Ticketed before CO Silver Elite expired - EUA? - Messed up upgrade fare?

[TC610]

I can't imagine I'm the first person this has happened to, but I searched the forums and couldn't find any similar threads.

My CO Silver Elite status expired on 2/28/11.  I was ticketed on a W fare for CLE->CUN on 2/14/11 for a flight departing tomorrow.

1) When I printed my boarding pass, I was excited to see "Silver / *S" and "Elite Access" on my boarding pass.  I didn't see my name on the Ugrade Standby list for the flight, however.  I would've liked to get the EUA as CO's site showed this morning that there were at least 9 BF seats left. 

2) Two of my friends called to say they were offered upgrades from their W fare to BusinessFirst for $79.  My only offer was to "Confirm a First Class Seat for $209".

Called in to CO and the rep I spoke to said he saw the Silver status on my reservation but since my silver expired - even though I was ticketed prior to the expiration, I was SOL for the EUA.  That is understandable. 
What wasn't understandable was that my friends who were ticketed nearly the same time I was, all of us booked in W, got offered a $79 upgrade but I didn't.  After 45 minutes of talking to the rep, him talking to his supervisor, him talking to another support agent (none of whom have seen this before), he was able to somehow book me in R for $79 (listed as "Add Collect" on my receipt).

Questions - based on the information given, should I have been eligible for the EUA?  If so, what did I need to say to the rep?  I didn't want to wait until I got to the gate tomorrow to work it out with an agent in case other people all snagged up the $79 upgrades.  IMHO $79 is worth it in case I can't get the EUA.  Also, what's the deal with me being offered a $209 upgrade instead of a $79 upgrade?  I *know* i'm going to have the same issue on the return flight.

Thanks in advance!

[Dan]

Interesting situation.  Here's my hypothesis.

CO's upgrade pricing is tricky.  There are buy-ups from your fare to the lowest F fare ever offered in that market and there are upgrade fares offered to non-elites that are officially only offered when there are more F seats than there are elite passengers.

CO's systems are confused in your case.  For baggage and elite access purposes it goes by the time of booking when you were elite.  However EUA is smarter and it's based on your current status. 

I would say $209 is the upgrade from your fare to the lowest F fare.
$79 is the non-elite upgrade fare offered when there are predicted to be more F seats than elites.  It wasn't offered to you as that system must see you are Silver.
The agent on the phone was able to give you the $79 offer that only non-elites get


There is no BusinessFirst to Cancun by the way, it's "international business" which is just domestic first seating with a funny name.

Great job snagging a $79 upgrade though!

[TC610]

Thanks Dan.  I had a (correct) feeling that this forum would have people who are able to hypothesize/explain things better than a CO phone rep!

FWIW, the F upgrade 2 days ago was $340 for each of us.  At T-24h it had gone down to $209 for me and $79 for them.