upgrade
 

hi guys,
can u settle an argument for me. do check in staff have the descretion to upgrade passengers?

Not at my airline. Unless you're willing to pay of course!

If we need to upgrade, the lucky pax who this happens to will have been pre-dermined before you've even left the house to get to the airport.

Operational Upgrades will always go to gold frequent flyer members first, or passengers on corporate accounts.

As a check in agent the most monotonous question we're asked is 'Are there any free upgrades available?'

Thos days are long gone!!!

Not at my airline either, upgrades are based on load factors and like at Striparella says the upgrades go to ff first and full fare tickets next.

Those days are indeed long gone.

One of the simple devices that check-in staff use to deflect this irritating and insulting question is: "No, only the cabin staff can do that" And the flip side is that - later - the cabin staff say, "No, only check-in staff can do that". :}

As an ex check in bloke I can honestly say that i was never told, "theres 6 meals upgrade who you like". The only time we could upgrade without permission was either, they had a gold or silver fqtv, or you worked with the person on check in and youd been told you could upgrade them!

On other airlines. We would go with a jam packed in y and have say 10 spare seats in C and the reason they wouldnt upgrade is that people didnt have the correct class of ticket!

Unfortunatly, smiling winking or even trying it on with the check in agent for an upgrade only gives them a big head!:D

Don't know about check-in desks (I've never asked - know the score and would feel too awkward). However, I recently made FF "Gold" with an airline here in the US. According to their website, all the upgrade decisions are made by the software, based on date of booking, fare paid and FF tier. That chimes with my recent experiences - in the last two weeks, I've had three upgrades - and all were web check-ins.

From what I've heard, the pickings are far leaner on international flights. Several of my colleagues are FF Platinum, one of whom has accrued 750,000 miles over the past couple of years. He usually gets upgraded on domestic flights, but has never yet managed it longer-haul.

One good thing about flying LoCo is that upgrades aren't a factor - one less thing to worry about!

On of the problems i face is pax seem to think that if there are 10 spare seats in J, we'll just upgrade people to fill them.

Nuh-uh.

It's all about protecting your product. Just because there are spare seats in better cabins does not mean they need to be filled.

Unless of course you are ground staff.......................

6

Upgrades are not done at check-in at my airline, unless you got upgraded BEFORE reaching the airport (usually applies only when a flight is severely oversold and only if you hold a higher-tier frequent flyer card). Operational upgrades (i.e. when upgrades are required due to oversales) are done at the airport but in a separate office after the passenger has checked in and are unrelated to a passenger asking to be upgraded, of course! In fact, many staff are really annoyed about being asked for such complimentary upgrades that such passengers might be marked not suitable for upgrade. Contrary to common belief (especially on US flights!) there is no such thing as a complimentary upgrade upon request.

BTW, I don't subscribe to the view that check-in staff tell passengers to ask the cabin crew to be upgraded on board. We usually even tell the crew prior to departure who has been particularly insistent so that they are pre-warned. Of course, often passengers TELL crew that's what was said on the ground. You won't believe the stories people come up with when asking for an upgrade, who said what, what happened when, etc. etc.

GC I am sure that Pax do make some really entertaining pitches that staff can enjoy afterwards ... One should also point out to would be upgrader: Due to an error by a carrier, I had a letter of apology and a cabin upgrade on my next sector. At the time, I was doing a project in HKG and the client would only pay for me to go Y, so this was a valuable document.

Within the 12 month validity of the document, I was not on a flight with spare capacity to execute the upgrade. :{ I know that they did try and I did check out the fullness of the PE cabin. Such is life and airlines are going to suffer from this problem for many years to come.

Mrs WH says upgrades at the airline she works for are usually finalised at the departure lounge/gate by groundstaff team dealing with boarding. This is also where all the issues of seating problems/queries/dbl bookings will finally get resolved - one way or the other!

I used to work on check in + if a flight was overbooked, we could put comments in the system for economy passengers - sfu - suitable for upgrade. I never had the final say though.

You will find that there are very few airlines which will give its Check in agents the power to upgrade, however, their supervisors usually DO have the power. But, if a check in agent was to ring the supervisor everytime a passenger asks for an upgrade I could see someone getting a cautioning! Basically it does not happen unless the aircraft requires upgrades as a result of an over booking!

Mrs S and myself got upgraded economy to business at the CX check-in for BKK-SIN. It was a 747, so I doubt it was overbooked, but the Upper Deck was pretty full. Didn't ask for it 'cos we had mega-cheap tickets. I travel a lot, usually One World, but I can count the number of times I've been upgraded on three fingers - and it's usually been for some reason. Mrs S on the other hand frequently seems to get upgraded... hmm wonder if there's a lesson there?

Slightly on a tangent, but just because it's a big aircraft doesn't mean that it won't be overbooked, particularly in that part of the world (where late canx and no-show rates can be pretty high). I don't normally have any access to operational figures, but I do remember being told once about a QF flight that I was booked on from HKG to SYD - at 4 months out, it was overbooked by 120 in economy. That flight went out without any anxiety, though - it was only about 90% full in economy on the day.

Only once has a walk up request been accepted. That was for some young honeymooners, made their day bless em!

When I started with BA, it was common-place for check-in staff to make recommendations as "SFU" (Suitable for Upgrade) or "NSFU" (Not Suitable For Upgrade) and a proportion of these may ba acted upon if "Operational reasons" (overselling in economy) led to the need to move some fortunate pax into the forward cabins.

In recent years, the selling of the forward cabins has improved, to the extent that we no longer over-sell the economy cabin as much and the use of computers enables the back-office boys to reward our Gold / Silver card holders or High-Yield passengers - these are usually earmarked in the Check In computer system for us to contact the back office.

That having been said, notice is still very much taken of the "NSFU" remark - rude or aggressive behaviour, wearing scruffy clothing or making excessive demands may very well result in you never being aware that you had been considered for the magic seats! In the event you were commented as a "contact back office" - the check in agent will contact them after you have left the desk! with a "definitely not" remark! (I've done this quite a few times recently - don't know if something is in the air or not, but people generally have seemed so rude in the last few weeks! .......anyone else noticed this???)

I have been upgraded at check-in, from Y to J, on the BKK-LHR trip with BA, twice. I have also been upgraded on a LHR-HKG flight with BA, from Y to WT+ and I have been upgraded from Y to J on an EDI-CDG flight, again with BA.

Upgrades
 

Have never asked for one. Apart from being bad manners (yeah, old-fashioned but proud of it!) I reckon it is a guaranteed way to ensure that you won't get it.
Nevertheless have been upgraded several times on BA & CX, once on MY & once on Swiss. Always LH, busi to first; always very nice! Mostly at check-in but once or twice at the gate.
I reckon the more pleasant you are to the guys & gals at check-in the more likely you are to get one if it's available.

So that's why it doesn't work for me
 

Well that's me stuffed then - always hand baggage, online check in - no opportunity to make the right impression.......:uhoh: