American Airlines previously offered excellent availability of their eVIPs or systemwide upgrades (SWUs) distributed to elite Executive Platinum flyers. Restricting access to premium space and halving the number of eVIPs given out should lead to more cash with fewer...
Very Bad Upgrade Advice…
The perennial consumer rights advocate Christoper Elliott is out with a new column entitled, First class for free? Try these innovative tactics to get an airline upgrade. In it, he offers horrific upgrade advice… Far be it from me to...
Paid Upgrades At The Gate On British Airways
Some airlines are aggressive at hawking upgrades, others do so in a more subtle way. I flew British Airways in economy class from Los Angeles to London last week. Just for kicks, I asked a gate agent if any...
A $365 Upgrade From Sydney To Los Angeles On United That Wasn’t Meant To Be…
At Award Expert, we do our best to be discerning. If a client tells us they want economy class but we see a great deal for business class, we are going to alert them. A long-term client asked me...
British Airways Releases 50,000 Extra Business Class Award Seats
British Airways has released thousands of additional business class award seats available for a limited time across a limited, but wide, date range. Through December 2nd, British Airways has made 50,000 extra Club World business class seats available for...
United Changes Fare Class Codes For Premium Cabins And Upgrades
United Airlines quietly updated its fare codes for some premium cabin tickets and upgrades over the weekend. With Polaris First class now just a memory, United has pulled A and F fare classes traditionally used to designate first class....
Giving Up An Upgrade To Eat Dinner With My Family
Would you ever give up a confirmed upgrade on a six-hour flight just to get home a few hours earlier? That’s what I did yesterday. I was flying from Newark to Burbank via San Francisco on United and had...
My 59€ Upgrade on KLM
If you know me, you know that I don’t stray much from Star Alliance unless it is a “review” trip for the blog. Yesterday, however, I found myself on KLM and encountered an unexpected upgrade surprise. My business partner...
Why I Turned Down An Upgrade To First Class On Air France
It was hard to resist, but I turned down a 1079EUR upgrade offer from Air France Business Class to La Premier (First Class) on my recent flight from Paris to Dubai. That is probably the cheapest price I’ll ever...
A Free Upgrade On Lufthansa…Just For Asking
I recently wrote about a free business class upgrade on Emirates…just for asking. Now I have another chapter to add to that story, this time on Lufthansa. John and I were traveling from Milan Malpensa to Frankfurt last week....
Live and Let’s Fly Weekend Digest: March 04, 2018
I’ve been grounded all week and am thankful for it. No plans to travel next week either. Plenty of time with family and friends instead. Lots of work too. There have been a handful of trips I’ve turned down,...
Virgin Atlantic Confirms Upgrade Story is #FakeNews
Virgin Atlantic has confirmed what we all knew…the recent Bloomberg story on upgrades was #FakeNews. Gilbert from God Save the Points has done an excellent job in covering this story, going so far as to record a phone call...
