Stuck in the back of the bus
 

I am a Co PLat and have booked a NW/KLM metal flight on July 15th ,from AMS to NBO and return on the 24th July on KLM codeshare with Kenya Air. The ticket is a coach M fare.Do any of you NW flyertalkers have any tricks or knowledge on how to upgrade this ticket . KLM never seems to make any D bucket upgrades to Co for this route and I am in the dark about upgrade certs or if they even exist. Everytime I talk to someone at KLM /NW or Co I keep hearing no chance. There are plenty of buiz seats left ,( the coach tickets were $1300.00 each and buizness around $3800.00 each so i dont want to fork over the money to upgrade). My Z Buis ticket IAH to AMS to Iah on CO was $1600.00 on the summer sale, so $3800.00 seems crazy to me. Am I SOL? or do you have any info that would help.
Do they do battlefield uogrades on KLM? I have been fanatasizing about bribing the KLM ticket agent or something at Schipol to get us upgraded. Help !!!!

Op Up?
 

I am sure you will get some good input from the members of our board. I mostly fly NW metal domestic. But from reading previous posts, I am guessing that your best bet will be to position yourself to get an "Op Up" or operational upgrade, which is when NW/KLM frees up coach seats by upgrading Elites into WBC. One tactic is to book your coach seat on a flight that is typically over-sold. You may want to check on the history of your flight (go off of time of month, day of week, and time) and to the statictics (you can use this site http://www.flyaow.com/classcwt.htm to check).

I would also recommend putting yourself on the volunteer list for an Op Up once you get to the gate for each flight.

Good luck & happy flying!

-A

Thanks Poopdeck90210 I am hoping for an OP Upgrade and will be at that gate as soon as my CO flight arrives at 830AM .If I remember correctly they dont even assign gates until the last minute at Schipol so I will be scrambling. I did manage to use my CO Status to bag Exit Rows going and coming so I can always pull my suitcase down and put up my feet

Based on other posts I've seen, you might want to inquire about upgrading using mileage at the KLM Lounge. I have heard of people upgrading with NW or KL miles from the lounge to WBC on NW/KL metal, but I don't know if they'll be able to do anything with CO miles at the KLM Lounge @ Schiphol.

I personally have not upgraded using mileage at Schiphol myself, but I have seen a thread here on FT that it can be done. IIRC, you may need to go to the lounge to do this (hopefully someone will chime in), I am not sure if the Transfer Desk or Gate will do this. As a CO Plat you will have access to the lounges as a SkyTeam Elite Plus member traveling on an Intl journey, plus you will have arrived on CO in J class.

As you have your status, and I presume miles, banked with CO, the first question would be can they do this with CO miles at the airport; secondly, does this apply to a KLM codeshare operated by Kenya Air?

It never hurts to ask! If you need to, you can first start at the Transfer Desk, assuming you will need to check-in there, then go to the KLM Lounge, and then try again at the gate if the first two don't work.

Hopefully someone will have more information here -- but if not, by all means try! Also, keep calling to see if upgrade seats open up before your trip. They may release seats, depending on sales at the 7 or 3 day mark, as it gets closer. Also inquire if you can waitlist (?).

SDF_Traveler

Thanks SDF traveler , I like the Idea of transfer desk, lounge, then gate trys as I often have found one persons no is another persons yes if I keep trying. I don't know when they release the D bucket for upgrade and if they will let me use CO miles . I would doubt it ,so I am hoping for a OP-Up or just some kind mercy on someones part. I definatly will try here with CO 3 and 7 days out to see if KLM has released any seats to them.....

NW and KLM have been were first two airlines to do the international code sharing. There operations by no means are seamless, but they are closer to seamless than anyother operating codeshares. That said, CO joined at a later date, and basically has lower status with the KLM staff. NW and KLM elites are treated basically the same on both airlines. Decent in the states and not so well in Europe. Even though CO does have a code share agreement with KLM my experience is that you are treated more as just a Skyteam elite and not a codeshare partner.

I think calling CO repeatedly before you leave would be your best hope. There is also a CO counter at Schipol. I have never known of one airline being able to book an award with another airlines miles, except as stated earlier some NW elites have had luck in the KLM lounge.

No, it does not.

KL agents (until recently) could only upgrade KL members at Schiphol. This has recently been expanded to include NW, but not CO.

No Worries
 

No Worries. Good luck. You may want to consider replying a post back to your thread and update us on your success. ^ :cool:

-Alan