Frustrating Lufthansa Allegris First Class Upgrade Glitch

Several days ago, I wrote about my desire to fly Lufthansa Allegris first class. I shared the best deal that I found, and asked y’all if there were any good deals that I was missing. I want to share a little saga I’ve been dealing with in recent days regarding this, about Lufthansa’s bad IT, or something.

Trying to upgrade to Lufthansa Allegris first class

Unofficially, Lufthansa is blocking award redemptions and voucher upgrades with its new Allegris first class. That’s not published anywhere (at least on any customer-facing webpage), but some people report being told that by Lufthansa representatives.

A few days ago, a longtime OMAAT reader reached out in regards to my post, and pointed out something that caught my attention. He explained how cash upgrades were seemingly possible from business class to first class, even for the new Allegris product.

He did a lot of research regarding which fare classes needed to be available to trigger this, etc. For example, if you book a business class ticket in the “Z” fare class that includes the route between Newark (EWR) and Munich (MUC), you can upgrade to first class for $1,260, assuming the “A” fare class is available in first class.

So he kindly helped me find an attractive business class fare, and I booked it, super excited to be reviewing the new Allegris first class. After ticketing my reservation, I saw the option to upgrade, exactly as I was expecting — score!

It worked all the way until the payment page, but then I got an error message, saying there was a technical glitch, and I should contact Lufthansa if the problem persists.

So I called Lufthansa’s US hotline, and the associate confirmed that the upgrade was available, and got ready to take my payment. After a moment, he said “sorry, it’s not possible, first class is sold out.” Obviously he was completely wrong — the flight still showed all three seats for sale, and I realized that arguing with him wouldn’t get me anywhere.

I then figured I’d try through the app. So I did that, and I got the same error message. However, this time around my ticket actually showed as upgraded, and I was able to select a first class seat, despite having not submitted payment. Huh?!

I knew this wouldn’t stick without payment, so I called Lufthansa, and wanted to see if an agent could process payment by phone, if the upgrade was already “confirmed” (or whatever you want to call it). The agent tried to accept payment, but this time around had a different excuse, telling me that cash upgrades aren’t available in advance, but can only be done at the airport. That’s of course completely wrong, once again.

At this point it occurred to me what was almost certainly going on. Clearly Lufthansa also blocks paid upgrades to its new Allegris first class. I had assumed that wasn’t actually the policy up until that point (or that it had changed), since you’d think the airline wouldn’t offer the upgrade in that way, or that at least one of two Lufthansa representatives on the phone would explain that this is the reason, rather than making up other excuses.

How ridiculous to block upgrades, but then to continue displaying the option, with an incorrect error message on the payment page. I suppose it should’ve occurred to me earlier, but for whatever reason, it didn’t. So consider this a warning, if you find yourself in the same situation that I do.

I don’t understand Lufthansa’s Allegris approach

I totally understand Lufthansa’s desire to sell its Allegris first class seats, given that there are only three of them per A350. So it’s not surprising that the airline isn’t making award seats available or allowing upgrade vouchers to be used in advance.

However, I find it a bit puzzling that Lufthansa is blocking paid Allegris first class upgrades even close to departure. For example, I’m seeing flights in the coming days with zero first class seats sold, yet the airline still isn’t allowing upgrades for cash.

Lufthansa can of course set the price, so if Lufthansa just wants a lot of money for the upgrades, the airline can always charge a lot. But to not sell upgrades at all — especially when the airline can set the cost — seems illogical. The value of an empty seat once the aircraft door closes is zero, so you’d think the airline would want to generate some revenue.

Hopefully this policy is updated over time, and this is just due to the novelty. In the meantime… *looks up fares to and from Bangalore*.

Bottom line

I can officially confirm that Lufthansa doesn’t seem to be allowing any sort of upgrades to its Allegris first class. I knew that award seats and upgrade vouchers couldn’t be redeemed, but Lufthansa’s website was suggesting that cash upgrades were possible. The entire process works seamlessly, until you get to the payment page, and then you get an error.

At a minimum, there’s an opportunity here to improve the technology and also train agents about the company’s policy. Though ideally Lufthansa would just update its policy for upgrades to be a bit less illogical, since no one wins when first class cabins go out empty.