- Joined
- Jun 19, 2006
- Posts
- 7,820
I've refrained from posting until this point, but since you asked . . . No.
Here's the breakdown:
Person 1 (me): Platinum; PNR A
Person 2: nothing; PNR B
Person 3: nothing; PNR B
Person 4: Silver; PNR C
Person 5: Bronze; PNR D
At this stage, it's important to note two things. First, I split myself off from the others (originally persons 1 to 3 were on the same PNR) in order to increase my chances of an op-up). Second, person 5 happens to work for a major international mining company in the travel bookings department and has senior (loacal (in Australia)) contacts with QF.
So, at the time we all checked in, there were three seats remaining in J. I remarked the to check-in agent at SIN that it looks like the flight is oversold in Y, he concurred and said the lounge agents may contact me (for an op-up).
I'd been checking expertflyer regularly and the only thing that changed was a drop in availability in J, from 3 to 2. About two hours or before the flight I approached the F lounge agent for some information on persons 2 and 3 (with respect to their seating assignments, as we weren't on the same PNR). Knock me over with a feather but person 3 had been upgraded to business with the annotation "service recovery" along with the name of the QF contact known to person 5.
I was fuming. At this point I hadn't put two and two together and kept telling the lounge agent that person 3 (the op-up) had flown maybe twice with QF before and certainly had no "service recovery" need issues. She couldn't explain it.
I went back to the J lounge and told the others. Person 3 (the op-up) thanked me, thinking it was me who had got it for him. It wasn't. Next, persons 2 and 5 get paged to the desk. They return to say that there was only one other seat remaining in J and one of them could have it. One of them took it and the other was told there still may be a chance he/she would be op-upped.
And bang. It happened. Just a few minutes before we were going to board, the third op-up came through. This meant persons 2, 3 and 5, with no status, were op-upped, while myself and person 4 (the only ones with status) were left in Y.
The details then emerged. Person 5 had spoken to his/her QF contact and asked about the possibility of an upgrade for all of us. Person 5 gave the QF rep his/her PNR and the PNR of persons 2 and 3. Way back then, the PNR of persons 2 and 3 was actually also my PNR, before I split myself off in the hope of getting an op-up.
The end result was the three people with no status go upgraded purely because person 5 has a high-level QF contact. Person 5 has also received two long-haul (10+ hours) QF op-ups in the last year when travelling personally (ie. not on business), both explicitly due to his/her relationship with the QF contact.
Not happy.
While my plan to get an op-up ultimately bit me in the bumb, my anger comes from the fact that non-status passengers were upgraded purely because one has a high-level QF contact. Yes, some may well say that person 5's company has a lucrative arrangement with QF and that needs to be protected. But at the expense of loyal flyers (ie. me, Platinum). How many other passengers on the flight were Platinum (or even Gold) and, in my opinion rightly, should have received the op-ups over the others?
It would be a different story if, say, J wasn't full and other points upgrades requests had been processed. But to me, this person (and how many others) are having their bread buttered on both sides by QF, because they were for a company who spends big on QF.
One wonders how often this happens.
Again, it would be different if the cabin wasn't full and upgrade requests had been processed. But op-ups seem to have been required (oversold in Y) and surely they should go to status passengers.
Anyway, I've been bitter about it ever since. Perhaps you can tell!
