JWWI

My experience has been mixed. 1st half of the year was 100% on upgrades as a 1K. Since mid-summer this has fallen considerably even with using up my PP (not much else to do with them). Since September my only upgrades to clear have been with PP and those only at about a 50% success rate.

halls120

Those were great times!

Doppy

Out of SFO I've started to count and at least 10-20% of every flight I'm on is 1K or GS. I can't remember the last time I got a CPU. The only way I have a chance is with PPs, and those usually don't clear either, and the last three that did, I was already on the plane when it came through. I am applying PPs to any flight over three hours.

I have a flight coming up tomorrow - too short to use PPs - I'm #16 out of 49 on the upgrade list - 27% of the pax are "elite." First is already full with no upgrades clearing.

PPs are still valuable for international travel.

Bronco1983

what do you mean paying for F?

GBadger

I wouldn't say I "have to" use PlusPoints, but I just have a large stock of them that are going to be expiring this winter, so I have been using them. Having said that, in the current climate I don't think that I would have cleared many upgrades without the PP applied. You can see what my luck has been for the past several years in my signature. Things have definitely dropped off -- I historically have not used PP for domestic travel, only international.

Out of DEN on the cheapest possible fare just isn't going to score you many CPUs, unfortunately.

Artpen100

I was a 1K before 2019 (and will make it again this month, due to the new mix of qualification options), and I found it hard to get upgraded even with GPUs, RPUs or now PPs applied. I recall getting a CPU as a 1K maybe once, on some short flight. Don't get me wrong, I am happy to get PPs and will use them if upgrade space is available (and over the course of a year, probably can use a lot of them), but if you have the impression that 1K means you will get upgraded regularly, that is not going to happen. I still buy F if I really want to be in F. Waitlisting is basically a crap-shoot, even for a 1K.

RobOnLI

To put things in perspective, I'm currently booked on an east coast flight that's approx. 2 hours long. As a 1K on a W fare I am not even in the top 50% of the upgrade list. I'm #19 of 34 right now. The cabin has 11 open seats.

I track my upgrade % every year. With just UA flying my upgrade % has broken down like this: 2013 84%, 2014 80%, 2015 76%, 2018 84%, 2019 82%, 2020 87%, 2021 I'm currently at 69%. See a pattern? This year things have gotten really tough for upgrades and I expect it to get much worse.

-RM

Artpen100

Data Point - I am on an IAD-DEN flight tomorrow, 2 open F seats, 41 on the waitlist. That is pretty much the way most of my flights look since Covid. (I paid for F again, though.) Hope I get my PDB!

zombietooth

I think you are asking, who is "everybody"? My interpretation of what is going on is that, during the pandemic, it became much more desirable to have more space and F demand increased to where even infrequent flyers were paying cash for it. So "everybody" means frequent flyers, including GS and 1Ks who previously didn't have to pay for domestic F but do now, and your average Joes who just want more space. The increased cost seems justified to many more people now, not just the wealthy, and this has been a boon for the airlines successfully monetizing their F cabins.

Repooc17

Here are some stats to hit you guys with (my own complementary upgrade status; excluding certificate use such as Plus Points - multiple airlines: UA + others)

19 out of 20 on CPU in 1Q 2021
9 out of 15 on CPU in 2Q 2021
9 out of 11 on CPU in 3Q 2021
4 out of 16 on CPU in 4Q 2021

In addition to a lot of other factors, seasonality is a trend as well.

bostonpilot

Similar to everyone else here, its been really poor for me. First half of the year, I was doing a lot of BOS-ORD-(small towns in the midwest) and I was doing pretty well with CPUs but since then its been terrible. I've been doing a lot of flights to hubs cities, especially transcons and that has been close to 0%, even with PP's. I recently did a EWR-SFO on a 777 that was fairly open in C when I booked a couple of weeks prior to departure but I still ended up #24 at takeoff despite using PPs. So, I'm pretty much assuming I won't get upgraded despite throwing PPs at all of my flights, even short ones, because I have almost 300 set to expire in Jan. 22.

One thing I have noticed though is that some of my upcoming transcons on wide bodies are selling premium economy seats as normal economy so I've been intentionally making connections rather than doing direct BOS-SFO flights in hopes that they don't do an aircraft change last minute. I figure the connection is worth the time if it makes for a more reasonable long flight if my upgrades are not going to clear.

JerseyCityS

24th on the list as a IK? Are you serious? That's incredible, and with using PP.

I just hit 1K yesterday for the first time.

Booked a EWR LAX in JAN in premium economy for a ridiculously low price of $230 OW. Shocked to see that, but I grabbed it. I applied 10 PP's to get first. I guess we'll see how it goes! I'll be happy with premium economy for the low price.

econ

Fares for the elusive R space have been as low as $200-210 on SFO-EWR. Good way to get favorable position on the J upgrade list with fewer PP needed.

RobOnLI

Two more flights I've been booked on or am currently booked on.

CLE-IAD #19 of 34
MCO-IAD #17 of 33

I'm not even hitting top 50% right now which is absolutely insane and I've not seen this before this year. Even on DEN-SFO that I did a few times pre-Covid I was in top 25% without PP/RPU/GPU.

Above two references are 1K on a T fare, no PPs. I just don't get how I'm super far down on a CLE-IAD flight since CLE isn't even really a focus city at this point.

-RM

gaobest

Don’t forget the 1k benefit on UAL - preboarding before F. Guaranteed overhead space as a pre board. I’m often standing in Tier 1 line as hordes of 1k (and GS of course) board. AS and surely other airlines aren’t letting their 1k equivalents board before F. Overhead space matters! Sometimes it’s hard to get overhead space in F.

This has been a ft mantra for over a decade when it became harder to get upgrades as airlines saw more Y pax paying an extra $99 for a F upgrade during OLCI. And yes, as a rare flyer who travels in a 3-person PNR, we do indeed pay F and fly only sometimes. Trade off is that we aren’t going to a lot of places.

some pax are paying for a seat in F. Usually these are pax without major status on any airline. Whether the ticket is F C D Z P etc is another story.