CalFlyer

Had a long chat with the check-in lady at my European home airport tonight. She asked me what I thought about the new upgrade order, and I was surprised since I had not heard about anything.

She explained that sometime in March/April Emirates changed the order for operational upgrades. It used to be that our EK status determined the eligibility for upgrades, but it has now been changed to highest fare bucket paid for that segment.

I am surprised. Lufthansa did the same thing in 2011 (or so), and they changed it back some time ago because frequent travelers were annoyed about the fact that occasional last minute travelers were upgraded while loyal guests not. Actually, for me it was one of the reasons I shifted most of my business away from Lufthansa.

Are we up for ugly times now? Can anyone confirm if this is fact or fiction?

gorbatzjov

EK has done op ups based on fare bucket for about a year now ex DXB. Outstations don't always follow the same rules (still had plenty of op ups ex BKK even on Y savers). From a business point of view it may make sense, but as I'm flying exclusively cheapest Y for business, it annoys the hell out of me too. That, plus the ridiculous high fares ex DXB made me shift most of my leisure flights (often in J) to Qatar this year.

CalFlyer

Not sure it makes sense business-wise. Frequent flyers typically do not purchase Y fares. LH made a turnaround, I guess for commercial reasons (they for sure lost my USD 120K per year).

skywardhunter

This happened last year on 14 August.

DYKWIA

Do a search over the last 12 months or so, this has been debated extensively.

Lux

Hmm. That's a rather broad statement, which I'm not sure matches reality.

skywardhunter

Not true.

Mr_Ed

As a 'frequent flier' I very much wish this was true. Unfortunately it is not.

eternaltransit

Maybe frequent flyer is defined here as "having shiny card/prominent tag attached to bag" rather than sectors and time in the air

skywardhunter

Who says my bag doesn't have a shiny tag?

m3red

Tags and luggage labels are for Instagram posts only.

It does make me laugh the amount of I/0s I see with their tags on...

ioto1902

I am quite surprised that a check-in lady (supervisor ?) asks such question.

If not wrong, this "rule" is not official, at least not published. Therefore, is it all right that she talks about it with customers ?

Moreover, what's the point of asking for opinions ? Was she required to do a survey ?!? If it is her personal curiosity, it is totally irrelevant.

Strange.

Flame3601

The moment when your son (Silver ) gets a op-up and you as a Plat do not as he was on flex-plus and you are on flex ticket.


FYI- Proud Skyward Plat and BA Exec club Gold tag baggage accessorizer

eternaltransit

Having had a look at who some of the iOs are and reports of behaviour, they are definitely in three camps:

- actual VIPs who don't care about "status" (theirs does not derive from flying!)
- FT-level frequent travellers who really want to be travelling less and wouldn't have space for their tags anyway
- senior country/region level executives but not the top, top bosses

The last group are the ones who display their tags proudly.

m3red

That would really annoy me. But I'd then just take my sons BP on the basis I'd have probably paid for it