Miles for upgrade ticket to Australia. Strategy?
 

I have very little knowledge about upgrades to business class, so I am asking for you advise.
Situation: my company is paying for economy tickets East Coast to Sydney, Australia for three of us next year (May 2014). I would love to be able to upgrade economy to business using miles. As of now one of us has 15,000 US Airways miles, 15,000 United and about 70,000 UR. We are willing to help ourselves via CC sign ups, and I guess we should start plan now to have right status and number of miles by next yer.

Would you please explain how upgrades work and what should be our strategy?
Since we don't know what airline we will use, I assume it will be star alliance, it usually more or less the cheapest option.

You're asking in the wrong place, but no doubt a Mod will be along in a minute or three to move the thread.

You buy the ticket. You apply for the upgrade. You wait. That's it. There's no magic beyond that.

tough to plan if you don't know the carrier.....

perhaps you can buy the mi you need when they get the tickets...

where will you start?

Philadelphia or New York.
How does it work usually? We should have economy tickets in certain upgradable class, correct? Status on Star alliance, united or need specific airline? If I understand correctly, only one of us needs miles and he can upgrade all of us, correct?

go on orbitz/other & see who flies to where ever you are going in oz....use this may perhaps...

then see what the ug will cost on each carrier....

aa isn't a player because it only code shares across the water.....us flights won't work either....

how far in advance will the tickets be purchased?...

i think your chances are pretty slim....but don't quit now....

This master thread may give you some ideas:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/star-...rs-thread.html

You may also check out each individual airline's website and see how their upgrades work. For instance, you can find types of UA upgrades on UA official site:

MileagePlus® Upgrades Overview

Also noted: