How often are you being upgraded?
I have good luck on most flights getting upgrades, but bad luck when traveling to Alaska, mostly the SEA-ANC run. Last week I went SEA-ANC-JNU-SEA, and did not get one upgrade. I have had some luck on the ANC-FAI run getting upgraded, but that's a relatibly short flight.
Do you feel you have a better chance of getting upgraded when traveling on a Tuesday rather than Monday??
With the exception of my trips to Alaska, I have been batting about 90% upgrades as a GOLD, and was getting about 50% upgrade success as a MVP.
All of you that participate on this site are great, and I have gotten a ton of good information from it. Thank you.
Barry
Interesting though, is that I booked a MVPG upgrade RT ANC-MCO yesterday for mid-March & could not use miles to upgrade the MCO-SEA return. The other three segments were upgraded at time of booking.
As an MVPG, I've had 100 % success with the complimentary upgrades on my flights in 2004 (SEA to West Coast cities, including DEN and LAS). I have not flown AS longhaul to the East Coast since "confirm at booking time" was eliminated for MVPGs -- clearly AS simply does not provide enough F seats to meet demand on those routes. (Instead, I always fly NW to those cities where I was succesful with complimentary upgrades on 59/60 of my flights in 2004 ... the 1/60 I was actually confirmed in F, but the NW flight went mechanical and I had to be rebooked on CO just 25 minutes before the CO flight departed, and F was full].
My friends who are MVP report 90-100 upgrade success on SEA to West Coast cities. After 8 years as an MVPG (I think that's correct), I decided in early 2004 it just wasn't worth the extra dollars and effort to requalify as MVPG (compared to the MVP level), so I scaled back my AS travel this year to reach just the MVP threshold (exceeded it by just 46 miles I think). I'll provide my own first-hand report as an MVP next December.
GMCTurbo:
Re: A .500 success rate on SEA-EWR
... I would say that is phenomenally successful. Surely that route, along with SEA-DCA, has got to be the most competitive upgrade route in the AS system, for a number of factors:
- EWR (and the rest of NYC) is a huge business market, implying very high elite populations and most travel being purchased or reimbursed by businesses (ie, willing to pay the higher coach fare classes eligible for immediate upgrade, or even F fares !) ... unlike leisure markets like MCO and MIA
- little nonstop competition (just CO, I think), and I know it's very, very tough to upgrade on CO on that route
- flight length -- we've seen many folks on FT willing to pay high coach fares (or F), use mileage upgrades, etc. fighting to get an F seat on the small number of these AS transcons per day -- it's amazing there are any F seats left over for complimentary upgrades !
Jeeves:
Re "... super-sized people occupying the middle exit seat ...".
I'm assuming you're referring to "large width" folks ... I notice that when one requests an exit row seat assignment on the AS web site in recent months (and also the NW web site), the exit row rules one must accept now state a person sitting in the exit row may not use a seat-belt extension -- have you noticed if these folks were using such an extension ? Perhaps the GAs and FAs are not enforcing this new rule ? PS: on an AA MD-80 flight a few years ago, I was sitting in the aisle seat of the 2-seat exit row, next to me was a fellow who easily weighed 350 pounds, if not more, occupying the window seat and 50 % of my seat. As he was sitting immediately against the exit hatch, he would have had primary responsbility for it in an emergency ... but it was clear there was no way he would ever fit through that hatch. The AA FAs didn't seem to care one bit.
If you fly Tuesday - Wednesday you tend to do better on transcons. Also transcons leaving in the AM and red eyes have more space. The dinner transcons from the east are tough (I guess everyone loves a hot meal in F and the only way to get one is flying F on a transcon dinner flight to Seattle)
If you can stay away from meal flights, your chance of upgrades will be much better.
Interesting though, is that I booked a MVPG upgrade RT ANC-MCO yesterday for mid-March & could not use miles to upgrade the MCO-SEA return. The other three segments were upgraded at time of booking.
Wow, ANC-MCO has got to be just about the best use of miles to upgrade there is! That trip might actually be worth the 10K for the confirmed upgrade!
I've had 100% success in obtaining exit row seats when I needed them but that may have to do with booking 3 to 4 weeks out. However, I've had a bad string of luck of having super-sized people occupying the middle exit seat. This has made me rethink the desirability of the exit row. From now on, I may try row 6 or 7 if I can't get up front.
Some MVP's have reported good luck with upgrades. My schedule must just coincide with too many of you darn Golds. :)
Edited to add: several of my upgrades earlier this year (including MCO-SEA) were due to the 36-hour rule. Reading these boards really pays off.
Our coach flight was fine. We were given Row 6, bulkhead seats on the two seat side, and had lots of leg room. We didn't get breakfast, but that was ok as we had just eaten a very delicious and hearty breakfast at Don Alejandro's at LAS. My seat was broken and didn't recline, but it was a pretty empty flight so Hunki moved over and had all of row 7 A-C to himself and I took his seat, 6 D.
To be perfectly accurate, I should add that there were many flights that I checked out on AS, but didn't book because they couldn't be upgraded at the time of booking. Those flights were instead booked on UA. In the end, it worked out perfectly for us. We logged over 50,000 paid BIS miles each on AS and over paid 100,000 BIS miles each on UA, requalifying for top status on both airlines.
We will see how 2005 plays out. I am not looking forward to the New Year's Day zeros. :(
We've been about .800 on bulkhead/exit row.
Most flights have a ton of Golds. I peak at the manifest when I can, or simply based on how many people in coach try to pull the "But I'm MVP Gold" routine to get a free drink or a dig-e-player. One SEA-EWR flight had at least 40+ Golds :-(
Frankly, I don't miss Gold (I was comped from DL for Q3/Q4 2003) as the best feature for me then was the upgrade-on-lower-fares-at-time-of-booking. The elite security would be nice, but not a necessity. The extra 50% bonus doesn't really add up to all that much for me as I do few longhauls. Getting back on topic ...
As MVP I've been upgraded with no problem r/t SEA - LAX (on a cheap fare), which I thought would be quite difficult. I love the pre-boarding/exit seats, even when not upgraded. My only upgrade problem was a r/t SEA - PHX (midweek) last month. I called in at 36 hours and got FC (barely) on the outbound; the rep told me at that time that the return FC was totally booked - no U, no F, no nuttin'. That surprised me.
The super-sized people I was referring to did not require seat belt extensioners. They just kind of overflowed into my arm rest and seat area. I either had to lean away from them or get used to leaning against their arm.
As I am less than 6 feet tall, I don't really need all of the additional leg room. I'm more interested in an empty middle seat or having a seat partner that shares the space more equally.
Was able to secure a $50 paid upgrade at checking on SEA-LAX aftermoon flight on a Sunday back in March. The return LAX-SEA evening flight on Thursday was at 100% thanks to folks returning from vacation in Disneyland and Mexico, and was an hour late to boot (which allowed all the standbys to get on), but I found the 737-900 to be surprisingly comfortable (I was in the "Back 20s").
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