Reward availability differs by location?

Just seen the following post by backdoc over at flyertalk:

I discovered something interesting this week when on the phone with Flying Club to change a UC reward ticket from LHR-LAX to LHR-JFK. I could see availability of a UC seat on VS45 for the day I wanted, but the Flying Club rep couldn't see it. The rep put me on hold and was gone for about 20 min, when she came back she said that there is a different "pool" of reward availability depending upon on your location. So, in my case, I'm in Los Angeles and I had availability, but the rep from in the UK didn't. She talked to her supervisor and got me a seat. So it may pay to ask.

Does anyone know if there's any truth in that? Would be very interesting if so...!

Oli

Here's the link to the thread: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/virgin-atlantic-airways-flying-club/1611270-upper-class-better-outbound-inbound-west-coast.html

[Nottingham Nick]

Yes, it's true - all airlines(and most multi-nationals) have region based deals for customers in different locations. It's part of the global economy - hence the ex-DUB and ex-AMS threads.

Nick

Yes, it's true - all airlines(and most multi-nationals) have region based deals for customers in different locations. It's part of the global economy - hence the ex-DUB and ex-AMS threads.

Nick

So it would be worth looking at dummy bookings using a VPN to the U.S. every now and again?!

So it would be worth looking at dummy bookings using a VPN to the U.S. every now and again?!

Yep! CyberGhost (or similar) VPN's have their uses. Do remember that when you do a dummy booking, this "locks" the seat for a certain period of time (20mins or so). So when you can see the seat available on your screen, it's effectively locked-out for a short period of time. This is sometimes why the Flying Club rep cannot see a seat available, but you can.

So it would be worth looking at dummy bookings using a VPN to the U.S. every now and again?!

Do you even need to do that? IIRC just doing a dummy booking for a one-way G from the US on the UK website can throw up different availability when you compare it to the inbound leg of a return booking.