Sep 17, 2014, 10:44 am

FlyerTalk Forums Expert How-Tos and Guides

Last edit by: mia

Reminder: you must enroll and select UA as your airline BEFORE making a reimbursable purchase (this includes MPX). Click HERE.

Caution: As of December 2016, it appears that American Express no longer reimburses MPX transactions.

Credits generally appear 3-4 days after making the transaction. No need to worry unless they don't appear after a week.

TravelBank funds can only be used on United and United Express flights. Partner flights are not eligible.

Gift Registry and Gift Cards

The consensus is that United gift registry contributions will be reimbursed and gift card purchases will not. So

Log into united.com
Set up a gift registry for yourself
Use the link in your gift registry web page to send an announcement to your email address. This better, faster, and more reliable than searching for your gift registry, especially if you have a common name. Even someone with an unusual surname like mre5765 has could not find his registry after creating it.
Log out of united.com
Follow the Make Contribution in your gift registry email
Contribute using your Amex platinum card

There seems to be no downside to contributing in sub-200 dollar chunks since the gift registry creates a single pool of cash. However there are lots of reports of successful fee credits from a single $200 donation. Whether done as on $200 transaction or eight $25 transactions, the result is that one will have $200 in ones TravelBank.

PLEASE NOTE: When you establish a gift registry for the first time, it will take 24 hours before the funds in the registry are available to use toward payment of a flight.

Do I have to join the united.com Club ($25 annual fee) to use my TravelBank?

Apparently not.

Does spending TravelBank credit count towards PQD?

Yes-for revenue flights only

Airline Taxes on Award Tickets

Doesn't seem to work anymore; see post 179 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/25297196-post179.html and #391

MPX (MileagePlus X)

It appears that this is no longer working. See this post: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/27589581-post1496.html.

Economy Plus fees

There are recent reports of this working on a per ticket basis. No recent report of an Economy Plus annual subscription being reimbursed.

Other Airline Reports
AA Thread
AS Thread
B6 Thread
DL Thread
HA Thread
UA Thread
WN Thread

$200 airline fee reimbursement reports: UA only. [2010 - 2016]

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Dec 29, 2014, 5:00 pm

#1066

lili

In memoriam

Join Date: Aug 2002

Programs: AA EXP "Life is good! Really good.""

Posts: 4,923

Quote:

Originally Posted by de13

I received my Amex credit today, within a week of purchasing, using 4 different transactions of $50 each into my UA gift registry. Thank you all for the info, I almost forgot this benefit was there since I barely flew UA this year.

Why four different transactions? Seems much more "suspicious" than one $200 transaction and four times as much work. But glad it worked for you.

Dec 30, 2014, 8:01 am

#1067

starbuk

Join Date: Apr 2014

Location: ORD

Programs: AAdvantage, UA, Avios

Posts: 637

We forgot to register UA as our airline before making the GR purchase, by about a ten minute window. Have people been successful in sending a secure message to get the credit to work? Will it go through since it was only off by a few minutes?

Dec 30, 2014, 9:26 am

#1068

iherebyresign

Join Date: May 2014

Location: RIC

Programs: Hyatt Globalist, AA EXP, National EE

Posts: 269

Quote:

Originally Posted by skisteven1

Can you post the specifics of the transactions? (ie. does it look exactly the same as the post above where it says "SPECIAL SERVICE TICKET"?)

Looks like this:

DEC19
UNITED AIRLINES HOUSTON TX
$70.00
Doing business as:
UNITED AIRLINES
600 JEFFERSON STREET
DEPT HQJ-CM
HOUSTON
TX
77002-7363
UNITED STATES
Additional Information: UNITED AIRLINES
Reference: 635634563465346356
Category: Travel - Airline

Ticket Number: xxxxxxxxx662200
Passenger Name: NAME \GAD DEPOSIT
Document Type: SPECIAL SERVICE TICKET

Dec 30, 2014, 9:59 am

#1069

TheCount2

Join Date: Apr 2010

Location: NYCEWR

Programs: MP(1K) Million Miler, Marriott Plat

Posts: 478

Quote:

Originally Posted by starbuk

You probably won't know until it is too late. If you are going to spend at least $400 on UA anyway, just put another $200 in the gift registry.

Dec 30, 2014, 10:14 am

#1070

skisteven1

Join Date: May 2009

Posts: 16

Quote:

Originally Posted by skisteven1

I'm curious as well. I waited until the last minute this year (yeah, yeah...) and obviously have not yet seen a reimbursement post.

Here's my transaction:

DEC26 UNITED AIRLINES HOUSTON TX $65.00
Passenger Name: LASTNAME \GAD DEPOSIT
Ticket Number: XXX60905328XXXXX
Document Type: SPECIAL SERVICE TICKET

The fact that there's a ticket number, a last name, and the type says "ticket" are all concerning to me. Did I do something wrong?

EDIT: According to post 991, this exact same coding for the charge was in fact reimbursed. So that's super encouraging.

THUMBS UP!! ^^^^^

I put my first $65 charge through on 12/26, and got the reimbursement on 12/29. Putting through the rest of the $200 now!

Dec 30, 2014, 12:20 pm

#1071

starbuk

Join Date: Apr 2014

Location: ORD

Programs: AAdvantage, UA, Avios

Posts: 637

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheCount2

You probably won't know until it is too late. If you are going to spend at least $400 on UA anyway, just put another $200 in the gift registry.

She said she got email that said reimbursement will take 2-4 weeks. Not sure if that is generic email for signing up with particular airline or not.

So if this credit hits in January 2015, does that count for the 2015 year or 2014? Reports from last year were unclear. Pretty sure it is based on purchase date but will talk to AMEX and update here.

Dec 30, 2014, 4:06 pm

#1072

enigmatic

Join Date: Jan 2008

Posts: 57

Quote:

Originally Posted by enigmatic

Didn't get my 2nd credit for some reason, charged on the 14th of Dec

Do you guys think I should:

1. Wait it out
2. Give Amex a call
3. Do another $100 charge before the year is up?

Transactions look the same to me

Passenger Name: LASTNAME\GAD DEPOSIT
Document Type: SPECIAL SERVICE TICKET

DEC14 UNITED AIRLINES HOUSTON TX $100.00
DEC12* AMEX Airline Fee Reimbursement -$100.00
DEC7 UNITED AIRLINES HOUSTON TX $100.00

Oh... called them up... On Jan 2nd I had already used 100 of my 200$ fee reimbursement, dang should have checked with them first how much reimbursement I had left! Next year I'll get a jump on the reimbursement and do it in early Jan.

Dec 30, 2014, 9:54 pm

#1073

Songer5

Join Date: Jan 2013

Location: 212

Programs: Marriott Titanium, Hilton Gold, UA Silver

Posts: 502

Quote:

Originally Posted by starbuk

That happened to me in Jan 2013. We did NOT get the reimbursement on that transaction so we did another a few weeks later.

Dec 31, 2014, 6:02 am

#1074

illj

Join Date: Dec 2014

Posts: 1

Another data point:
Dec 27 chose United as airline
Immediately after, charged $200 once for registry
Dec 31 four days later, full credit posted with date as of Dec 30