was given 2 upgrades on the IAH-EWR leg (on a 777 !!!). This required a "red-coat" and about 25 minutes to accomplish. At IAH met up with Mom and tried getting the 3rd seat upgraded. Gate desk snottily (I felt like I was back at AA) replied that 1st was full. During boarding I watched as 5 folks were given "on-board" upgrades.

Attempts to upgrade the return flights both at the ticket counter and both gate counters received the standard reply of "these are award tickets and we can't upgrade them, if you wanted 1st class you should've cashed in 1st class miles" !!!!

So I say "no" to both questions. Travel was on April 6 and 14 so was after the corrections to the recent 3 hour enhancement.

The Concorde was simply fantastic http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Steve