Well folks, maybe I'm the last person in the Western Hemisphere to realize this reality, but I guess I've somehow had my head in the sand on this important point all along.

I naively assumed that Star Alliance carriers made their award inventory equally available across all carriers as part of their partnership agreement (i.e. no special inventory stash held back for your own fliers).

Well, I learned the truth tonight when I did extensive planning on united.com for first class award tix to OGG next OCT from the east coast. When I had everything all figured out and looking great, I call US award desk and lay it all out --- the res agent is totally silent for a moment. She then advises that she has nothing available whatsoever on those days to Hawaii. In fact, she went on to say, most HI inventory seems to come up 7 to 8 months prior to travel days, not the old 330 day rule, when using UAL.

That was news to me!!!! :mad: So, if I were using UA miles right now, I could've booked all four of us to Maui for a week in the front cabin and been done. But, UA is not releasing those seats yet to US award travel -- and it's anyone's guess when they might.

Makes it very frustrating. :(

ANY WORDS OF WISDOM????

ANY WORDS OF WISDOM????

Yes. Call UA and see if they agree with the availability that you found on united.com. Their website is notoriously unreliable.

If you CAN get all of your flights from the UA agent, see if they will hold it for you OR try to conference the US res agent onto the phone, it's a long shot, but might work.

Yes. Call UA and see if they agree with the availability that you found on united.com. Their website is notoriously unreliable.

If you CAN get all of your flights from the UA agent, see if they will hold it for you OR try to conference the US res agent onto the phone, it's a long shot, but might work.

Thanks, NEO. Tried it, but no dice. UAL rep confirms that they routinely set aside inventory on high demand routes for their own pax and then release later to alliance partners if seats remain.

My best guess is that their yield mgmt forecasting systems decide just exactly when those seats get released -- there is no hard and fast rule, it depends on the day of the week, the flight time and the month, etc, etc. Ugh.

Still very depressing to see perfectly good flights in F available, just not to me. :(

I have a *A award to BKK, and there was one leg ORD-LAX that hadn't cleared F (was still in C). I kept checking on the UA site, and it finally showed an available F seat. I called US, and he was able to change it immediately. Which reminds me that I need to take it to the airport to have it reissued.