OK, I've got a pretty tough customer service problem and wanted to get FF feedback and ideas.

My father wanted to take his girlfriend to Stockholm in part to see my brother. He only had enough points for himself and wanted to borrow points from me to take his girlfriend. USAir had just started flying there and he was able to corner two Envoy tickets for Sept 13 through Sept 20 of this year.

I'm CP and 1K (yeah, yeah, I know don't ask, I travel way too much), and didn't have enough USAir points, so I got her a USAir Envoy ticket using UA points (obviously in her name). The ticket is UA paper stock and comes to me. He got his own Envoy ticket using his own USAir points. Both were PHL->ARN.

So far, so good.

So, my Dad breaks up with his girlfriend and wants to invite me to join him. I won't get miles (being the miles whore I am), but what the hell. But I know this going to be a bear: changing a US Envoy award ticket on US medal, with a ticket on UA stock, all in a third person's name, using my points.

I call UA, and as I predicted the only way they can do it is to cancel the first ticket (in the girlfriend's name), try to put a hold on the seat before it goes back into inventory (in case someone is waitlisted for an 80K saver Envoy award that day), and then re-issue the ticket in my name.

Make sense so far? Good, so this is where it gets complicated.

There is a problem. USAir no longer flies to Stockholm on Sept 13th and 20th. (Why didn't the let us know and rebook? But that's another story.)

Under normal circumstances (ie. I wasn't trying to change the name on the ticket), US would probably make some sort of an exception to get my Dad and his girlfriend into Envoy via Manchester or something... Let's assume we do that as a first step. However, if we then try to change the ticket by releasing my Dad's girlfriend's ticket - there is no open award seat to put a hold on (since it was done as an exception) for me to pickup. In addition, at this late date, it's unlikely I'm going to find much in the way of cheap / free seats (Coach or Envoy) to pickup.

I ended up talking to the USAir rep (very helpful, FYI), and he said if we wanted to try something I'd have to talk to a supervisor and they'd have to try to figure something out in conjunction with UA.

My strategy (at this point) is to call USAir, ask for supervisor and explain the situation. Since they would have to do something (make exceptions to squeeze my Dad and his girlfriend in Envoy on a connecting flight, I assume), I'm thinking it might be better to reschedule for May of next year when US (in theory) begin Stockholm flights again. That would solve US's immediate problem of rebooking two Envoy class tickets by pushing it out to a date next year, but in addition to having them make exceptions for two seats, we would also like to change the name on the one ticket (girlfriend -> me). Just to make it even more burdensome I'd like to leave from DCA vs. PHL, but I'd accept a PHL departure and find a way to PHL.

The alternative seems to be to cancel entirely. We'd (I assume) get them to refund the points (and taxes?) without points redeposit penalties because they were unable to provide the flights.

Think this will fly (pun intended)? Any other ideas or thoughts?

Hmmm....this is over my head. I'm sorry about all the trouble.

Question though - so were the loads that bad that they are ending this flight early? Sounds like it - and thus I wouldn't hold out hope for getting the PHL-ARN flight back next May. Kind of surprising considering it's underserved by the US Airlines,

US is still serving ARN in September, it just doesn't operate every day of the week. I think there is still a return flight on the 20th, but no flight there on the 15th. If I'm not mistaken, there is a PHL-ARN on the 14th. I'm not sure why the flight only operates certain days of the week. I know that a fuel truck tore up one of our 767's in Barcelona recently, but I had assumed that airplane would be back in service before September. I never flew that trip, but other people said the loads were fairly heavy on it.

Hmmm....this is over my head. I'm sorry about all the trouble.

Question though - so were the loads that bad that they are ending this flight early? Sounds like it - and thus I wouldn't hold out hope for getting the PHL-ARN flight back next May. Kind of surprising considering it's underserved by the US Airlines,

According to the published schedule (PDF, but who knows if that's accurate), it shows Sept 6th is the end of the scheduled flights. For next year, I had to punch in flexible dates and keep hitting 3 days earlier until it came up N/A (showing them starting May 12th). But yeah, this would be a crap shoot. If I do get a May date and they don't fly, I think we could get them honor the seats on a flight to a different destination or via a connection. Although next year I won't be a Chairman's and it might be tougher.

As far as September goes.
PHL-ARN xMW
ARN-PHL MWF only

Last non-stop EB is Oct 7
Last non-stop WB is Oct 8

Correct on the May 12 date.

Good luck. You do have an issue on your hands.

If there is no flight you get the points back and get to try again for another flight on United or another airline- sure, it's a pain, but you cannot change the name on an already-issued ticket.

I think my approach would be to push both US and UA (esp since you're top tier with both) on this one and ask them to shepherd you into an acceptable arrangement. The girlfriend issue makes things a little sticky...... I can certainly see the airlines' resistance to help out with that being the case.

Surely between US/UA/LH, there should be some wiggle room in getting you in and out of ARN. This is going to be a tricky one, though. You're on the right track, however, to approach a supervisor and cross your fingers they're in a good mood. This will take some real effort. Keep us posted and good luck!