For the uninitiated, ExpertFlyer is one of the best — and most advanced — tools around for travelers and frequent flyers. The site, which is owned by TPG parent company Red Ventures, not only helps you search for award availability but also has access to airline schedules, live seat maps and more.
You can even set real-time alerts for a specific seat or award ticket — and then receive a notification the minute the alert is triggered. ExpertFlyer Premium costs $99.99 a year plus tax, or you could sign up for the TPG exclusive Hilton Honors cobranded cards to get it for free.
On Friday, TPG was first to report that American Airlines was changing the confirmed upgrade process. Previously, the Fort Worth-based carrier used the "C" and "A" fare class for upgrades to business- and first-class cabins, respectively.
Going forward, AA will continue using "C" and "A" for upgrades, though the number of seats available in those fare classes will be a subset of what they are today. For years, AA has used "A" interchangeably for revenue and upgrade seats.
Sign up for TPG’s free new biweekly Aviation newsletter for more airline-specific news!
Now, the seats available for purchase will be different from those available for upgrades. In doing so, AA will also start selling discounted business-class fares in the "C" fare class.
That poses a problem — how do you know if a seat in the "C" or "A" fare class is available as an upgrade?
You could search route by route on AA.com, but the best way is to use ExpertFlyer. For one, searching is faster since you can see multiple dates and times at once. In addition, you'll get a sense how many seats are available. Plus, if there's no availability, you can set an alert to automatically notify you if space pops up later on.
Thanks to a recent update to the web-based software, ExpertFlyer is now able to distinguish between seats available for purchase and those available for upgrades.
Related: The beginner's guide to ExpertFlyer
If you want to see if an upgrade is available, use the Award and Upgrade Availability feature in ExpertFlyer. Input your desired flight, date and cabin.
The results will display the most up-to-date inventory from American.
Take a look at the above example of Flight 33 from New York to Los Angeles on Nov. 2. ExpertFlyer shows that there are zero first-class upgrade seats in the "A" class of service. (Note that you could set an alert to see if something opens in the future.) There are seven business-class upgrades available in the "C" class of service.
Taking a look at AA.com confirms the data provided by ExpertFlyer.
Getting a sense for the seats available for purchase in the "C" and "A" classes is a little bit clunky — for now. You'll need to use the Flight Availability search, but be sure to select the "Don't Show Interline Connections" option (or change the point-of-sale to a different country). Otherwise, the data provided will only show the upgrade-level data for the "C" and "A" fare classes (which you can already find under the Award and Upgrade Availability search).
Within the next two to three weeks, ExpertFlyer will release an update that automatically populates the revenue/paid "C" and "A" classes in the Flight Availability search. We'll update this post when that update is deployed. In the meantime, you'll need to use the workaround above to see the seats available for purchase.
With AA's latest change, ExpertFlyer is even more valuable than before. Being able to see the nuance between the seats are available for purchase and for upgrades is a pro-level feature that would take hours to replicate by manually searching on AA.com. Plus, with the ability to set award and upgrade alerts, you'll never miss that coveted upgrade.
All in, if you're an American Airlines flyer, there's really no better time to subscribe to ExpertFlyer.
