Upgrade to PE is not possible using *A upgrades. You can upgrade Y, B or K fare EVA tickets directly into Business.

Ok but when I book up a EVA flight using UA miles the UA award site just says "Economy" , do you know what the fare class actually is , or at least how EVA sees it?

All of this is published. If you use miles to purchase a ticket it is not upgradeable, period. If you want to sit in a higher cabin then you must use miles for that higher cabin, or use cash for an upgradeable class of service then use miles to upgrade that. Number of UA miles required to upgrade on BR is published in UA *A award charts... to business, not PE as that is not offered. And remember that your actual mileage cost is the award cost less miles that you will earn on the paid ticket.

There is much discussion in this thread about how to find out if upgrade is available before making the purchase, bottom line is there is no guaranteed way to find out, but your best bet is telephone to EVA and ask them to check for Z class. You should purchase the economy ticket at EVA web site as they let you select class-of-service that is upgradable (Y or B class for economy) and if you buy and then discover the upgrade is not available you can cancel if still within 24 hours.

DAK

Ok got it about award tickets.., I will go the route you suggest just buying eco ticket on EVA then trying upgrade...worth a shot...thanks!

It should book into whatever fare class BR uses for the respective award.

BR (like most *A) use X for economy award and I for business award. Per my last post there is lots of debate as to whether availability of I is a good proxy for availability of an upgrade. What is known is that once the upgraded ticket is issued, it is issued in Z class.

DAK

I'm flying LHR-BKK next month and I'm torn between just buying a discount PE ticket and buying a B class ticket trying to upgrade using United miles. That would be an upgrade to business, not to PE, right? Also, my understanding is that I do not have the free 24-hour cancellation period, so should I should I just call and ask about Z class and hope for the best before I book?

Yes, Y or B Class economy upgrades to Business when using United miles for SAUA.

As I read it you do not have a free 24 hour cancellation period. What you probably will have, based on my check of the EVA B fare on their website, is no change fees with a B fare (any fare difference and tax difference are charged) so you can easily change to a different date for free (fare & tax difference) if SAUA is not available on the original date you book. I would still call to check for Z before you book.

Thank you, that's very helpful!

I just called and there were 2 spots in Z, so I bought the ticket and was able to immediately upgrade. I can't believe how easy that was. Thanks again!

Awesome! That will be a nice flight.

Anyone been successful in using *A for the Chicago-TPE flight on EVA? Have a flight in December that I keep getting the dreaded Inventory Not Available. Checked EF and while there are about 20 business class seats available, no Z or I class inventory.
What are the odds that this is because they are trying to sell the seats first before release for any type of upgrades? Busy time of year so I can see that being the case. Hope that's the case and I can get lucky and they don't end up selling/open some inventory for upgrades

Why not call EVA and ask if any flights in your range have Z availability and change your flight to one with availability if there are any?

Yes.

EF doesn't show Z inventory.

Hey all, fairly new person here. After reading through EVA business class reviews, getting stoked, and reading through the forum to figure out how to upgrade, I finally completed that round trip for SFO-TPE in October.

I know it's thoroughly documented already. Still, I was unsure when going into this, and hopefully I can help out another new person going the same route. My findings and notes:

• You need full fare economy to upgrade, so when searching/booking choose Economy Class > Economy Plus. They have several fare classes and weird naming schemes, but it'll show the fare class on the sidebar. I got fare class B, I think Y is called Economy Plus too.
• Call the local EVA office and ask for fare class Z, or award space. I read somewhere about calling the EVA office in Taipei, but the local office is enough. Seems many people call them up as they were familiar with the upgrade process and award space.
• Upgrade availability is tricky, have backup dates/times in mind. One service rep told me people do it months ahead of time (unlike me, 2 months before my flight) while there's a lot of availability, but didn't mention more spaces opening as the flight gets closer. He did say >4 or so spaces is preferred, but I found I was able to upgrade my flights with 3 spaces and 1 space (I got lucky!), while it didn't go through on a flight with 5 spaces. It just depends how many are available for *A.
• If upgrade isn't available, just request a refund. You should get an email confirmation quickly, but it'll take 2-3 weeks to refund.
• United's upgrade page was slow and crashed once when requesting upgrade. Someone mentioned the service was unavailable at some point, but it worked for me. Look up your booking on EVA to confirm, mine immediately changed to "Royal Laurel Class/Z".
• I was wondering what class you get upgraded to (EVA's site shows business, royal laurel, premium laurel), but evidently you go straight into Royal Laurel.
• As mentioned elsewhere, upgrade is 30k miles each way

Thanks everyone on here for sharing your knowledge. Going to be cool to go on basically my first non-economy flight ever!

Fairly new to this and I have been a lot of reading.

My flight will be LAX to TPE on Oct 6th.

I tried upgrading to Business with EVA "B" class fare - on Aeroplane but I got a message that SAUA wasnt available. I then called into customer service and they confirmed Z upgrade seats also not available.

Does all of mean seats arent yet released by EVA? Does anyone have experience with LAX-TPE upgrades? Thanks.

Wow lucky! Looks like you're able to snag the upgrade already and its 1-2 months out. Wondering whats up with LAX-TPE route!

Whatever inventory was already released has been taken. If EVA determines the loads warrant it they will release more inventory at some point but it may not be until much closer to departure.

There are 3 BR flights a day from LAX. Have you checked Z space availability on the other flights that day? How about the day before or after? If there is availability on another flight you could change to that flight and confirm the upgrade now, otherwise you will have to keep checking and hope they open up more upgrade space.

