You Can Now Easily Redeem Delta Miles To Upgrade

As a person flying roughly 1000000miles every year only in paid first class around the world, I just don’t get why people would play their a*s off just to upgrade in economy and business on the big three sh*t product. That’s a waste of time.

I tried it a month ago it wanted like 150k to upgrade from Comfort+ to biz on a flight from TLV to JFK for ONLY ONE DIRECTION!!!
Furghetta 'bout it!

I applaud that the upgrade w/miles system is less cumbersome than it was previously but tend to agree with you that this is yet another way to increase monetization for their first class, I think that complimentary upgrades are largely a thing of the past.

@Debit2 — Really. You take an 11-hour flight every other day, all year long? Not disagreeing on your assessment of the Big 3 US carriers, but I think you slipped an extra zero in there.

For many of us with a stash of SkyMiles who fly primarily on paid economy or economy+ flights for work, this presents a very easy way to upgrade those flights. I just cashed in 9,900 SkyMiles to upgrade a SLC-LAX flight that I was unlikely to get upgraded on. Is this the most practical or efficient use of points? Absolutely not. But it will make the 2hr jaunt down to LA a little more comfortable.

One advantage of this program is that you can both burn your miles through an upgrade without sacrificing the MQD/MQM that you need to qualify for status.

i dont' see this as "worsening upgrade rates" at all because at 1cpm value, these people are directly buying the desired at fair cash value. of course the bunch of whiny losers on flyertalk will proclaim this will be the stick that breaks the camel's back when in fact they're so blindly loyal to DL even sitting on turd won't get them to change minds and change carriers.

I’ve never understood the fuss about Delta Not that it can’t be decent on a particular flight
It’s old aircraft lipstick on A pig and perhaps the worst value proposition
in history of any FF program
Because they run a bit more on time? Thank me for my loyalty? Yawn
So much is out of their control like every airline

One way to Detroit in an antique plane for 100,000 miles in First ?woo hoo!
LAX to Sydney in a tired business class for a half million miles 500,000 one way
Ugh I’ll pass folks no thanks
I’m flying QantAs in First for 70,000 miles thank you and you can be certain
I didn’t book with Delta and won’t
life is too short to be screwed and throw your money down the toilet even if you have unlimited excess of funds
Let the buyer be educated and aware
I avoid them like the plague
While i do I see a satisfactory airline I also see but one that is highly dishonest in customer service relationship and incredibly overpriced plain and simple
The best thing I appreciate about Delta is sucking some of the overflow of passengers
off of my favorite airlines so we get better pricing,more upgrade
and redemption opportunities
The Amex relationship appears to have minted a boatload of devalued mile currency in Sky Pesos or it could just be Delta greed
Love having no miles with them it’s a great feeling

@Dwondement. 70,000 miles in Quantas 1st...sure.

I didn't know about the change, and called Delta this morning to see if I could upgrade a one-way Award Ticket from JFK to LAX from Delta Comfort to Delta One - and was quoted 40K. (The original ticket had only been 20K.)

Why don’t Americans just buy a ticket in the class they want to travel instead? I know premium fares ex the US are obscene compared to the rest of the world, but if airlines brought their pricing back to the real world they might be able to fill their cabins with paid fares instead of free upgrades.

So, on domestic flights we often see that little banner offering to upgrade with miles. But we just booked an international flight (ATL to FCO) and...no banner showed. I called and asked to be put on the waitlist for upgrade with miles. They said that if we clear off the waitlist, the miles will automatically come out of our account. I'm wondering which has the better chance of actually getting that upgrade...waiting for one of those banner offers to pop up, or being put on the upgrade waitlist (our reservation detail page now shows a little note at the top that says "NOT COMPLIMENTARY UPGRADE ELIGIBLE Upgrade Status:Upgrade Waitlisted"). Also, our reservation was done by the company's travel agency and they put my spouse and my reservations together. I'm thinking I should have them unlinked so that if only one spot becomes available at least one of us can get it?