Upgrade options

Hi everyone,

I'm planning a trip to New Zealand next year, currently looking at LHR to AKL via SFO (VS for LHR-SFO and NZ for SFO-AKL) and I'd like to upgrade the LHR-SFO + SFO-LHR parts of the trip using miles. I have enough in my Flying Club account to do PE-UC both ways for the VS flight and am happy to be in PE for the NZ part.

I've been looking at the ITA matrix for flight costs and K all round is within my budget, S all round is about £800 more which is a little too much. Since I only need an upgradeable fare code for the LHR-SFO and SFO-LHR parts of the trip, is it possible to book 1 ticket (to cover LHR-AKL) but have the LHR-SFO in S or H so it can be upgraded but the SFO-AKL part in K?

Failing that, any good suggestions on how to go about this before I phone Virgin and try and explain all that on the phone?

Welcome to v- flyer .
Unfortunately what you are proposing is not possible unless you book as two separate itineraries ( LHR -SFO return and SFO -AKL return).

DL

Thanks, that's what I feared

Do you know if booking a single ticket in S and just upgrading the VS segments using my miles is possible then? If so I'd just need to weigh up the difference between a more expensive single ticket versus the risk of back to back flights on different tickets..