A very stupid question

Forgive me for my stupidity as I'm probably missing something very obvious but can't you book flight upgrades online? I thought VS were changing the site so you could see what booking classes were available then book that as an upgraded booking.

I'm probably doing something stupid but when I log in to FC, go to Spend Miles it gives you an option to search for flights noting how many miles are needed below but when you search for a flight the upgrade options that are presented are for - or does that represent the tax?

Am I being stupid, should I just call them?

[?]

Thanks in advance for any pointers!

Not a stupid question at all...

At the moment you can book fares from an upgradeable bucket online, so you can upgrade later, but can't actually process the upgrade itself online.

You can book upgradeable/companionable fares online from within the Flying Club area of the website:

http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/fr ... /index.jsp

You'll still need to phone VS to apply the upgrade itself, and once you've made the trip, you'll need to phone them again to get the mileage and tier points for the paid class of travel credited to your FC account.

Mike

Thanks for the response Mike - and apologies if I should have posted this in the 'Ask a Guru' section.

One more question, just because they let you book an upgradeable fare, I guess there's no guarantee that you will be able to upgrade it so best to book by phone?

Thanks again [:)]

[Neil]

quote:Originally posted by NicolaUK
One more question, just because they let you book an upgradeable fare, I guess there's no guarantee that you will be able to upgrade it so best to book by phone?


Exactly correctly. I would always still do the whole transaction on the phone with FC, saves the potential problem of no upgrades being available after you have booked the upgradable fare class.

Thanks again, have called and nothing's been released yet - anyone know how far out they are released (LGW/MCO 10-21st April)?

[Neil]

quote:Originally posted by NicolaUK
Thanks again, have called and nothing's been released yet - anyone know how far out they are released (LGW/MCO 10-21st April)?


Ah, now that is the tough part.

There is no garauntee that any reward seats will be released at all. You haven't said which class you are looking to upgrade to (UC or PE), but from the details you have just given, you are flying to MCO in the middle of the Easter Holidays, and I would therefore guess that no reward seats will become available.

MCO at Easter is VERY popular, with the flights all selling out very quickly and quite often VS do not even release any low bucket fares at all because they know they can sell the higher ones without problem.

The only thing you can do is keep checking every day, but I would seriously advise you to make plans based on the fact that upgrades wont be available.

Just for your info, we went to MCO at Easter last year and I checked from the day of fares going on sale, all the way up to the flight date and not one reward seat, in any class was available at all. When we went to MCO in February this year, not in any school holidays, we could only get reward seats on the outbound flight, nothing inbound, so it really is not easy to get them on the MCO route.

You may get lucky and I hope you do, but please don't bank on it.

Neil

I, probably stupidly, assumed the Easter rush would be over but guess the kids are still off then.

I'd never normally go to Orlando at Easter, am well aware of how busy it will be, but we're booked on a cruise out of Tampa on the 15th and thought we'd do some parks for a few days before - will have to rethink or just bite the bullet I guess!

yeah and just remember that upgradeable fares are a LOT more costly than non -upgradeable ones.
so much so that its often only a small amount more to actually buy a cheap PE or UC ticket in the first place.

In general miles upgrades is not the way to go, full reward flights on long hauls in peak season is best use of your miles.

you may have other reasons of course, but that's my 2p's worth!

Have you thought about flying to Miami instead of MCO? Assuming you wanted to upgrade to Upper, there is much more availability due to the bigger UC cabin. The L fare ( going out on the 10th and returning on the 25th (no UC reward availabilty on the 24th) is 476+ 284 to add for taxes etc plus 60,000 miles for the RT upgrade - or 30K one way. PE would be slightly less in taxes, etc and 40k for the RT upgrade.

You could always satisfy the theme park urge at Busch Gardens in Tampa?

Hope this helps

RedV

Thanks again, I did think about Miami but we live 10 mins away from Gatwick so can just jump in a cab.

[Nottingham Nick]

The whole Easter period is a V.Busy time on both sides of the pond.

Not a good time to be looking for bargains, or LGW/MCO reward seats I am afraid.

Nick

Yes, I am quite aware of that - I just thought the school holidays were earlier than they are, that's all.

BA did have offers on for when I want to go (I was initially looking at flying in to TPA and out of MCO) but whilst deciding what to do they pulled the sale [ii]

School holidays generally used to be arranged so that the easter weekend was in the middle.

Parts of the country still do that but some have it so that the easter is at the end of the two weeks and others have it at the start of their break.

So was was once a two week period has now been extended.