Best chance of Pts Upgrade PE to Bus, SYD-LAX-SYD: QFF LT Gold or VA Platinum

[cchampion]

Any thoughts on the best chance of getting a points upgrade from Premium Economy to Business SYD-LAX-SYD: Do I book QF using my LT Gold (22k LSC) or book VA using my Platinum status?

 

[Harthagan]

I just now got 2x J upgrades for Syd to Lax. Good use of 90k points. Only regret is springing $200 more each for premium saver seats instead of freedom economy. I was hedging my bets lol

 

[Harthagan]

Oh should have mentioned I'm VA Gold

 

[Matt_01]

I do not use VA on international flight but would suspect that VA may be the better option as you are at the top of the VA totem pole. On QF you will have the CL, WP1 and WP in front of you.

 

[clipped_wings]

I just now got 2x J upgrades for Syd to Lax. Good use of 90k points. Only regret is springing $200 more each for premium saver seats instead of freedom economy. I was hedging my bets lol

Your success may have been determined by your original fare bucket. PE will always trump Y flexi in the Priority Stakes.

 

[clipped_wings]

Any thoughts on the best chance of getting a points upgrade from Premium Economy to Business SYD-LAX-SYD: Do I book QF using my LT Gold (22k LSC) or book VA using my Platinum status?

How far out is your travel? I'd be checking every day for availability.

 

[cchampion]

How far out is your travel? I'd be checking every day for availability.

My base fare will be PE. I am looking at departing SYD 6 Sept, returning from LAX 15 Sept.

 

[Harthagan]

Your success may have been determined by your original fare bucket. PE will always trump Y flexi in the Priority Stakes.

Yeah that is probably true however the whole points upgrade system remains murky to me. I didn't actually get my upgrade via the waiting list, I randomly noticed there were reward business seats available so I called up and asked what the go is. The agent told me that he would hold the seats for me, meanwhile it took about 20 minutes for him to subsequently have me taken of the points upgrade waiting list and only then could he assign me the seats.

I was curious why they would release reward business class seats to the public rather than upgrade status pax already on a waitlist. His response basically i translated to mean that there are multiple methods of getting a business class seat using outright points and points/cash upgrade and all 3 avenues are seemingly operating independent of each other (as confusing and frustrating as that may be)

 

[clipped_wings]

His response is pretty much correct. There's a revenue fare bucket for Virgin to sell. And there's a points reward seat that Velocity releases. Then there's the waitlist, which only comes in to play after the first two have panned out at T-48.

Like I said earlier - it pays to watch availability every day.