[flyhi152]

I used my "HawaiianMiles" to upgrade a reservation for my wife. She was going to fly from Honolulu to Phoenix and what I printed out clearly showed

" FIRST " not "Coach", "Economy" or "Cattle Class"

Arriving at the airport in Honolulu she received a boarding pass for a seat in Coach without any further explanations. When we showed the printout to the check in clerk he explained

"There is nothing in the system showing that you made a reservation for First class and the print out that you are showing me does not mean anything. Only what is in our system matters -- Did you pay the $ 600,- for the upgrade ?"

We asked him for a supervisor and after waiting for almost 1/2 hour we talked to a lady who did not even know who we had talked to. Since this guy had mysteriously disappeared with our printout we asked her if this is a normal thing for Hawaiian Airlines: Mystery employees behind the counter that nobody seems to know (he was the only male among 4 or 5 ladies...) and mystery reservations that don't exist in the system. We both gave her a detailed description of the gentleman, told her through which door (behind the counter) he had disappeared and voila: after about 20 minutes she returned with our printout together with a complete printout of the booking records. All what she was willing to tell us was that a mystery manager had reversed the upgrade without leaving any notes and explanations other than "Upgrade reversal, Miles will be credited back to account"

No information why we were not informed by Hawaiian Airlines about the downgrade and no information why this was done. Naturally, this manager did not have a name.... We can only make assumptions:

1.) The mystery manager needed this seat for his golf buddy he could not just offer him a seat in Coach....

2.) A cash payer needed the seat and Hawaiian Airlines looks at any reservation that is paid with their "Hawaiian Miles" as a loss if the plane is booked out. This was also the answer that I received numerous times on prior occasions when trying to get an upgrade: You can pay cash, there are still seats available, but you can't use your Hawaiian Miles"