Diamond Medallion comfort + lack of upgrade after booking "revenue hold"
 

Hi All,

I'm a new member to FlyerTalk and apologies if my question has already been answered on a older thread.

I'm Diamond Medallion and I've been steadily booking flights on Delta for my upcoming business travel. What usually happens is I book coach tickets, and 10-15 minutes later, when I look at my Delta app. I'll see that because of my status I've been upgraded to Comfort + (WU class) seats (and receive a email confirmation). At this point I select the Comfort + seats I like and I'm all set.

Today I noticed something peculiar happen and I'm hoping you all can explain what's going on.

I booked a round trip from MLB to IAH and as usual, about 10 minutes later, I received the Delta email stating I had been upgraded to Economy plus but what was odd it was only for 3 out of 4 segments! On my return flight, the IAH to ATL segment I was still in a main cabin (fare X) this has never happened to me before since Delta introduced Economy plus unless all the Plus seats were filled when I booked.

So wondering if I had done something wrong at booking, like accidentally booking a basic economy ticket, which I'm well aware does not come with medallion upgrades, I called the Diamond Medallion hotline. The nice lady looked at my record and said she also thought I should have received a economy plus upgrade based on my purchased fare class. She then put me on hold and called the "help desk". After waiting a few minutes she came back with the following explanation and I'm going to do my best to repeat what she said.

She said the Plus seats are on a "revenue hold" for this segment (IAH to ATL) of my trip so that's why the other three segments instantly upgraded and this one did not. I asked if there's a way I could be informed of this "revenue hold" at time of booking so I could try and avoid these types of segments. She said "No" there's no way for me to access this information. Only way to know is to book, and then not receive the instant upgrade, which indicates the segment is a "revenue hold". she did say that at some point the "hold" is released and I'll automatically upgrade if there's seats available. But the kicker is I could end up in a middle Plus seat so if I want to keep the isle economy seat I have now I should go into my Delta app and uncheck the request for Plus upgrades. That's a real big disappointment because being Diamond, in 2016, I never ended up in a middle Plus seat because of the instant upgrades to Plus I received shortly after booking a ticket.

So I'm wondering has this "revenue hold" policy on Plus seats been around since day 1 and I just got unlucky to finally run into it with this segment? Or is this a new 2017 policy and I should just get used to it, which would really, really suck BTW!

thanks all for the responses!

I think this just means that revenue management doesn't necessarily release every open seat on every flight into WU inventory. It's no different from seeing open FC seats but not getting a free elite upgrade into FC at the DM window.

It's the latest "enhancement" that allows you to pay to be upgraded to C+! #smh

I'll take a shot. To me revenue hold is their term for saying "We are not releasing these seats for upgrade, until closer in--perhaps check-in to see if we can make revenue on them". I believe this has been around since at least the formal C+ upgrade process was put in place. I, too do not recall this being an issue on any of 145 revenue segments I flew with DL last year. I am hopeful that you just ran into some tough luck--because yes--that would stink to not be able to confirm the upgrade shortly after ticketing.

(Edit: I guess I was slow to the draw--but agree with the others!)

Welcome to FT!

You can see if there is C+ upgrade space available at time of booking from Delta.com. While logged in, go to Delta.com and do your flight search. Hover over the upgrade status box from the main cabin section. If you see "Comfort Plus - Available" that means there are seats in WU and you should clear immediately after booking. If it says "Comfort Plus - Eligible" there are no seats in WU and you will be added to the wait list.

My suggestion is to never request a C+ upgrade until you can verify there are seats in WU for upgrade and the seats available in the C+ section of the plane are to your satisfaction. Remember, Delta will upgrade you to a C+ middle if that is all that is available when WU is open.

A bit of a different perspective from me. While I don't think C+ is much (if any) of an "upgrade" I do appreciate that it's not all given away on flights where there are more Medallions than C+ seats. My legs are physically longer than the pitch in regular economy, so I buy C+ to ensure that I have the space I need. There ought to be space to reaccomodate folks who paid when something goes awry or they need to make a change.

ok, so is this something new for 2017?

Never saw this once in 2016

Another perspective is that C+ seats shouldn't be given early to PMs if there will be DMs on the flight who want C+ and will be unable to get these seats.

Thank you for the tip on how to check for available vs. eligible.

I have seen this happen just a few times. I believe that Delta is now starting to handle Comfort Plus upgrades as they do with first class upgrades. There is capacity controlled upgrade space. Not really a surprise. They want to sell the comfort plus space and if they can't, they will upgrade you for free. You also seem to be signed up for automatic upgrades, which I would not do. That means you might be upgraded into a middle seat in comfort plus. I would change your profile so that you have to manually do the upgrade and avoid any issues with middle seats.

I'm assuming that C+ seats are still for revenue sale?

This happened to me on a BDL-ATL-MSY itinerary, where ATL-MSY didn't immediately clear into C+ at purchase, with multiple C+ seats open on the seat map. I called DL res trying to figure out the problem, the agent did some digging, couldn't figure it out, then she called a supervisor, and lo and behold, C+ wasn't available for purchase at all, even for cash - it was totally booked up. The res agent was as puzzled as I was with regards to all of the unassigned seats, but the answer was as simple as that.

That could've been a one-off fluke, but sometime's Occam's Razor applies (not all that often with DL, but the agent and I were both equally surprised).

It definitely existed in 2016 as well. But it's a case-by-case, route-by-route, flight-by-flight thing.

It's sad to see that this is now how we're looking at this. I get the revenue piece from DLs perspective but to not clear Diamonds into C+ at booking when there are seats available seems foolish in terms of what that does to loyalty among DLs group "of most valued customers" - I get and actually endorse holding back seats from Platinums or even Golds within 3 days to allow for late booking Diamonds.

I agree with your sentiments. I'm sure I'll sound like a snobby/ entitled Diamond flier ; ) but I put a lot of effort into being loyal to Delta, often taking Delta flights when there are better options on other carriers. I guess I'm being a bit foolish with my loyalty? Maybe this will be the year I start checking out the other carriers to see what they have to offer.