Air NZ One Up advice

Forums › Travel (planes, train, cruise) › Air NZ One Up advice

1 | 2 | 3 | 4

Networkn
32871 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 15469

ID Verified

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1576785 19-Jun-2016 21:45

I really really resent this new system by air NZ (Yes I know it's not "new", but rather the newest). I have real issue with the lack of clarity around the process, about the true likelyhood of the success and the potential extra costs. At least when it was a set amount, I could make an informed decision.

We used to fly exclusively AirNZ and enjoyed BC travel due to the volume of our CC spend and the amount of travel. Now we just fly Air NZ if it's the "best" option and this seems increasingly less and less often. Our few interaction with the "new" management have been very unsatisfactory, they are not the company they were under Fyfe.

Geektastic

18009 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 8465

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1576797 19-Jun-2016 22:27

I've only flown BC once in my life, when Air France gave me an entirely unexpected upgrade in 2013 from Paris to Hong Kong. Very nice, but for my money I would rather spend more time in the place I am going than BC. Someone else's money? No problem!

We do seem to be well charged by ANZ for our flights. Friend of mine flew Emirates Manchester to Auckland, Business Class (which in the UK includes being collected at home in a limo and dropped off at home on your return) and she paid NZ$8,000 return...! ANZ always seem to want a lot more than that whenever I look.

PE always seems a bit expensive as well, although I have paid for that once or twice.

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9996

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#1576847 20-Jun-2016 07:26

networkn:

I really really resent this new system by air NZ (Yes I know it's not "new", but rather the newest). I have real issue with the lack of clarity around the process, about the true likelyhood of the success and the potential extra costs. At least when it was a set amount, I could make an informed decision.

We used to fly exclusively AirNZ and enjoyed BC travel due to the volume of our CC spend and the amount of travel. Now we just fly Air NZ if it's the "best" option and this seems increasingly less and less often. Our few interaction with the "new" management have been very unsatisfactory, they are not the company they were under Fyfe.

Elite APD upgrades still offer fixed price upgrades, but unless you get in early and get these confirmed with R class availability you're still left hoping you'll win the lottery and actually get the upgrade confirmed. They do however clear ahead of OneUp's so if people have friends who are Elite they're crazy to lodge OneUp's if their friend is happy to gift APD upgrades.

The real world reality is Air NZ have full BP and PE cabins to the US on a huge number of flights, and having given away status to so many people with deals like the Westpac one it's a greater number of people now fighting for seats. At the end of the day it's a compromise between selling seats or giving them away, and Air NZ seem to prefer the revenue from selling seats!

I've changed planned dates for a couple of my trips this year just to get upgrades cleared in advance. I'll take a confirmed BP upgrade to SFO any day even if it means traveling a day later rather than gamble with the upgrade clearing especially as it's only a 77R rather than 77W so has a lot less BP seats.

Batman

Mad Scientist
30014 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 6217

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1576894 20-Jun-2016 09:35

it depends. about 50% of the time when i bid on the lowest it gave me upgrades. I think the lowest number is what they're prepared to upgrade you for, and it appears they will rather fill seats than have them empty.

so you need to guess how full or empty the class is ...

Batman

Mad Scientist
30014 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 6217

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1576896 20-Jun-2016 09:36

Geektastic:

Does anyone have a feel how much would be a reasonable bid to upgrade Economy to Premium on the Auckland/LA flight to stand a reasonable chance of success?

If I were you i'd shoot for business class. I didn't like PE.

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9996

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#1576898 20-Jun-2016 09:39

joker97:

Geektastic:

Does anyone have a feel how much would be a reasonable bid to upgrade Economy to Premium on the Auckland/LA flight to stand a reasonable chance of success?

If I were you i'd shoot for business class. I didn't like PE.

You can't go from economy to PE directly unless you have 2 x RU. You can only upgrade to BP from PE with a OneUp or APD upgrade.

Apple TV

Stream your favourite shows now on Apple TV (affiliate link).

