Does anyone have experience with a paid upgrade from business to first?

I have an upcoming J ticket, albeit booked using CO miles. It looks like the F cabin is completely empty on my US-DXB and DXB-US sectors (off-peak times).

afaik it's not possible to upgrade a mileage redemption by paying the cash difference between cabins.

Thanks! Too bad, because the f cabin appears to be completely empty, and we would be willing to pay for the experience. Oh well.

I often get upgraded if the flights are full. I am a gold skywards member.

The best way to get upgraded is :

1. Don't check in early online - your economy seat then gets booked for you
2. Don't check in too early. Around 1 1/2 to 2 hours before the flight seems to work
3. Be polite to everyone.
4. Don't be pushy or ask in earshot of other passengers
5. Dress the part. Flip flops and cutoff sleeves aren't going to get you anywhere near business class

Hi Diablo777. Welcome to FlyerTalk. Although I know that your intentions are good (and thank you for your thoughts) as a piece of friendly advice the etiquette here on the boards is not to post the same thing in more than one discussion thread and to also not post the same thing more than once in any given thread. Thanks.

Do you have any evidence of this apart from any personal experience?

My experience is the polar opposite. I'll give you an example. This Sunday I am on SIN-MEL.

All of economy (in every fare bucket is sold out). Waitlist is closed. Plenty of capacity in J. And F is wide open.

The load controller will start working the flight Sunday afternoon and all elites in Y will be upgraded well and truly prior to them getting to the airport. A good tell tale is if you see your Y seat selection disappear within the 24-hr window. If it does, you can pretty well be guaranteed you've already been op-upped.

If the staff working the flight run out of J seats, they'll push elites from J into F. How you dress, your manners etc are irrelevant as the load controller wont have laid eyes on you.

Same goes for OLCI. They will simply offload you if they need and push you forward. Makes no difference from my personal experience.

I'm in paid J this Sunday. If I get op-upped into F, I'll roughly know by how many people the flight was oversold by in Y.

I just got a free upgrade from SIN to MEL, the plane was overbooked and im only a blue tier, not sure if it was because i was on the flight which started in DXB or not