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Unofficial: Complimentary CK/EXP Premium Economy Upgrades?

Unofficial: Complimentary CK/EXP Premium Economy Upgrades?

Old Jan 20, 2017, 7:04 am
  #46  
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
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I think if you are EXP who bought a PE ticket vs. an EXP who bought a Y or lower class ticket, I expect AA will prioritize the EXP who bought the PE ticket since they are giving more money to the airline vs. the EXP who just bought a regular Y ticket.
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 7:08 am
  #47  
 
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Originally Posted by jay_dubya
I don't see the upside to AA giving PE pax upgrade priority. Especially once upgrade priority switches to EQD based later this year - what's aa's interest in upgrading an otherwise low spending gold over a high spending exp just because they happened to have spent slightly more on this flight?
No-status passengers upgrading from business to first certainly have priority over EXPs wanting to upgrade from coach to first. Of course, that's an imperfect analogy since a two-cabin upgrade isn't currently allowed at all for anyone. But I think that it is entirely fair for a no-status customer wanting a one-cabin upgrade (using currency, miles possibly including a copay in most cases) to trump an EXP wanting a two-cabin upgrade.

But we'll see what AA thinks once the policy is officially announced. I can see arguments both ways.

Originally Posted by ericdabbs
I think if you are EXP who bought a PE ticket vs. an EXP who bought a Y or lower class ticket, I expect AA will prioritize the EXP who bought the PE ticket since they are giving more money to the airline vs. the EXP who just bought a regular Y ticket.
I don't think anyone doubts that. The question is whether the order will be
1) CK W > CK Y > EXP W > EXP Y > PPRO W > PPRO Y > PLAT W > PLAT Y > GOLD W > Gold Y > no status W > no status Y
or
2) CK W > EXP W > PPRO W > PLAT W > Gold W > no status W > CK Y > EXP Y > PPRO Y > PLAT Y > Gold Y > no status Y

With EQDs presumably being the tiebreaker within a purchased cabin and status level.

Last edited by ashill; Jan 20, 2017 at 7:14 am
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 7:33 am
  #48  
 
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Originally Posted by ashill
I don't think anyone doubts that. The question is whether the order will be
1) CK W > CK Y > EXP W > EXP Y > PPRO W > PPRO Y > PLAT W > PLAT Y > GOLD W > Gold Y > no status W > no status Y
or
2) CK W > EXP W > PPRO W > PLAT W > Gold W > no status W > CK Y > EXP Y > PPRO Y > PLAT Y > Gold Y > no status Y

With EQDs presumably being the tiebreaker within a purchased cabin and status level.
I expect #1 to be the more likely candidate for the upgrade priority because I fully expect that status will still be the primary factor first for upgrade priority. The only caveat that AA stated for 2017 and going forward that is different from 2016 and before is that Status + EQDs from the last 12 months will decide the priority within the same level (e.g: An EXP with $30K in spending will trump an EXP in $15K spending but both will trump a Plat even if they spent $35K last year).

Last edited by ericdabbs; Jan 20, 2017 at 7:39 am
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 9:53 am
  #49  
 
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Originally Posted by jay_dubya
what's aa's interest in upgrading an otherwise low spending gold over a high spending exp just because they happened to have spent slightly more on this flight?
Sell the PE seats and not just have it full of EXPs on free upgrades.
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 10:12 am
  #50  
 
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Originally Posted by carlosdca
Sell the PE seats and not just have it full of EXPs on free upgrades.
Do you really think that aa thinks that pe won't sell unless it's a short cut to J upgrades?
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 10:25 am
  #51  
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Originally Posted by carlosdca
Sell the PE seats and not just have it full of EXPs on free upgrades.
That goes without saying. CK/EXP PE upgrades will only be day of departure for seats that would have otherwise gone unoccupied.

-FlyerBeek
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 10:47 am
  #52  
 
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Originally Posted by jay_dubya
I don't see the upside to AA giving PE pax upgrade priority. Especially once upgrade priority switches to EQD based later this year - what's aa's interest in upgrading an otherwise low spending gold over a high spending exp just because they happened to have spent slightly more on this flight?
Because it would incentivize both the Gold and the EXP to buy up to PE, which is likely to command more than a "slight" premium (probably at least 50% in most cases)?

The only downside is that on the margin it might incentivize the EXP to defect to UA or DL. But the "high spending" EXP should almost never find herself in the scenario described because, by definition, she generally buys high fares.
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 11:09 am
  #53  
 
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Originally Posted by FlyerBeek
That goes without saying. CK/EXP PE upgrades will only be day of departure for seats that would have otherwise gone unoccupied.

-FlyerBeek
would be interesting to see how well PE sells considering that EXP probably would be among the most likely to purchase PE. On other airline's flights, I typically find PE to have higher load than J cabin.
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 1:02 pm
  #54  
 
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Originally Posted by jay_dubya
Do you really think that aa thinks that pe won't sell unless it's a short cut to J upgrades?
AA has all sorts of incentives to buy more expensive products that go beyond just the product itself. For example, business and first class tickets get EQM multipliers. Similarly, fully fare tickets get advantages in upgrade priority and in EQM earning. It's probably not the case that AA thinks they can't sell any of these products without having frequent flier benefits in place, but the benefits probably help sell more of them.
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Old Jan 20, 2017, 1:11 pm
  #55  
 
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Originally Posted by jay_dubya
Conversely, if buying pe guarantees that you're at worst number 21 on the upgrade list - aa will effectively be discouraging customers from buying J by guaranteeing them a decent spot on the list and a comfortable fall back.
Then it seems it would be a good idea to eliminate that "comfortable fall back", i.e. the free upgrade from Y to W for EXPs in the near future

Last edited by carlosdca; Jan 20, 2017 at 1:18 pm
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Old May 23, 2017, 7:54 pm
  #56  
 
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Any ideas if this has started yet and if so, how it works? I'm on ICN-DFW next weekend and PE seems wide open...
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Old May 23, 2017, 8:17 pm
  #57  
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Originally Posted by SpeedRicer
Any ideas if this has started yet and if so, how it works? I'm on ICN-DFW next weekend and PE seems wide open...
Best I can tell at this juncture, majority opinion seems to be that AA has changed their mind about this (and/or only did it for a short period of time, possibly,) and is not offering these upgrades to PE.
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Old May 24, 2017, 10:22 am
  #58  
 
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This sounds great on paper. With the huge number of ac equipped with PE seats out there, I look forward to taking advantage of this on my regular SCL-DFW and SCL-MIA flights before it's "enhanced" away...

But I do give credit to AA for adding something positive to the program.


Seems I came to this thread late...and it's already gone. *sigh*
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Old May 24, 2017, 11:49 am
  #59  
 
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I've got a flight DFW-GRU next Wednesday. I'll report on whether there were open seats in PE if I was still in Economy.

When I did the same flight in March, I got the free PE, and I was even allowed to select the seat in advance. But now on aa.com there is nothing about EXP getting a free PE seat, so I suspect that it is gone.
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Old May 29, 2017, 10:52 am
  #60  
 
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I just got a call from AA. They are giving me a free upgrade to PE on my flight DFW-GRU tomorrow. Both window and aisle seats were open.

With all the news about bad treatment of customers, it is nice to report something on the plus side! Also, perhaps the comps to PE from economy for EXP are not quite dead. It is all UTR and probably on a flight by flight basis depending on the load.
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