WestJet Offer to Upgrade: How Does It Work?

Airline bid upgrades are a common practice across the industry and are generally seen as a win-win for both passengers and airlines. For the airline, it’s a chance to earn extra revenue on a premium cabin seat that might otherwise go unsold. For passengers, it offers the opportunity to enjoy a more spacious seat and enhanced service, often at a lower cost than paying the full fare upfront.

While the upgrade bidding process is largely the same across most airlines, each carrier has its own nuances. In this article, we’ll take a closer look at WestJet’s Offer to Upgrade program, along with some helpful tips for securing an upgrade on your next flight.

What is WestJet Offer to Upgrade?

WestJet’s Offer to Upgrade lets passengers place a bid within a set range using cash or WestJet points for a chance to upgrade to a higher cabin class, such a Premium or Business Class. Eligibility depends on factors such as the number of unsold premium cabin seats and the passenger’s original ticket class, as not all fares qualify for upgrades.

Upgrades may be offered on select WestJet flights and destinations. To check if your flight qualifies, you can enter your reservation code and last name on the upgrade page of the WestJet website, or use the WestJet app to view your eligibility in the “Manage Trips” section.

How Does WestJet Offer to Upgrade Work? 

After you book your flight, you can access the Offer to Upgrade either by navigating directly to the Offer to Upgrade landing page and submitting your reservation code and last name to check if your flight is eligible. You can also access the upgrade offer page through the Manage Trips” section of the WestJet app or website. WestJet may also send you an email inviting you to participate in an upgrade offer as your departure date approaches.

WestJet offers two main ways to upgrade: a fixed-price upgrade or a bid upgrade offer. With the fixed-price option, you pay a set fee to move to a higher cabin class. For a bid upgrade offer, you submit the amount you’re willing to pay within a predetermined range.

I won’t dwell much on fixed-price upgrades since they’re straightforward—you either pay the stated upgrade fee or you don’t. These are often referred to as last-minute or at check-in upgrades, where you may be offered an upgrade at a fixed amount. You might save money this way if the airline has many empty premium seats and wants some additional revenue. However, if the premium cabin is nearly full, the fixed-price upgrade could be close to or match the outright price of the premium cabin ticket. Ultimately, the cost depends largely on how full the flight is.

Not every flight qualifies for an upgrade. WestJet decides eligibility based on several factors, including booking fare, seat availability, aircraft, and route. Additionally, bid upgrade offers are only available up to 75 hours before departure.

Upgrades are not offered if:

• You are booked on an UltraBasic fare
• Your booking is on a codeshare flight or issued by another airline
• The passenger is an unaccompanied minor

Placing an upgrade offer is a simple process that you can complete on the WestJet website or app by following these steps:

• Enter your reservation code and last name to check your eligibility.
• Select the flight segment you want to bid on, then adjust the slider to set your offer. This offer includes all taxes and fees.
• Provide your contact information and choose your payment method: credit card or WestJet points.
• Review your details and submit your offer.
• Once submitted, you’ll receive an email confirmation. You can use this email to modify or cancel your offer up to 75 hours before your flight, as long as it hasn’t been accepted yet.

On the Offer to Upgrade page, passengers will be presented a bidding range with a toggle button to switch between cash and WestJet points. You can place a bid within this range, with higher bids generally having a better chance of being accepted. The outcome of the offer depends on how the bid compares to others and the number of available seats in the upgraded cabin.

Using an example Economy itinerary of a WestJet flight from Calgary (YYC) to Tokyo–Narita (NRT), we can evaluate the bid upgrade range and compare it to the cost of booking a premium cabin outright to determine if bidding offers good value.

Since this route is operated by a Boeing 787 Dreamliner featuring both Premium and Business Class cabins, you have the option to bid on one or both for an upgrade. For instance, you might choose to bid only for Business Class if you prioritize having a lie-flat seat for the trans-Pacific flight and don’t see Premium as a significant enough upgrade.

Alternatively, you can bid on both cabins to improve your chances of securing an upgrade. You’re free to set different bid amounts for each cabin class, allowing you to prioritize how much you value each respective upgrade. 

Looking at the bid upgrade ranges, we can see that the bid range for an upgrade to Business Class is $1,240 to $2,350, and $750 to $1,425 for Premium.

A quick calculation shows that bidding at the lower end of the range can result in a savings of over $500 on a Business Class upgrade and about $350 on a Premium seat.

On the flip side, bidding near the top of the scale isn’t worth it, as you’ll end up paying more than the outright fare. This suggests that you can secure some solid savings in either cabin by keeping your bid toward the lower end of the bidding range.

You can also use your WestJet points to bid for an upgrade. The lowest bid on this route starts at 131,000 points for a Business Class upgrade. Since we know that the lowest cash bid is $1,240, we can calculate that WestJet is valuing its points at about 0.95 cents per point when used for bidding. Typically, WestJet points are worth 1 cent per point when redeemed for flights, so the value takes a slight hit when used for upgrades.

Because 131,000 points is a very high requirement and WestJet points can be hard to accumulate in large amounts, bidding even at the lowest available rate probably won’t be feasible for most travelers. Plus, keep in mind that these points are required on top of the cash already spent on the economy ticket.

If you’ve booked a Premium fare on a route like this and are thinking about bidding for an upgrade to Business, don’t bother—it’s terrible value. The starting bid is only $40 less than if you’d booked Economy, so combining the $1,644 Premium fare with a minimum $1,200 bid means you’d end up paying $554 more than if you had just booked Business Class outright.

Therefore, booking Economy class with the intention of submitting an upgrade offer appears to be the only sensible approach.

