One up on Air New Zealand

Has anyone ever been successful in upgrading their seat on Air New Zealand. I am booked for the end of March in premium economy. I have been checking seat status and as of today only two seats have been booked for business class. I guess I'm wondering if I can make a lower offer the closer it gets to the departure date. Right now it looks like I would have to bid about $800 for a strong offer. By the way, I did purchase my ticket back in May when the airline had a two day sale and got $1000 off the regular price for premium economy.

Thanks for any info.

Generally speaking you won't be able to buy up until you are at the gate--or maybe during the checkin process--without paying a change fee. The exception might be if you are using miles.

There is usually a scheme with FF's being able to upgrade first, then if there are still seats they will be made available to others just before the flight.

By the way, what you see in the airlines seat map and what are actually sold might not correlate. There could be any number of seats sold to a large travel agency or cruise line which are not assigned yet.

AirNZ in the past would charge the difference between what you paid and the current fare for the upgrade. My October flight had empty seats in First and PE. We had a row each in PE. November flights were also low volume. AirNZ moves terminals December 3 at LAX so be prepared for much longer Immigration and Customs lines. Gone are the days of short lines.

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