THY Now Offering Paid Discounted Airport Upgrades
 

THY has for the past week been offering paid upgrades from any Y fare to J on the BOM to IST route for a bargain $300. I upgraded today from a highly discounted P fare and even got a front row 'first class' cabin on their Jet Airways 777. Quite understandably, no business class mileage credit is applied. Is anyone aware of similar practices being adopted on other routes?

I only heard of some discounted CC upgrades from certain destinations.

300$ from P class is definitely a steal :)

Was "Y" overbooked?

LH once offered my C > F BKK to FRA for $600. I declined and got an op up at the gate.

When airlines that usually don't sell airport upgrades offer them at cheap rates, it is an indication for an overbooked flight.

$300 is a very good deal especially for the seat you got ^

Y was only 80% full and business 50%. The BOM TK staff informed me that they got permission from Istanbul to offer the $300 upgrades on all flights where business seats are available.

Dd they offer it to people who aren't Elite+ ?

There were printed notices at all check-in desks and all economy passengers were eligible. Only a few people took up the offer. The gate agent informed me that only E+ passengers were being allowed that day into rows 1-2 (the first class cabins) which were around 40% full.

Sometimes but only sometimes E+ has its benefits ;)

Maybe, but not always
 

I just flew SKG-IST-JFK yesterday, and asked about a paid upgrade in SKG and IST, and was rejected both times.

In fairness, the handling at SKG is handled by Goldair, so they're probably not empowered to sell upgrades for $.

However, when I inquired about the upgrade in the massive TK lounge in IST (while in transit), the two supervisors both quickly said no. When I tried pushing a little bit, they told me to go speak to the ticket counter out in the departures hall. When I asked them to call the ticket counter on my behalf, so as to save me the cost and trouble of getting a Turkish eVisa (so as to enter Turkey and go landslide), they both shrugged and said no.

FWIW, there were 3x empty seats in C/J on the my flight from IST-JFK last night, so it was not an issue of capacity control.

I would never count on paid upgrades at airports, especially any flights to/from North America. In fact, even J (upgrades using miles and E+ vouchers) is hard to come by, much less awards and last minute cheap upsells.

Odds for upgrades are much higher IST-KUL and IST-BKK where options are plentiful. Again, J fares to those cities are a lot cheaper to begin with.

back in March at LAX. they were offering upgrades to CC for 300$. but 2 weeks later that wasn't an option. I don't have much more info than that. but it is a good deal even if its just for CC.

a few weeks later my parents couldn't get the same offer.

on my flight on June 7th out of LAX. i couldn't get any kind of upgrades miles or cash, nothing was available. i overheard TK employee mention there was only 2 empty seats on the whole flight.

Check-in counter opens at 2:45 pm, last time I was there there were already multiple folks trying to get upgrades to CC, go to the ticket sale counter on the right, instead of regular check-in lines.

At this point, I'd just try to book LAX flight on CC as soon as possible once you know the dates, it's becoming more and more difficult to upgrade. Perhaps they should launch second daily flight, red eye, leaving IST 1-2 am and arriving LAX 5-6 in the morning would be ideal.

HKG to IST - seen paid upgrade from Y to CC for EUR 400 and Y to C for Eur 800.

Yeah I was offered Y-CC on the IAH-IST route for $300 also. Interestingly, on the way back IST-IAH there was not an offer even when I inquired.

I wouldn't mind paying that to be upgraded from Y(H) to C this Friday from SIN to IST :p

Anyone know if this is being offered on the IST to BOM route also? Also - who should I inquire with - the check-in staff? A $300 upgrade to J would really be awesome for my overnight flight tonight!