On the upgrade offer page, you’ll notice an “Offer Strength” meter that reflects the amount you’ve chosen for your bid. This is simply a visual gauge showing where your bid falls between the minimum and maximum allowed. It doesn’t take into account other bids, seat availability, or your actual chances of success, so feel free to ignore this meter and bid whatever amount you’re comfortable with.

Prior to submitted your bid, there are some important terms and conditions of a WestJet upgrade offer to be aware of:

• If your WestJet upgrade offer is accepted, your original ticket’s fare rules still apply, including for changes or cancellations.

• You will earn WestJet points on upgrade fees, in addition to tier and milestone qualifying spend.

• The bid amount for the upgrade is charged on top of the ticket price you’ve already paid.

• Refunds for upgrade offer payments are only issued in the event your flight is involuntarily rescheduled or cancelled and the upgrade can’t be accommodated or you choose not to rebook. No refunds are given for voluntary changes or if you change your mind after your bid is accepted.

• If you’re traveling on an itinerary that includes more than one segment, you must place a bid to upgrade each segment individually with a separate offer.

• WestJet considers multiple factors when assessing an offer such as, the fare class of your original booking, your WestJet Rewards status level, seat availability, and the number of travelers in your booking. Placing a bid does not guarantee an upgrade.

• You must place a bid for all passengers on the itinerary. If your bid is accepted, all passengers will be upgraded at the bid amount.

Once your bid is submitted, you can modify or cancel it as long as it hasn’t been accepted and it is at least 75 hours before your scheduled flight departure. If your offer is accepted, your payment method will be charged the bid amount, your flight will be rebooked into the upgraded cabin, and a confirmation email will be sent. You will be issued a new booking reference and boarding pass reflecting your updated itinerary.

If your offer is not accepted, you’ll be notified by email. No additional charges will apply, and you’ll travel in your originally booked cabin.

Maximizing Your Upgrade Offer’s Success Rate

To improve your chances of receiving a bid upgrade, it helps to gather as much information as possible, especially regarding how many premium cabin seats remain available on your flight. This information can help you determine how competitive your bid needs to be.

If many seats are still unsold, a lower bid might be enough. But if the cabin is nearly full, you will likely need to submit a much stronger offer to have a realistic shot at an upgrade.

One of our favorite websites is Seats.aero. It’s not only a great resource for finding award seats but also offers several useful tools for gathering flight information. For example, the Fare Class Viewer tool lets us check how many seats remain available on a specific flight. This is available from the “Tools” drop-down menu at top the Seats.aero homepage. 

Related: Seats.aero: A Simple & Effective Flight Award Search Tool

To find out how many unsold premium cabin seats are available on our Calgary (YYC) to Tokyo–Narita (NRT) flight, we would enter the following details into the search.

The search results display each fare class on our flight along with the number of seats still available in each class. Since we want to know how many Business (fare code J) and Premium (fare code W) seats remain unsold, this information can offer some insight into our decision on how much to bid.

This specific flight has J4 and W5 listed for Business and Premium respectively, meaning that there are 4 Business and 5 Premium seats still available. 

This information is highly time-sensitive. If your flight is still months away, it won’t accurately reflect how full the cabin might be. I recommend monitoring seat availability using this tool in the days leading up to your departure date to gauge the demand for premium cabin seats and adjust your bid accordingly.

You might have noticed I’ve only mentioned upgrading on WestJet flights operated by the Boeing 787 Dreamliner thus far. That is because I feel these routes generally offer the best upgrade value. The Boeing 787 Dreamliner provides a far superior passenger experience and is the only aircraft in WestJet’s fleet with a true business class seat featuring lie-flat pods. These aircraft usually serve the airline’s long-haul routes to Europe and Asia where greater comfort and elevated service are a priority.

The rest of WestJet’s fleet consists of narrowbody aircraft with recliner-style seats in the Premium cabin. Since these planes typically fly short- to medium-haul routes, a bid upgrade to Premium may not offer enough added value to warrant the additional cost. In many cases, it might make more sense to pay for an extended comfort seat in economy and pocket the savings, instead of bidding or paying for Premium.

Related: Finding the Best Aircraft for a Redemption

However, there are certainly times when a Premium cabin seat can be worth it, like on one of WestJet’s red-eye flights, where having a larger seat to relax in can make a noticeable difference in how refreshed you feel upon arrival.

Another good practice for bid upgrades is to bid slightly above the minimum amount. This can help weed out and put you above any bidders who have placed a minimum bid, which should improve your chances of success. 

Another aspect to be aware of is that WestJet takes your WestJet Rewards status level into account when evaluating upgrade offers. Although the terms and conditions don’t state exactly how or to what extent status impacts the process, I think it’s reasonable to assume that a higher status should increase your chances of a successful bid. Conversely, if you have no status with WestJet, you might want to factor this into your bid amount, as you could be placed at a disadvantage.

When placing an upgrade offer for a reservation with multiple passengers, you must submit a bid for each traveler. The more passengers in your booking, the lower your chances of a successful upgrade, since there must be enough seats in the upgraded cabin to accommodate every passenger in your party. If you want to upgrade only certain people in your party, they must be booked on a separate reservation.

Finally, take your route and travel day into account. On busy routes like transcontinental flights between Canada’s West and East Coast, which draw many business travelers, you’ll likely need to bid higher to improve your upgrade chances.

Conclusion

WestJet’s Offer to Upgrade program provides a flexible and potentially cost-effective way to enjoy a more comfortable flying experience by bidding for a seat in a premium cabin. While it’s not guaranteed, understanding how the bidding process works, monitoring seat availability, and placing a competitive offer can significantly increase your chances of success.

Since you’re only charged if your bid is accepted, there’s little risk in trying. This is especially the case if your flight is on one of WestJet’s Boeing 787 Dreamliners, as an upgrade on this aircraft provides a significantly better passenger experience, making it an ideal target for a bid upgrade.

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