How many Velocity Platinum are there?

[Qld4101]

Also intrigued by this comment, I was not aware they were removing either?

 

[hummel]

I'd be interested to know too.

I have 4 upgrades sitting on my account to use as a WP.... however I drop to SG on June 12th. So assuming I'll be losing them...

 

[maninblack]

I said "effective". They are releasing far less upgrade seats than they used to making these upgrades far less likely.

 

[Ben6]

I said "effective". They are releasing far less upgrade seats than they used to making these upgrades far less likely.

Only my experience but I have never not been able to upgrade a seat (domestic or international) so far.

 

[maninblack]

Only my experience but I have never not been able to upgrade a seat (domestic or international) so far.

Indeed that used to be the case

 

[serfty]

Indeed that used to be the case

Ar you stating that if Z class (Business award) is available on a flight then one might not be able to upgrade into that from a Flexi.

Since the SABRE switch, I have never been able to upgrade to business if an award in business was not available.

 

[Ben6]

Ar you stating that if Z class (Business award) is available on a flight then one might not be able to upgrade into that from a Flexi.

Since the SABRE switch, I have never been able to upgrade to business if an award in business was not available.

Ditto, I upgraded a MEL-LAX recently and confirmed over the phone that Reward seats and Upgrades come from the same pool, so you can easily check online. If a reward seat shows on the flight, then an upgrade will also be available. There are initially 4 seats allocated to this pool per flight for long haul international and then more "may" be released if demand is particularly slow for that flight. I assume that domestic works the same way but I don't know how many upgrades are initially available. I do know that a recent MEL-PER flight I checked had 7 seats available for upgrade and that seemed like plenty to me.

 

[n7of9]

...and confirmed over the phone that Reward seats and Upgrades come from the same pool, so you can easily check online. If a reward seat shows on the flight, then an upgrade will also be available.

i have read this a couple of times on AFF, but on a recent SYD-AUH upgrade request i found this not to be the case on 2 flights i enquired about...both showed J Reward as being available but was told on the phone that Y+ to J upgrade using points was unavailable for those same flights - have i misunderstood something?

 

[dandandan]

There is around 1,000 Platinum members under 12 according to todays June velocity magazine promoting a new junior high flyer passport.

A couple of colleagues and I have long wondered what the percentage of Platinum VA members there are compared to Gold, Silver, Red and not Velocity members at all. The full lounge these days gives (I think) a false impression as we are all generally congregated in there and obviously there are many more VA flights than in years past. I have not failed to gain row 3 seating for close to 2 years now, so with only 6 x Row 3 seats in a typical yield of 135 (80% of a 737-800) the max would be 4.4% of all travelers but I have no idea how many people on a typical flight would have a Velocity membership at all.

Does anyone know the rough percentages?

 

[Deleted member 29185]

Only my experience but I have never not been able to upgrade a seat (domestic or international) so far.

Note quote below......maninblack referred specifically to the complementary upgrades. You cannot use a complementary upgrade on international so I think you are comparing different products. My experience of complementary upgrades is very different to yours. My only flexi seats in the past 6 months or so have been short haul international and could not upgrade. Domestically, my previous flexis were about a year ago and I tried to upgrade to PER from BNE, SYD and MEL and no go. It was very short notice though. Hence, I lost 4 comp upgrades last year and I'll most likely lose 4 this year and my wife will most likely lose her 4 this year too. Great benefit and I concur with the statement quoted below.

the effective removal of the so called "confirmed complimentary upgrades"

 

[Caversham04]

Note quote below......maninblack referred specifically to the complementary upgrades. You cannot use a complementary upgrade on international so I think you are comparing different products. My experience of complementary upgrades is very different to yours. My only flexi seats in the past 6 months or so have been short haul international and could not upgrade. Domestically, my previous flexis were about a year ago and I tried to upgrade to PER from BNE, SYD and MEL and no go. It was very short notice though. Hence, I lost 4 comp upgrades last year and I'll most likely lose 4 this year and my wife will most likely lose her 4 this year too. Great benefit and I concur with the statement quoted below.

I've been lucky - I'm very happy with Row 3 and I only book Flexi's if the cheaper tickets are unavailable and I HAVE to travel on a particular flight. I've only once had a problem booking Row 3 and my two attempts at using Complementary Upgrades have been successful (including two on one flight as SWMBO was travellnig with me). Both of the flights were ex-ADL, which may help to explain things?

 

[williamsf1]

i have read this a couple of times on AFF, but on a recent SYD-AUH upgrade request i found this not to be the case on 2 flights i enquired about...both showed J Reward as being available but was told on the phone that Y+ to J upgrade using points was unavailable for those same flights - have i misunderstood something?

Are you a Gold or Platinum member ?

 

[CMak]

I haven't had a problem getting row 3 (and often with my other half) and using my complimentary upgrades
CMak

 

[n7of9]

Are you a Gold or Platinum member ?

i am Gold

...(10 characters)

 

[Gredgy69]

I used my 4 complimentary upgrades in November last year to upgrade myself the missus and the 2 rugrats to business on Syd-Per.

 

[jaspon]

while on VA500 yesterday ool-syd, i loosely inquired as to how many plats there were on board, the FA kindly told me there were 21 plats and 17 golds, on the flight. Which I thought was a lot.
They then mentioned that OOL ranks 3rd after syd & bne for the amount of plat flyers. interesting

 

[jsoprano]

They then mentioned that OOL ranks 3rd after syd & bne for the amount of plat flyers. interesting

Not surprising if you consider QF ignoring this market for a long time, so at least proportionally way more QF SGs and WPs would have migrated across to VA than in MEL for example.

 

[smit0847]

Not surprising if you consider QF ignoring this market for a long time, so at least proportionally way more QF SGs and WPs would have migrated across to VA than in MEL for example.

Agreed - VA own OOL!

 

[rsellens]

What do you mean removal of "confirmed complimentary upgrades"??

Recently I tried to redeem 4 complementary upgrades for 2 people MCY-MEL-HBA next March. There was only one flight MCY-SYD-HBA (so I get less status credits) where this was possible in an entire month which actually coincided with the number of award seats availabe. It is obvious that VA have restricted both award seats and complementary upgrades hoping to sell them off as Upgrade Me premium bids. I used to be able to do this with only a few days notice.

 

[wannabeinvestmentbanker]

They then mentioned that OOL ranks 3rd after syd & bne for the amount of plat flyers. interesting

I would definitely believe this. The OOL lounge can get quite busy at around 6.30am with a Syd and Mel flight departing within five minutes of each other at 7am. You get a lot of snarls from the general boarding queue as we all file out of the lounge and seem to form a continuous stream of priority boarding. Row 3 is always completely full but 4-8 often have shadows.

QF definitely ignoring OOL with QP having very limited hours being unfortunate for those QP members who pay a lot for that lounge access flying Jetstar at other hours.