fadam

We are planning to go at the end of Feb for 8 weeks. Has anyone ever tried to buy an upgrade to business class just before boarding or during check-in? Is it even possible or worth the price?

EmailKid

So while walking around the airport (in search for that elusive noodle shop ) saw that the Evergreen Transit Hotel had a sign that said "Fully Booked."

Suppose I shoud post this to the other thread, but did find a soup / noodle shop pretty much across from China Air lounge by Gate D3 IIRC, but only young attendants.

Agree that the Evergreen Deluxe is quite nice, unfotunatelly my Houston travel agent managed to make my journey back from BKK span about 36 hours with a layover at TPE for SEVEN hours and another SIX at LAX And since it's a CO redeye, can't even try for a same day early departure standby

And I tried to see if they would bite at my CO Gold Elite card and Evergreen Deluxe class of service, but they told me I'd have to have President's Club card to get in.

EmailKid

ihate2fly

I have several times out of LAX. What I've done is call reservations in LA approximately 12-24 hours prior to departure and ask if they have seats available in the higher class. When they do I've been told they'll update my PNR and I'll have to pay with a CC at the airport. I am 3 out of 4 this way and 2 for 2 using miles to upgrade.

TaiwanAir

Wow, I didn't realized that there's an such high demand for Evergreen Transit Hotel at TPE. Maybe YVRCNX should book in advance then!

Seven hours in TPE without lounge access You should get out of TPE and visit Taipei 101

yvrcnx

I did e-mail the transit hotel. They e-mailed back and asked to make reservation via e-mail giving them flight information etc.
What is Taipei 101?
I never really considedered going into Taipei as it is quite a drive but if there is a good reason and it's not to stressful I wouldn't mind.

DFW1972

how much did it cost for the upgrades, if you don't mind me asking. is it cheaper than buying a discounted business class ticket?

9V-JKL

Its the world's tallest building (currently). Quite a sight. A really nice mall and foodcourt to boot too!

fadam

There is a sale going on this weekend for Vancouver outbound flights. I booked DE class on a Saturday flight at the end of Feb YVR to BKK for $1180 CAD return + tax. I am glad I waited a week to book this. However, I am getting no where with the seat assignments as some kind of microsoft error message is preventing me from doing so. Is there anyone else having the same problem?

Thanks

fadam

BTW, I tried using 5 different browsers on Windows and Macs with the same error message. It must be from their end.

ChaShaoBao

about the requirement for 6 flights...They don't count a EWR-SEA-TPE roundtrip as 4 flights do they?? I assume not, but that's annoying because I'll probably do two roundtrips this year in deluxe class, which would put me well over 25000 but not the 6 flights requirement.

EVA Air

Unforunately, since the flight number is the same, they would count EWR-TPE (v.v.) as one flight.

The six-flight requirement is obviously to prevent everyone from becoming Silver.

jimbo99

Its a bit tough really... it seems once you have silver you only need to get the miles to keep it. (40,000 in 2 years). And 50,000 in a year gets you gold (with 80,000 in 2 years to keep it).

Talking of interpretation EVA rules:

You can get a diamond card by miles or "starting from 2003, being a Gold Card member for 8 consecutive years within the Gold Card validity period" (from website).

They introduced this in 2003. But I wonder:

1) I assume the "starting from" thing relates to when the rule was introduced, not when they count the years. So if you've been gold since 2000 you would get diamond in 2008, not 2011.

2) Diamond is valid for two years. After that, assuming you've continued your "gold" flying pattern, would you drop back to gold and start another 8 years as gold?

Any comments?

From my observation there are alot of golds about these days, but diamonds are rather rare. Normally you need 140,000 miles in a year to get diamond.
I can imagine that within a short time the numbers of diamonds could swell as a result of this rule - unless you drop back to gold after 2 years.

I dropped back to silver for a year but have now been gold for about 6 years. I was thinking of switching away from EVA after - but might hang on if it gets me gold for another 2 years and then diamond permanently (subject to continuing flying the required number of miles for gold).

The most attractive feature of diamond to me is the guaranteed availability. Also from diamonds I've met, upgrades are pretty common. (One guy seemed to sum it up on LHR/BKK by saying I always pay for deluxe but fly in business. Sometimes I use my miles, othertimes they just upgrade me.)

I've found the "priority" wait list hasn't work well on gold over the last couple of years and neither has "priority" luggage handling. Get upgraded about 30% of time LHR/TPE my main route.

EVA Air

I would think the 8 years would start from the year they introduced this new benefit.