Do Plats/Golds/Silvers get status upgrades on NW-coded AS flights? What about AS-coded AS flights? Or does one need to use the certs that come in the elite packages?

Any help would be appreciated.

Use the gold and platinum upgrade certs that are sent at the beginning of the year. But, best of luck getting upgraded because of the very liberal AS upgrade policy for their MVP and MVP Gold, plus guest upgrade certs, etc. Remember the NW certs are only usable day of travel.

Actually, I have had 100% success upgrading prior to travel. Our company travel people will book the flight (usually a super-cheap fare, not the Y the cert requires) and as soon as I get a conf # I call the Alaska 800#, ask if they have any upgrade seats available, and tell them I have a "NW Gold confirmed upgrade".

Most of the time, they put me on hold, come back in a couple minutes and ask if I want window or aisle. A couple of times they didn't even put me on hold. They just tell me I need to present the cert when I check in.

I always do Web checkin. The BP has instructions to the GA to collect the cert but every time (8 now) I board with the BP in one hand and cert in the other, and I still have all my certs.

I don't know if it's against the rules or not. But it works every time for me.