Tag Archives for upgrades.
American Airlines is changing complimentary elite upgrades on domestic flights with separate premium economy and business class cabins: coach passengers will upgrade only to premium economy, while business class upgrades will start from premium economy. The change affects premium transcontinental and Hawaii routes, making paid premium economy more important for elites who want a shot at business class.
American Airlines appears to be offering domestic first class upgrades for as little as $35, a new low that makes sense for casual passengers but stings for loyal customers waiting on complimentary upgrades. The shift shows how little traditional elite upgrades are worth now that airlines would rather sell the seat for almost any cash amount than give it away as a loyalty benefit.
American Airlines passengers often see deadheading pilots move ahead of them on the first class upgrade list, but the same basic priority exists at United, Delta, and Alaska in less visible ways. The issue is not pilot rest, but whether airlines are increasingly built around union contract priorities instead of paying customers.
Airlines increasingly sell first class upgrades instead of giving them free to elite members, and passengers are seeing different upgrade prices for the same flights. American denies using status or personal customer data to set upgrade prices, but the trend toward personalized offers could still make loyalty less valuable.
Hilton Honors will start selling upgrades to elite members of the Honors program through their mobile app.
American Airlines CEO Robert Isom says the airline has caught up at selling first class upgrades instead of giving them away. That may be good merchandising, but it guts the core value of elite status: if American will sell the seat for $40, the customer spending tens of thousands chasing upgrades is being told exactly where they stand.
I spent three hours in an American Airlines coach middle seat from Washington National to Dallas — and got two and a half hours of real work done. That should not feel revelatory, but after years of chasing upgrades and paying more for domestic first, it made me rethink when the extra space is actually worth the money.
Marriott elite upgrades are supposed to be a loyalty benefit. But hotels are increasingly turning better rooms and suites into auctions, asking even top-tier members to bid for upgrades they expected to receive free — and warning that dozens of other guests may already be competing for the same rooms.
Airlines are selling domestic first class seats for as little as $26 instead of using them to reward frequent flyers, and that is quietly gutting the biggest reason many customers chase top-tier status in the first place. That weakens premium credit card spend. But there are ways they could fix this.
Delta usually sells its first class seats rather than giving them away as upgrades. So when a gate agent in Salt Lake City still had two empty seats to fill, she did not just clear the list and move on. She turned the gate area into a break dance contest and used that to assign the seats.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