As noted in this thread and others, it is advisable not to mention award space (or even SAUA / upgrade space) as that can only serve to confuse the agents. Just ask for Z space only.

Also, the reason to call the Taipei office is that the agents there are more experienced and helpful. At other offices, you really don't know what they're doing. At the US office for example, the agents have come up with crazy excuses not to do things and end the call as quickly as possible.

As well-documented in this thread, SAUA needs Y/B/K on BR to upgrade. B fare doesn't always show up on the website, so calling BR to book is sometimes necessary to get the lowest SAUA-eligible class. Don't just book the Y fare if the B fares don't show up. Finally, as with all awards, always find availability first, then book the ticket.

Very interesting data point here and I do think we all know about it already but it suggests that EVA isn't making inventory available until much closer to departure. I decided to check for Sept 1st flight - this coming SUNDAY (BR11) and viola, plenty of availability(Z fare class)! I think these upgrades will work themselves out closer to departure date so I'll just wait until closer to my Oct 6th departure, perhaps 2 weeks out and go from there. Another thing that I noticed is the fare price remains very consistent - fare for same class of ticket (B) is same for Sept 1st flight or Oct 6th..

When I called the SFO office I just asked how many are available for fare class Z and they understood both times it was for upgrade space, but it could be I got lucky.

I didn't know of K, and also didn't ask for Y over the phone, just booked off the website. Likely gave EVA some free money there, but lesson learned, good to know for a future trip. Thanks for helping out a noob.

Out of curiosity, how do you check the availability of the Z class? I just checked their website and did a mock booking and the lowest i found in business was D.

I also just booked my IAH-TPE flight for January and also got the dreaded "Inventory Not Available" message in the United app. Keep us posted when you get yours.


Thanks!

As mentioned in past posts, it is not possible to check Z availability online. It is necessary to call in to EVA.

While this thread is primarily focused on using UA miles on a SAUA for EVA, can anyone confirm that all *A partners (Aeroplan, Avianca, Lufthansa, etc) have access to the same bucket of EVA upgradeable space as UA? For example, US-TPE requires only 25K Aeroplan miles (per their still-published chart) compared to UA's 30K, so if one needed to transfer CC points to an airline to book the upgrade, Aeroplan makes more sense. Avianca is another partner that requires 30K miles (per their still-published chart). The downside I see to this is in the event other *A members don't have the same availability, one is now stuck with 25K-30K points in Aero/Avianca/etc.

It's not possible to confirm they have the exact same spaces, but I've always used Aeroplan and never had issues checking with Z availability.

That is the way it is supposed to work. Most of the issues seem to be in the interface each partner has to the SAUA system. Periodically different partners may break access to the system from their site so even though technically each partner has access to the same space if one partners interface to the system is broken, like happens to United periodically, their system cannot access anything. It is usually a technical problem rather than a difference in award inventory.

I'm 48 hours before my flight and got a text saying it was time to check in, but when I tried to check in it said "You cannot check in if you have an upgrade reservation and have not completed deduction of your mileage."

Anyone know what this means? The miles were definitely deducted from my United account.

You cannot check-in upgraded tickets online - only at the ticket counter. I would caution to do the following, based on my multiple flights with BR:

1. bring a printed copy of the upgrade receipt from United - I've been asked to show it in the past, although rarely
2. if you are traveling with someone else, I suggest checking in separately and having one person stand back out of sight and hold any larger/heavier carry-on bags. Some BR agents will weigh and measure carry-ons, and a laptop with a few odds and ends can exceed the limit. I've left my bags in the car, gone to the check-in counter for my boarding pass, and then gone back to the car to get the carry on bags. It's a hassle, but much less of a hassle than dealing with the odd overzealous BR agent who insists on checking a laptop

Thank you for these tips. I'm surprised they are so rigid about carry-ons for RL pax. I'll be careful about not bringing too much!

Anyone knows if I booked a PE for Eva fare class T, can I upgrade using my krisflyer miles into business?

No, only K is eligible as far as PE classes. SAUA-eligible classes on BR are the default Y/B and the BR-specific additional eligible fare class K.

Correct I called into the LA EVA Air customer service center. They know what I was referring to.

Will do! i just checked again today - T-13 days and still nothing. I suspect, if other data points are correct, the upgrades will open up around T-4 days.

For straight awards the pattern used to be T-10, T-7, T-4 (and less), so check in those ranges. Not sure that it correlates to Z but it might.

Thanks! Yes i was told that only Y/B is eligible for upgrades.
Even if I were to book in PE it is still not eligible to upgrade into business.

PE class K is also eligible but it is the most expensive PE fare and almost always more expensive than Y or B so it does not make sense to purchase it if you are doing SAUA.

Actually, how do I go about it for the SAUA?
Do I purchase the economy ticket first in Y/B then request for upgrade or should I call Eva Air for this? Does anyone know if the upgrade is immediate?

These questions have all been answered in this very thread.

As noted, please read the thread and understand how SAUA works before proceeding. For further reference, the wiki in the following thread about SAUA on BR is specifically for using UA miles, but the procedure is similar: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/eva-...itedmiles.html

As always when upgrading using SAUA, the procedure should be:

1. Confirm upgrade inventory availability;
2. Book eligible fare class for upgrade;
3. Apply SAUA via your FFP.

Thanks for the tip. I will check again at T-10 and will let you guys know!