Upgrading on Lufthansa
 

I am travelling in July (July 1) BOS to FRA, and am trying to upgrade that flight. Any advice for a 1P?

If there's no NC inventory, get on the waitlist ASAP. The longer you wait, the worse your chances.

There is no waitlist for upgrading on LH

Be sure to book it as a LH flight, then call UA and ask to upgrade it (they will have to send a note off to LH to request it). Best to check with UA first on which fare buckets can be upgraded, last I checked it was just Y/B

If it looks like you won't get it that way, you can use a paper SWU or paper MP cert to waitlist the day of the flight.

If you wish to upgrade in advance using miles, you must have purchased a Y,B,M,H or C fare.

If you are going to upgrade with a 1K systemwide upgrade (someone else would give you) then that is done on a stand-by basis when you check-in at the airport. This certificate can be used on almost any fare.

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In order to upgrade with miles, you have to call UA and begin the process. They will contact LH to request the upgrade and mail you a paper certificate to turn in at the airport. You have to contact UA again to see if the upgrade cleared. It usually takes LH 48-72 hours to get back to UA, and sometimes the request has to be sent multiple times.

There is no NC inventory on LH. Upgrade inventory is I (or O for First) on LH.

Welcome to FlyerTalk, Swarthy Gent! Your advice would be excellent if this were a UA flight, but LH does not differentiate between award inventory and upgrade inventory. If there's no award availability, there's no upgrade availability either.

At present, there is no award/upgrade inventory available on that flight. cgruber, have you already booked your flight? If you can fly two days later, there is an I-Class (fare class for Business awards) seat available on LH 423 BOS-FRA on July 3rd. On that date, there is also availability on LX 53 BOS-ZRH.

I don't think one can use UA miles/certs to upgrade LX.

I have already booked, as I have business in London later that day.

Miles yes, certs no. But only on Y and B fares, IIRC.

I have requested an upgrade and have the certificate from United. How frequently do I call to "keep it current"?

I believe you're incorrect. BJ is right, no upgrades on LX using MP.

But not UA miles.

Well, according to this page, Swiss is one of the airlines on which Star Alliance upgrade awards can be used.

They seem to be suspended for the time being though... :confused:

I stand corrected. Thank you.

Right. Up until a week or so ago, you could.

Just to reiterate.
You must book an LH flight with the LH flight number (not a UA code share flight number).
You must book in Y, B, M or H.
You must have a paper mileage cert from UA.
You must call UA international reservations once a week and ask them to send a message to LH requesting the upgrade, because LH does not maintain a waitlist.
During the last week before the flight, you must make this call to UA every day.
You must not expect the upgrade to clear until a day or two before the flight.

Thank you! I appreciate the advice. (I'm a newbie at this [Lufthansa travel])

Or C. ;)

How does one find I or O inventory on LH? As far as I can tell, they're not listed on SeatCounter...

I don't know. It used to show sometimes on ExpertFlyer, but now, no.

The folks at the LH ticket counter will tell if you ask them about a specific flight.

Any idea if they'll tell you if call reservations?

Never tried.

Some UA agents will tell you if there is "I" or "O" inventory, but they will tell you that there is no gaurantee that LH will honor an upgrade request just because the inventory is available. :rolleyes:

I personally have had a 100% success rate with confirmed upgrades on LH if there was I or O inventory available when I requested the upgrade.

The way that I can find out is by using LH's own mileage redemption booking tool. If the seat is available for a mileage redemption, it's also available for an upgrade.

The caveat:

- you need to be a Miles&More member
- you need to have enough miles to actually be able to redeem the award you want to check

Thankfully, I have quite a number of LH miles in the bank (and the account number and PIN of my father's M&M account, for the few times that my own miles would not be enough for something I want to check... :D ).

(Bolding mine) I think that LH may actually maintain a waitlist, they just won't put UA requests on it. My reason for this thinking is that I have an LH flight next week FRA-DEN and my TA has access to LH systems. She went in and requested I class for me (just playing around, really) and the system took it. I still shows several days later as requested. I have no idea what will happen if they decide to give it to me. They may pull miles or expect a cert next week (I have a SWU printed for LH that I was planning on trying to use). Of course, the flight is pretty much sold out (0-3 seats avaialable any given time I check) so I'm not holding my breath.

Sort of corrected. My statement was with the understanding that UA has cancelled their members' ability to use the *A upgrade system.