Star Alliances upgrades on SQ (through Miles&More)

[KeithMEL]

Hoping the collective wisdom here can assist me with a Star Alliance upgrade as I've not had any practical experience with this form of upgrades. Faced with the imminent expiry of my Miles&More miles and Upgrade vouchers, I'm attempting to use these to upgrade an SQ sector for both my partner and I.

Some questions:

1) The M&M website states that the ticket I'm trying to upgrade must have been originally booked through LH.

To book an upgrade award, you must first have booked and fully paID for a flight (with the exception of flight award tickets) through www.lufthansa.com or the Miles & More online platforms for which the ticket must have already been issued.

This contradicts my understanding of the Star Alliance upgrade product - I thought the flights can be on any partner airline's ticket stock? I am trying to make a PEN-SIN-BNE commercial booking through the SQ website and don't really know how this itinerary can be achieved through an LH channel?

Or could I simply be misinterpreting the intent of that T&C?

2) Is Upgrade class inventory derived from the same inventory used for regular award redemptions? For example, could I simply check inventory through ANA or the LifeMiles tool? I'd rather avoid having to trawl through different dates with the LH call centre if I can.

3) The SQ sector I'm trying to upgrade is SIN-BNE, but it is preceded by a PEN-SIN which is an MI operated sector. No stopover in SIN. Would the presence of non-Star Alliance content on the same ticket cause any issues with a Star Alliance upgrade (even when only upgrading the sector marketed&operated by SQ)?

MTIA for any advice.

Cheers
Keith

[Desert Traveller]

[...]

1) The M&M website states that the ticket I'm trying to upgrade must have been originally booked through LH.


This contradicts my understanding of the Star Alliance upgrade product - I thought the flights can be on any partner airline's ticket stock? I am trying to make a PEN-SIN-BNE commercial booking through the SQ website and don't really know how this itinerary can be achieved through an LH channel?

Or could I simply be misinterpreting the intent of that T&C?

[...]

I did not have any issues upgrading SQ flights on SQ stock purchased through the SQ website.

[...]

2) Is Upgrade class inventory derived from the same inventory used for regular award redemptions? For example, could I simply check inventory through ANA or the LifeMiles tool? I'd rather avoid having to trawl through different dates with the LH call centre if I can.

[...]

For SQ, it is not...but it is mostly the same especially for the regional sectors. The LH M&M *A online upgrade tool works fine for SQ upgrades both for miles and eVouchers. Only drawback is you need an issued ticket with confirmed dates.

[...]

3) The SQ sector I'm trying to upgrade is SIN-BNE, but it is preceded by a PEN-SIN which is an MI operated sector. No stopover in SIN. Would the presence of non-Star Alliance content on the same ticket cause any issues with a Star Alliance upgrade (even when only upgrading the sector marketed&operated by SQ)?

[...]

This should be no problem as the upgrade is for each sector only.

[KeithMEL]

Fab! Thanks so much Desert Traveller!

[Kyo]

I think you'd get an upgrade as far as SIN, but not to PEN on MI unless you detour via BKK on a *A itinerary in the first place...

You'll find Krisflyer can be a bit arbitrary.

[KeithMEL]

Only upgrading on the SQ sector so should be all good. I was going to purchase a LifeMiles redemption on TG but the schedules via BKK didn't work out too well and not going to faff around with 2 separate tickets PEN-SIN and SIN-BNE when not shopping over in SIN.

Outbound itinerary will be on a LifeMiles redemption on SQ followed by an AK JHB-PEN after a few days with the parentals in JHB (doesn't make sense heading back out to SIN just to fly interstate in Malaysia when there's a perfectly adequate direct flight).

[G_G]

I confirm what Desert Traveller said : I've upgraded online a TK ticket purchased through a travel agent with a M&M eVoucher without issue

[demue]

Just make sure your revenue flight is booked into the appropriate Eco fare bucket. For SQ it is B & Y, but oddly no mention of S which would be SQ's most expensive Eco fare.

I have upgraded FRA-SIN on SQ from Y to C on an Eco B fare via LH's *A Upgrade tool using 2 eVouchers with a SQ stock ticket when the 744 was still plowing the route. Think I booked it 2-3 days prior to departure as nothing was showing available before that.

Last week I tried to upgrade SQ CGK-SIN for my GF via the LH *A upgrade site (yup only 1.5hrs flight so let's not talk about the "value" here, but you want to keep your lady happy right and she really didn't like the Eco middle seat SQ assigned her after an a/c change ), but it was just a few hours before the flight so too close to departure and S booking class didn't get accepted (it's not part of the drop down either).

YMMV. Good luck as this is probably the best use of eVouchers or expiring LH miles I can think off. Unless you have enough expiring miles to go for an outright redemption which would be complicated in your case due to the PEN-SIN segment.

[KeithMEL]

Confirming that the product does exactly as it says on the tin - just upgraded SIN-BNE on our SQ PEN-SIN-BNE booking originally ticketed in Y.

I can't seem to do it online for some reason. A call to the Australian call centre followed. First agent insisted that we could only use e-Vouchers for Lufthansa Group carriers but 2nd agent was more clued up.

It took a fair while to find my SQ reservation even with the PNR and ticket numbers, but after a bit of typing and 15 mins on hold, she came back and confirmed that it's all been done and dusted. There were also no issues upgrading 2 pax traveling on a single PNR using a combination of miles and e-Vouchers.

I could then select seats in the upgraded cabin through the Manage Booking page on the SQ website. Our ticket has not been revalidated/reissued (quick call to the SQ call centre confirmed this isn't necessary and all is in order), and more importantly on the SQ website I can see that our booking has an 'Upgrade receipt' featuring an LH ticket number.

Interesting trivia - attempting to book an ex-AU return booking to PEN seems to throw up a Flexi booking in E class on the SQ website, which isn't eligible for a Star upgrade. There was no apparent way to book any other RBDs higher up in the hierarchy through the SQ website. I was going to use a TA but in the end decided to take advantage of a LifeMiles promo for the outbound leg whilst I managed to book a Flexi ticket in Y ex-PEN for the return leg. It'd probably cost the same redeeming LifeMiles in Business both ways but the little voice in my head wanted to prevent the LH miles & e-Vouchers from coming to an untimely end....