Questions and Answers

I have to travel to Europe & Australia once a year. My company will purchase a standard ticket for my travel but I am tired of flying coach & I want to at least upgrade for one way of my trips.

What is the best way to upgrade to a Business seat after my company buys the ticket?

I have a 100,000 miles with United & my status is Silver level.

I have 100,000 miles with Alaska & my status is MVP level.

Thank you for any help or wisdom!!!

Hi David, are you just planning ahead, or do you actually have these trips booked? If already booked, what is the fare class code of your economy ticket? Unfortunately not every class is eligible for upgrades

Also, do you have any credit card points?

[QUOTE=”rickyw, post: 32744, member: 1436″]Hi David, are you just planning ahead, or do you actually have these trips booked? If already booked, what is the fare class code of your economy ticket? Unfortunately not every class is eligible for upgrades

Also, do you have any credit card points?[/QUOTE]

I don’t have any credit card points saved up.

Thank you for the help!

If your company books the ticket on United then it’s possible you could use UA miles to upgrade but, as Ricky said, it depends on what fare class was purchased. Not all fare classes are upgradeable. Here’s a link to the UA website where this is discussed. Note that there is a co-pay as well but your status may help you avoid some fees: [URL]https://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/mileageplus/awards/upgrade/mua.aspx[/URL]

To use your Alaska miles, the company would have to purchase the ticket with them for you to be able to use your miles and again, the fare class would have to be one that is upgradeable. Here’s info from the Alaska Air website:

[I][B]I want to upgrade with miles. How does that work?[/B]

In order to upgrade with miles, your ticket has to be booked in a certain fare category. When shopping at alaskaair.com, select “Mileage” from the Upgrades type box from the Upgrade Preference box, and you’ll only be shown fares that qualify for an upgrade. Flights with available upgrade seats are designated with a “U” next to the fare. If you are booking through a reservation call center or a travel agent, you’ll need to ask for fares in “Y, S, B, M, or H classes of service”. For more information and pricing, please view our [URL=’https://www.alaskaair.com/content/mileage-plan/earn-use-miles/first-class-upgrades.aspx’]Mileage upgrade[/URL] information. [/I]