Batman

Mad Scientist
30014 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 6217

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1576904 20-Jun-2016 09:42

in that case bid the lowest. (from reading about how little he wants to spend)

Geektastic

18009 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 8465

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1576927 20-Jun-2016 10:12

I bid the minimum that got me 'average' chances on the meter.

When my wife was speaking with Air NZ re-arranging her flights, the lady said that although she has had to 'break' our joint booking and rebook the missus onto an $1800 special to LHR on the same flight, when the people are looking at upgrades they will still see a marker that we are travelling together and my wife has said that unless my OU clears, she wouldn't take her RU even if it was offered, preferring to sit with me (fortunately!).

Geektastic

18009 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 8465

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1576929 20-Jun-2016 10:14

networkn:

I really really resent this new system by air NZ (Yes I know it's not "new", but rather the newest). I have real issue with the lack of clarity around the process, about the true likelyhood of the success and the potential extra costs. At least when it was a set amount, I could make an informed decision.

We used to fly exclusively AirNZ and enjoyed BC travel due to the volume of our CC spend and the amount of travel. Now we just fly Air NZ if it's the "best" option and this seems increasingly less and less often. Our few interaction with the "new" management have been very unsatisfactory, they are not the company they were under Fyfe.

I agree that a system where you can just pay a set amount would be better.

I've seen a couple of airlines do this at check in - they have wee boards on the desk which offer upgrades for a specific amount and if you fancy it you can just flop out the credit card there and then.

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9996

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#1576945 20-Jun-2016 10:44

Geektastic:

networkn:

I really really resent this new system by air NZ (Yes I know it's not "new", but rather the newest). I have real issue with the lack of clarity around the process, about the true likelyhood of the success and the potential extra costs. At least when it was a set amount, I could make an informed decision.

We used to fly exclusively AirNZ and enjoyed BC travel due to the volume of our CC spend and the amount of travel. Now we just fly Air NZ if it's the "best" option and this seems increasingly less and less often. Our few interaction with the "new" management have been very unsatisfactory, they are not the company they were under Fyfe.

I agree that a system where you can just pay a set amount would be better.

I've seen a couple of airlines do this at check in - they have wee boards on the desk which offer upgrades for a specific amount and if you fancy it you can just flop out the credit card there and then.

They are available for all customers - you just need to know an Elite to gift one to you.

You can buy a Twin Seat at check-in, but the very real world reality though for many flights (particularly to North America) is that the flights are full in the premium cabins by check-in so this option wouldn't even be able to be made available for many flights. Airlines that fly empty premium cabins want to grab cash to fill up those seats at check-in, whereas Air NZ have no trouble filling premium seats with paid passengers.

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9996

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#1576946 20-Jun-2016 10:46

Geektastic:

I bid the minimum that got me 'average' chances on the meter.

When my wife was speaking with Air NZ re-arranging her flights, the lady said that although she has had to 'break' our joint booking and rebook the missus onto an $1800 special to LHR on the same flight, when the people are looking at upgrades they will still see a marker that we are travelling together and my wife has said that unless my OU clears, she wouldn't take her RU even if it was offered, preferring to sit with me (fortunately!).

One of the stupid system limitations is that there is no way to link a RU and APD or OneUp upgrade across different PNR's. If her RU clears and your OneUp doesn't she'll find it potentially impossible to actually "downgrade" to sit with you.

Apple TV

Stream your favourite shows now on Apple TV (affiliate link).

Geektastic

18009 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 8465

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1576963 20-Jun-2016 10:52

sbiddle:

Geektastic:

networkn:

I really really resent this new system by air NZ (Yes I know it's not "new", but rather the newest). I have real issue with the lack of clarity around the process, about the true likelyhood of the success and the potential extra costs. At least when it was a set amount, I could make an informed decision.

We used to fly exclusively AirNZ and enjoyed BC travel due to the volume of our CC spend and the amount of travel. Now we just fly Air NZ if it's the "best" option and this seems increasingly less and less often. Our few interaction with the "new" management have been very unsatisfactory, they are not the company they were under Fyfe.

