Tag Archives for upgrades.
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.
American Airlines has opened one of the best systemwide upgrade opportunities it has offered in years: buy premium economy, request the upgrade by Wednesday night, and business class can clear as long as a seat is still for sale. That makes this promotion unusually broad and unusually valuable, because it bypasses the normal scarcity of upgrade inventory and turns a hard-to-use benefit into confirmed long-haul business class for August travel.
One of baseball’s greatest hitters of all time was Wee Willie Keeler, who introduced the ‘hit and run’ play to the game when he was a member of the Baltimore Orioles. It was his 44-game hitting streak that Joe DiMaggio broke. It was his record of 8 consecutive seasons with 200 hits or more than Ichiro Suzuki broke.
And his batting advice is exactly how you maximize your chances of an upgrade for both airlines and hotels.
An internal American Airlines update says the carrier will now surface paid first class offers to customers who are in the process of trying to confirm an elite upgrade certificate. In other words, while you’re using the upgrade instrument you earned through loyalty, American will simultaneously try to sell you the seat—another step in the industry’s shift toward monetizing premium cabins even at the expense of elite benefits.
American Airlines now upgrades deadheading pilots into first class ahead of the customers who actually earn those seats. Ten high-value flyers watched a pilot get the only available upgrade on their flight, a moment that captured how far the airline has drifted from its own loyalty promises.
American Airlines now sells first class upgrades for as little as $40 — but if you cancel your trip, that money’s gone. The airline even tried to fix the problem, then botched the rollout and rolled it back, leaving travelers stuck paying for upgrades they never took.
Delta is now selling first class from just $26 more than coach. Only 12% of premium seats still go to upgrades—a number that shows how little airline loyalty is worth today.
The end of status? Airlines that once promised loyal flyers free first class upgrades now sell those seats for as little as $40, leaving even their best customers stuck in coach.
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 »
