QF economy upgrade to business

[dcd]

We have enough points to upgrade from economy to business from Brisbane to LA. Trying to work out the process. As I understand it, you buy a economy class ticket, then go online to upgrade. I believe you only get an upgrade if there are spare seats in business? When do we find out if we have seats? There are three of us travelling together in April 2012. What are the chances that we all get the upgrade so we can sip the champers together?
Thanks for any replies

 

[bam71]

We have enough points to upgrade from economy to business from Brisbane to LA. Trying to work out the process. As I understand it, you buy a economy class ticket, then go online to upgrade. I believe you only get an upgrade if there are spare seats in business? When do we find out if we have seats? There are three of us travelling together in April 2012. What are the chances that we all get the upgrade so we can sip the champers together?
Thanks for any replies

You'll find out around 24hrs prior to departure. I must admit though, without status, you'd be lucky to get it:-|

 

[opusman]

You'll find out around 24hrs prior to departure.

Make that about 5 hours!

There are three of us travelling together in April 2012. What are the chances that we all get the upgrade so we can sip the champers together?

Your chances are not good I'm afraid. Upgrades on that route a pretty scarce generally, and the odds of getting 3 seats is pretty slim. If you post your exact flight details people can tell you what the availability is like at the moment, although April is still a fair way off.

Also be aware that, if you are all traveling on the same booking, then the upgrade will either come through for all of you or for none - they won't upgrade 1 out of 3 or 2 out of 3 of you.

Also if you are all on the same booking than one of you (the one making the request) has to have enough frequent flyer points to upgrade you all.

 

[markis10]

Make that about 5 hours!

Most times the upgrades clear around the 24 hour mark, 5 hours is late in my experience.

The upgrade lottery is just that, I would look at using the points for a PE Any Seat Award instead on the way over and grab a OW Y back?

 

[Alanslegal]

Apart from the comments above, you can only upgrade certain economy tickets, that is not all tickets are upgradeable such as red e-deal, sale fares etc. If you are on a fare that is upgradeable, you can apply for a points upgrade 3 months (or 90 days) before the actual flight [I can't remember which is the correct one]. Once you elect for an upgrade, you enter the upgrade lottery; yep a lottery. There's a whole range of deciding factors in who gets upgraded but one of the important factors is your QF frequent flyer status. The higher your status, the higher you end up on that upgrade list. To me, I guess its a way to reward (with a better upgrade chance to) those who fly frequently vs. those folks who fly once in a while.

 

[james4321]

The reality is that unless you have a high status (at least Gold) with QF then your chances of getting an upgrade are minimal. There must be thousands of people who have joined Qantas FF to get points through their CC spend plus Woolworths spend etc, who dont realise that unless you are a Frequent FLYER your chances of getting to upgrade to the pointy end are virtually NIL. Unless you fly regularly you would probably be far better off saving the annual fee and putting it towards the cost of buying a ticket, because the benefits that you might have thought that you are going to get through FF membership are very unlikely to be realised.

 

[zahra01]

Hi, I flew QF from LAX to Melbourne last week and upgraded with points, I had a discounted business class flight, and got into first class. It was for my husband and myself. I was really surpised it came off, as I was only a bronze status at the time, and I'd even considered doing a stupid status run in the middle of my holiday to get my FF status higher, but luckily it wasn't a problem this time !!
I hope it comes off for you. I suppose there might be more people trying to go from Y to J...but good luck !

 

[Alanslegal]

I suppose there might be more people trying to go from Y to J...but good luck !

Sounds very logical. Most people want to get out of Y esp. on these long long haul flights. But I guess when one is in J then they would be already very content to be there, and F would be a bonus.

 

[ftm]

The issue of Status only really comes in to it when there are fewer seats available in the higher class than there are people requesting an upgrade. If any of my flights lately are anything to go by, you would have no problem. EZE-SYD a week ago was 3 pax in A-Zone (cosmetically configured as Business), 7 Upper deck, main deck Business empty.

 

[Mojopac]

I stopped flying Qantas years ago. Emirates always seems to do a good deal. We upgraded on points from London toBusiness. When we got to the check in, we were given new boarding passes for First Class. Fabulous. This is the third time Emirates have done this for us so I can't see any reason to change from their excellent service.

 

[trooper]

Unless of course.. like the OP.. you wish to fly from BNE to LAX. Not a route one typically associates with Emirates I'd suggest...

 

[Stephen65]

In the Good Old Days you could use points to buy a guaranteed upgrade to J at the time of booking your Y fare. Now you have to buy the Y fare and hope.

 

[FlyboyAl]

I'm booked LAX-SYD next Wednesday, and just got an email from Qantas offering Y+ for 35000 pts or J for 55000 pts. It was a red e-deal ticket for $998.
I thought long and hard about giving up 80K, then regretfully accepted their offer of J .
3rd time this has occured in 2 1/2 years. 1 was an op up to Y+, and the other was a points upgrade to Y+.
But I ONLY ever get upgrades when I'm on my own. The FlyGirl gets very pi**ed off when nothing happens when we fly together!

 

[straitman]

I'm booked LAX-SYD next Wednesday, and just got an email from Qantas offering Y+ for 35000 pts or J for 55000 pts. It was a red e-deal ticket for $998.
I thought long and hard about giving up 80K, then regretfully accepted their offer of J .
3rd time this has occured in 2 1/2 years. 1 was an op up to Y+, and the other was a points upgrade to Y+.
But I ONLY ever get upgrades when I'm on my own. The FlyGirl gets very pi**ed off when nothing happens when we fly together!

Better to be lucky some of the time rather than not at all.

 

[Alanslegal]

I'm booked LAX-SYD next Wednesday, and just got an email from Qantas offering Y+ for 35000 pts or J for 55000 pts. It was a red e-deal ticket for $998.
I thought long and hard about giving up 80K, then regretfully accepted their offer of J .

Is that a guaranteed points upgrade? or just the chance to enter the upgrade draw? If its the former that's awesome.

I've been offered the chance to upgrade on cheap red-deal fares, like many here have, and luckily our two upgrade draws were successes.

 

[FlyboyAl]

10 minutes after I replied to the email, the points had been deducted, and the upgrade came through.

 

[serfty]

Is that a guaranteed points upgrade? or just the chance to enter the upgrade draw? If its the former that's awesome.
...

I've had this before - such offers occur and immediately.

Points deduct and off you go and pick seats.

 

[Alanslegal]

I've had this before - such offers occur and immediately.

Points deduct and off you go and pick seats.

That's awesome!

Just having a look at seat availability for QF12 12/10 and it's showing as:-

F5 A4 J9 C9 D7 I1 W9 R4 T0 Y4 B5 H5 K2 M2 L0 G0 E0

So any correlation as to why these offers are made?? I would assume Y is relatively full and J is relatively empty.

 

[ozmille]

Never had one of those emails :-(


Sent from my iPad using Aust Freq Fly app

 

[ozbeachbabe]

I'm booked LAX-SYD next Wednesday, and just got an email from Qantas offering Y+ for 35000 pts or J for 55000 pts. It was a red e-deal ticket for $998.
I thought long and hard about giving up 80K, then regretfully accepted their offer of J .
3rd time this has occured in 2 1/2 years. 1 was an op up to Y+, and the other was a points upgrade to Y+.
But I ONLY ever get upgrades when I'm on my own. The FlyGirl gets very pi**ed off when nothing happens when we fly together!

What was the total points deducted? It would have only be the 55,000 from whY to J LAX/SYD not 80K? :?: