Upgraded on my own - Do I have two bookings now?

[3rdCoastFan]

Hoping for some help - and that this will be useful for others who purchase airfare via a cruise line and then upgrade on your own. 

 

For a river cruise next spring, we're flying ORD-AMS via United and returning BSL-MUC-ORD via Lufthansa. Tickets are 016. I have separate record locators. 

 

I called United and upgraded to business on the outbound. Easy enough. 

 

I called Lufthansa and upgraded to business for the MUC-ORD leg of the return flight. PNR stays the same but it looks like I have new 220- tickets. When I view my flight via United's website, it shows business on the outbound and economy on the return. When I view my flights via Lufthansa's website, I see this: 

 

I called Lufthansa and the agent I spoke to seemed confused, too. She said that her system showed us as being in economy for both BSL-MUC and MUC-ORD. She suggested I call United or Viking to figure it out. I'm skeptical that either party will know what to do since I purchased upgrades directly from Lufthansa for Lufthansa flights after Viking issued the tickets. 

 

That said, I haven't flown Lufthansa. Does this look right? Is this how their system shows upgrades? I'd like to get it sorted now rather than when I go to check-in and find that our bags are not checked through to ORD, for example, or that we don't have any seats (economy or business). Happy to try the HUCA approach or ask for a supervisor - but are there specific questions I should ask? 

[em-sk]

8 hours ago, 3rdCoastFan said:

Hoping for some help - and that this will be useful for others who purchase airfare via a cruise line and then upgrade on your own. 

 

For a river cruise next spring, we're flying ORD-AMS via United and returning BSL-MUC-ORD via Lufthansa. Tickets are 016. I have separate record locators. 

 

I called United and upgraded to business on the outbound. Easy enough. 

 

I called Lufthansa and upgraded to business for the MUC-ORD leg of the return flight. PNR stays the same but it looks like I have new 220- tickets. When I view my flight via United's website, it shows business on the outbound and economy on the return. When I view my flights via Lufthansa's website, I see this: 

 

I called Lufthansa and the agent I spoke to seemed confused, too. She said that her system showed us as being in economy for both BSL-MUC and MUC-ORD. She suggested I call United or Viking to figure it out. I'm skeptical that either party will know what to do since I purchased upgrades directly from Lufthansa for Lufthansa flights after Viking issued the tickets. 

 

That said, I haven't flown Lufthansa. Does this look right? Is this how their system shows upgrades? I'd like to get it sorted now rather than when I go to check-in and find that our bags are not checked through to ORD, for example, or that we don't have any seats (economy or business). Happy to try the HUCA approach or ask for a supervisor - but are there specific questions I should ask? 

 

The reality is airline computer systems frequently copy data when a ticket is created and it tends to be a one-way copy.  If you do an upgrade like this it frequently does not go back the other way.  These inconsistencies are common.

 

If United thinks your in business on the flights they operate, and Lufthansa thinks your in business in the flights they are operating I would declare success and ignore the inconsistencies. 

 

 

[fbgd]

You could have opened up a can of worms here.

 

A few years ago I had flights on UA with tickets issued by a Star Alliance partner airline. I had an involuntary reschedule and instead of calling the (rather useless) alliance partner I thought I'd be smart and contact UA. Everything looked fine until I got to the airport and the agent couldn't issue boarding passes. I had to get on the phone and sort it out with the alliance partner and it was a complete palaver. I missed my outbound flight as the issue took so long to resolve and at one point the agent said I'd have to downgrade from First to economy on the overnight transatlantic flight!!

 

I learned my lesson that day and that was to work with whoever ticketed it on any issues. 

 

That said given the opaqueness of Cruise Air ticketing its hard to know what you have and I doubt any Viking agent would know how to process an upgrade using what I assume is a United upgrade instrument.

Edited December 8, 2018 by fbgd

[Globaliser]

17 hours ago, 3rdCoastFan said:

PNR stays the same but it looks like I have new 220- tickets.

 

From your first post, it sounds like you originally had a 016- ticket for BSL-MUC-ORD. Is that right?

 

And this post makes it sound like you now have a 220- ticket. Are you sure about that? Do you have a 13-digit ticket number starting 220?

 

If you do, then the key is to find out what that ticket says, as opposed to what's in your reservation. The reservation itself is clearly capable of confusing and misleading because there are duplicate reservations for your MUC-ORD, one pre-upgrade (in economy) and one post-upgrade (in business).

 

I don't know anything about LH's upgrade processes, but the first question that I would be asking myself is whether the new itinerary (with one sector in business class) has actually been ticketed, or whether what you see on the LH website is simply that a reservation has been made in business class (which is not the same thing).

[3rdCoastFan]

I appreciate the replies so far. I'm very glad to try and get this sorted now so I don't have the same headache as @fbgd when we travel in the spring. I would have been glad to purchase upgrades via Viking but it was cheaper overall to upgrade directly with the airline. Then again, you get what you pay for. 

 

Here is a screen grab of my receipt after I purchased the upgrade (I hope the redactions aren't too confusing). The document number runs 13 digits - and it still references the original 016 ticket. I have separate receipts for me and my fiancé. I assumed that the document number was the ticket number but @Globaliser 's comments lead me to believe that I may be confusing "document number" for ticket number. 

 

Which helps me know what to ask when I call LH again (has the new itinerary been ticketed?). I may even try United first since I consistently get a bad connection when I call 

 

[Globaliser]

1 hour ago, 3rdCoastFan said:

Here is a screen grab of my receipt after I purchased the upgrade (I hope the redactions aren't too confusing). The document number runs 13 digits - and it still references the original 016 ticket. I have separate receipts for me and my fiancé. I assumed that the document number was the ticket number but @Globaliser 's comments lead me to believe that I may be confusing "document number" for ticket number. 

 

Which helps me know what to ask when I call LH again (has the new itinerary been ticketed?).

 

That's really helpful, thanks.

 

That's a receipt for the payment, which shows what the payment is for. There is therefore no doubt that you've paid cash to upgrade this sector.

 

However, it's not a new ticket. You can see that the document is called an "Electronic Miscellaneous Document", and it's possible that you will see if referred to as an "EMD" (for obvious reasons). It is, basically, a payment receipt.

 

What is interesting to me is that it says that it's been issued "in connection with" an 016- ticket - presumably that ticket number is the number of your original ticket for this part of your journey. (Because you said that you have separate bookings for the outbound and inbound halves, I'm assuming that you have always had separate tickets for the outbound and inbound halves - not that this matters much for what I'm about to say.)

 

That note suggests to me that LH's processes may mean that you will not be issued with a new ticket, but that your entitlement to travel in business is established by your original 016- ticket in economy together with the EMD for your single-sector upgrade to business. That's something that only LH, or someone who knows LH's upgrade processes, can answer. The question really is whether those two documents together are all that you need to travel in business, or whether you will in due course be issued a new ticket to reflect the upgrade. You know that you have a reservation for travel in business on that flight, as that can be seen in the booking, but you do need to know whether you already have all the valuable documents (ie tickets etc) that you will need.

[em-sk]

On 12/8/2018 at 9:33 AM, Globaliser said:

 

That's really helpful, thanks.

 

That's a receipt for the payment, which shows what the payment is for. There is therefore no doubt that you've paid cash to upgrade this sector.

 

However, it's not a new ticket. You can see that the document is called an "Electronic Miscellaneous Document", and it's possible that you will see if referred to as an "EMD" (for obvious reasons). It is, basically, a payment receipt.

 

What is interesting to me is that it says that it's been issued "in connection with" an 016- ticket - presumably that ticket number is the number of your original ticket for this part of your journey. (Because you said that you have separate bookings for the outbound and inbound halves, I'm assuming that you have always had separate tickets for the outbound and inbound halves - not that this matters much for what I'm about to say.)

 

That note suggests to me that LH's processes may mean that you will not be issued with a new ticket, but that your entitlement to travel in business is established by your original 016- ticket in economy together with the EMD for your single-sector upgrade to business. That's something that only LH, or someone who knows LH's upgrade processes, can answer. The question really is whether those two documents together are all that you need to travel in business, or whether you will in due course be issued a new ticket to reflect the upgrade. You know that you have a reservation for travel in business on that flight, as that can be seen in the booking, but you do need to know whether you already have all the valuable documents (ie tickets etc) that you will need.

 

I have done the same thing a few times.  Used a credit card points program to book an Air Canada flight with the over seas leg being the Lufthansa flight from Vancouver; then called in to Lufthansa to upgrade to premium economy or business.  In my case the original book never reflects the upgrade.   What the original poster is seeing is not unusual.   

 

 

[3rdCoastFan]

To (hopefully) close the loop on this - I called United and they said to call Lufthansa again. I called Lufthansa again and the agent said that my business upgrades are confirmed. Not much more that I can do other than chalk up my confusion to poor website design and/or my unfamiliarity with LH's policies and procedures. I have all of the documentation I need, I think, to demonstrate that I have confirmed upgrades in case there is an issue when I check in. No back-up options for me if I miss the ORD flight but at least there are plenty of options departing the next morning. 

 

I can see the benefit of letting Viking handle the upgrades from the start; perhaps the savings when doing it on my own weren't worth the slight headache. Live and learn. Thanks again all for the comments. 

[Globaliser]

3 hours ago, 3rdCoastFan said:

I can see the benefit of letting Viking handle the upgrades from the start; perhaps the savings when doing it on my own weren't worth the slight headache.

 

In a sense, yes. However, there is a great advantage to familiarity with your airline's processes. If this is simply how Lufthansa does it, then you'll know next time. Those who've done it a few times wouldn't even bat an eyelid.

 

Glad that you've had confirmation that you're all set.