A few weeks back I posted that “SOLVED: Why sometimes the Regional / Global cert Delta Medallion shows “shadow” flight and sometimes not. Also, does it really make any difference? Let’s find out!“. That post showed that there IS a reason why sometimes you do see the second “shadow seat map” when you log in to Delta.com and sometimes you don’t.
The other interesting bit I learned from that post is that when a Delta rep does put the Regional Upgrade (RU) request in above the medallion upgrade (on their screens – we can not see this as end users) the buy-up upgrade offers goes to N/A.
But the one data point I did not know was this: does moving the request up have any impact on the upgrade speed or chances. The Delta phone rep told me that it should not matter as they (Delta IT) “fixed” the problem that not moving it up, in the past, created.
Just to update you if you did not read the other post (shame on you) both my wife and I are flying together but on separate reservations (booked as separate one-way tickets to burn up a bunch of $50 Delta e-Gift cards all on one trip). We have linked the two reservations and both have requested an RU upgrade – wait-listed – since there is no open RU space. We had the rep put my wife’s request in above the medallion upgrade request but mine left as-is, that is, under the medallion request.
Today I was looking at my flights and saw that my coach seat was gone. I had not been contacted by Delta about this change nor that my RU had cleared. So I called the Diamond Medallion line and asked if my RU had in fact now cleared and it had. Sweet!
So we have a data point and at least one example now that does seem to confirm what the rep said that where they put your upgrade request in your reservation, i.e. above or below the medallion upgrade request, it should in fact NOT impact your shot at an upgrade – nor make it faster or slower. The only real difference is the shadow seat map either appears or does not. This can be nice if you want to be able to see open seats (if the seat map is blocked by Delta for who knows what IT reason) but that is all it now seems to accomplish.
I honestly expected my wife’s upgrade to clear before mine and am surprised by the way this has worked out. Now the only thing to wait on is to see when / if her RU upgrade clears and if moving it above the medallion upgrade has any negative implications.
Oh the joy of tinkering around with Delta when they are so non-transparent with all our elite toys! – René
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I asked the Delta Twitter rep to put our GUC’s for an Israel trip above the medallion upgrade request; so, I truly hope there are no negative impacts. I still don’t understand the shadow searmap concepts or any related implications.
@KC – See: https://eyeoftheflyer.com/2016/04/17/a-renepoints-podcast-about-delta-regional-upgrade-what-you-really-must-know/
and
https://eyeoftheflyer.com/2016/05/01/renespoints-podcast-ep3-delta-regional-upgrade-vs-free-medallion-upgrades/
Thanks. Should I assume RUC and GUC’s are handled the same? For example, if I go to the mobile app, I can hit the upgrade button and see that there are 14 Delta One seats available from JFK to TLV and 21 available on the return flight. If I pull up change seats in the app or on my laptop, all the Delta One seats are still grayed out. If my GUC would have cleared, I think you’re saying that it would appear like I could choose a Delta One seat even if it wouldn’t actually let me choose. Have I interpreted this correctly? Many thanks.
@KC – You can not see shadow map in Fly Delta App – only on Delta .com.