RobertS975

OK, here's the situation... booked on a through flight SAN-MSP-BOS and the upgrades have been requested. Now what is the best tactic for making this happen as a through flight, because if the flights were a true connection and separate, I believe that I would have over a 90% chance to get upgraded on both legs.

But the through flight concerns me in that the seat selection would require the same seat to be available on both legs etc.

What's the best thing to do on these through flights?

RobertS975

Anybody?

justhere

SDC to a different flight and not take them.

If that's not an option then there's not much you can do. If you don't clear for the first leg, you might beg and plead with the GA for the connecting flight to see if they can add you to the upgrade list. I tried that once in ATL and I'm pretty sure they were able to do it but F ended up full anyway.

msauter

Use a PU503, god knows thats about all they're good for!

RobertS975

The long and the short answer is that medallions do get screwed by the computer with regard to upgrades on through flights. In my instance, the 5 day window came without any good news. So I looked at the separate segments and the SAN-MSP segment was available for upgrade although the MSP-BOS continuation was not available.

So I call SMS and ask if they can split the flights... they can't but hand me over to Customer Service. It took her an honest 12-15 minutes, but she came back and said that she had cleared me into FC on the first segment (SAN-MSP) and I was still holding my coach seat on the second segment to BOS.

How this will work at the airport is still somewhat concerning! Assuming the second segment does not clear in advance, I will get a FC boarding pass in SAN for the first segment and hopefully a BP for the seecond segment. I will need to deplane in MSP and negotiate with the GA in MSP handling the flight to see if I can snag an upgrade for the continuation to BOS.

If DL is going the sell these through flights, for the purposes of medallion upgrades, it should handle them as connecting flights without a plane change.
(That said, more often than not, a through flight often involves a change of aircraft at the hub anyway!)

cny

A couple of weeks ago on a PHL-MSP-SNA through flight, I was upgraded on the first leg, but not on the second, and my seat assignment was somehow entirely eliminated for the second leg. The GA determined that I had been given a first-class seat on the next MSP-SNA flight, which happened to be the next day. He eventually got me back into a seat on the original flight, but it was in the last row. I e-mailed Delta about this, and all they could come up with was "computer glitch."

RobertS975

My itinerary page on the website now shows the through flight from SAN to BOS via MSP as if it was a connecting flight... the upgrade showing as cleared on the first leg and "requested" on the second leg. I don't know how the Customer Service agent did it (and it took her 12 minutes+) but too bad DL doesn't handle all "through" flights in this fashion.

And BTW, if anyone ever chooses through flights thinking that with such a flight, one cannot miss a connection, they are very mistaken. If your originating flight is very delayed into the hub airport, good chance DL will have found another aircraft to make up the second seegment.

fti

Often even a "through" flight has a change of gauge as it is called.