Standby Upgrade On Thai Airways: How It Works…
Intro
The other day, I was flying from Vientiane to Bangkok and then over to Denpasar the following morning. For some reason, a business class ticket was quoting around 1100$ for the two flights, while the economy was 360$. So I thought to myself, why don’t we try out this standby upgrade scheme that Thai Airways offers?
I succeeded, and let me tell you how.
The Details
Thai Airways offers “standby” upgrades on all of their flights, subject to availability. Customers have two choices when it comes to upgrades.
Economy to Business
Business to First Class (only to London, Tokyo, and Osaka)
Unfortunately, unlike some other airlines, these upgrades are at a fixed cost. Certain airlines utilize a bid-to-upgrade scheme, but Thai Airways has a chart that is displayed below here:
As you can see, there are some reasonable rates and some not reasonable rates. I find it interesting how Kualu Lumpur and Denpasar are in the same bracket, as the DPS flight is over double the flight time.
There is one last catch: you can only upgrade your ticket when the check-in counter opens. Or can you?
My Experience
Arriving from Vientianne, I decided to inquire if I could upgrade my ticket the night before. The first person I went to replied with a yes but told me to proceed to do it in the ticketing office. The ticket office is located in the back by the D/E check-in areas, near where you walk up for departures.
When arriving at the ticketing office, I was met with a firm no, since the upgrade had to be done 3 hours before the flight. Having just been told yes by the other agent, I pushed back a little, and they kept looking to see if it was possible. After some back-and-forth phone calls, the agent finally cleared my upgrade for the locked-in rate of 7,100 Thai Baht.
Now, I do not recommend going this route, and my guess is that this was the exception rather than the norm. However, it never hurts to ask when it comes to upgrades, so why not?
Needless to say, I had a lovely flight on Thai Airways the next morning, and one I am excited to share.
Final Thoughts
If you are stuck in economy on Thai Airways, just know that TG offers mostly attractive “standby” upgrades on all of their routes (subject to availability). If interested, head over to the ticketing office when you arrive at the airport, and they will let you know if it is possible. Just be aware: they are only supposed to process these upgrades 3 hours before departure.
Oh, side note: they take AMEX there!
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