ATOBTTR

$896 or 83,400 miles to UG TPA-ATL (and only that leg - no buy-up offer for leg two to SAT.)

Is 250 extra MQMs worth the extra $896? Or would it be better to use 83,400 miles for a F upgrade on ATL-TPA over an Int’l J award redemption?

ethernal

In fairness, I don't think 83,400 will get you any international J awards anymore. Isn't 86K the new 82K (in the unlikely chance you find any awards at that rate)?

jrl767

hockeyinsider

Maybe on a partner airline, though a couple of blogs have suggested Delta's award-redemption prices are much lower if you're originating outside the United States even on flights with Delta metal.

But regardless, Detroit–Paris ranges between 205,000 and 210,000 miles round-trip in economy for most of December. In January and February, it's mostly in the 105,000–116,000 range, though there are some dates around Valentine's Day for 50,000 miles round-trip. For Delta One business-class, the cheapest between now and the end of March was 150,000 for two days in February. On many dates Delta wants 560,000 miles round-trip for business-class, which is highway robbery if you ask me.

ethernal

Careful, @LBJ will come here and highlight the one random Tuesday to the one random European city that we didn't even know DL flies to on a 763 and show us how we're wrong that these 86K one way J fares don't exist..

paule123

Just curious why the system isn't offering an upsell to F when the flight has 5 F seats for sale and 4 "R" availability in F. I'm no status, in EC flying ATL-MSY tomorrow. Couple days ago it was offering the upsell for something like $139.

bergamini

I see this fairly regularly. It seems to hit a certain threshold of something and then stops the offers. I have called DM line and gotten offers in line with what was there before sometimes and other times it was outrageous.

hockeyinsider

I think revenue management has to have astronomical prices for upgrades because they need to convince us, psychologically, that first-class is worth paying at the time of booking. If you know you can always upgrade for $75 or $100, let alone get a complimentary upgrade at the gatehouse, you'll never pay for first-class. I doubt anyone is paying $896.23 for Tampa to Atlanta.

ethernal

As I mentioned above, I feel like DL is easing off of FCM offers when there are fewer than 5 seats or it's within 1-2 days of departure. It may just be anecdotal but I have seen a lot more F seats going to the gate on the same routes I used to take.

Heck, on a flight this AM, I was #18 on the F upgrade list but still managed to grab a C+ seat at the gate. This would never have happened to me even a few months ago.

It's nice because I have a new record of not sitting in the very last row of the plane - a full month now - thanks to either F upgrades going through or someone getting bumped to F and me being able to get their C+ seat.

Hawkeyefan

How much is a FC meal worth, in value terms?

ethernal

Isn't that a subjective question? From a pure monetary perspective it isn't worth more than any $15-20 meal you could find at the airport. The real question is the opportunity cost - if being able to eat on the plane means you don't need to eat on the ground, that may save you time - and time is money, but the amount of money time equals is variable between people.

pvn

If time is the reason you can't eat on the ground you're probably missing a lot of flights.

ethernal

What's that supposed to mean? I generally aim to get to clear security and get to the gate at T-40. I'm pretty good at achieving +/- 5 minutes on this (with the big variable of course being security). I've never missed a flight (except a SDC I did while sitting in a terrible traffic jam that delayed me in aggregate of 3 hours - and getting to the airport a half hour earlier wouldn't have saved me there).

While one could argue that you don't have to board at T-40, that begins to trigger a whole separate set of time tradeoffs related to dropping off and picking up a checked bag.

I definitely view the single biggest value of a first class meal as being the fact that it saves me from having to worry about a meal on the ground before/after a flight.

pvn

it means it takes like 2 minutes to grab a sandwich at a kiosk

ethernal

Fair, but I assumed we were talking about a hot meal. Even a fast food stop at the airport seems to take 10-15 minutes in aggregate these days. If that is the comparison point then you might as well say the value of the meal is $10.99 since that is the cost of the wrap they serve in Y.