I agree that a system where you can just pay a set amount would be better.

I've seen a couple of airlines do this at check in - they have wee boards on the desk which offer upgrades for a specific amount and if you fancy it you can just flop out the credit card there and then.

They are available for all customers - you just need to know an Elite to gift one to you.

You can buy a Twin Seat at check-in, but the very real world reality though for many flights (particularly to North America) is that the flights are full in the premium cabins by check-in so this option wouldn't even be able to be made available for many flights. Airlines that fly empty premium cabins want to grab cash to fill up those seats at check-in, whereas Air NZ have no trouble filling premium seats with paid passengers.

I do find it odd that we can gift APD's between us but not her upgrades. As far as Air NZ are concerned, it's not costing them more money so why would they care? It seems an odd restriction. She was on course to get Elite this year but then changed contracts from Auckland to Wellington so rarely needs to fly now, whereas she was flying up and down every week.

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9996

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#1576979 20-Jun-2016 11:05

Geektastic:

I do find it odd that we can gift APD's between us but not her upgrades. As far as Air NZ are concerned, it's not costing them more money so why would they care? It seems an odd restriction. She was on course to get Elite this year but then changed contracts from Auckland to Wellington so rarely needs to fly now, whereas she was flying up and down every week.

Gifting RU's is limited to Elite's.

Other being able to gift RU's would be a nightmare - you'd go from a low to moderate RU redemption (remember lots of people never use their upgrades) to suddenly having somewhere in the vicinity of 200,000 RU's potentially being redeemed. Getting RU's cleared can be difficult enough now, I even had a friend flying back from Singapore a couple of weeks ago that had 8 people at the gate still hoping for RU's to clear into BP. When you've only got 18 seats in total it's very clear they're not all going to clear.

Geektastic

18009 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 8465

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#1577029 20-Jun-2016 12:00

sbiddle:

Geektastic:

I do find it odd that we can gift APD's between us but not her upgrades. As far as Air NZ are concerned, it's not costing them more money so why would they care? It seems an odd restriction. She was on course to get Elite this year but then changed contracts from Auckland to Wellington so rarely needs to fly now, whereas she was flying up and down every week.

Gifting RU's is limited to Elite's.

Other being able to gift RU's would be a nightmare - you'd go from a low to moderate RU redemption (remember lots of people never use their upgrades) to suddenly having somewhere in the vicinity of 200,000 RU's potentially being redeemed. Getting RU's cleared can be difficult enough now, I even had a friend flying back from Singapore a couple of weeks ago that had 8 people at the gate still hoping for RU's to clear into BP. When you've only got 18 seats in total it's very clear they're not all going to clear.

They are an odd thing though because I suspect more people fly with a partner than alone, so who is going to want to be split up?!

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9996

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#1577035 20-Jun-2016 12:12

Geektastic:

sbiddle:

Geektastic:

I do find it odd that we can gift APD's between us but not her upgrades. As far as Air NZ are concerned, it's not costing them more money so why would they care? It seems an odd restriction. She was on course to get Elite this year but then changed contracts from Auckland to Wellington so rarely needs to fly now, whereas she was flying up and down every week.

Gifting RU's is limited to Elite's.

Other being able to gift RU's would be a nightmare - you'd go from a low to moderate RU redemption (remember lots of people never use their upgrades) to suddenly having somewhere in the vicinity of 200,000 RU's potentially being redeemed. Getting RU's cleared can be difficult enough now, I even had a friend flying back from Singapore a couple of weeks ago that had 8 people at the gate still hoping for RU's to clear into BP. When you've only got 18 seats in total it's very clear they're not all going to clear.

They are an odd thing though because I suspect more people fly with a partner than alone, so who is going to want to be split up?!

Most people flying together are on the same PNR - and if you lodge a OneUp it has to be for both people on the PNR.

If you lodge an APD Upgrade or RU it can be for one, or both pax.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4