usedtobeimportant

I often take my family along on business.

I typically use miles to book their awards and then pay for mine matching their flights exactly.

But I find two things happen:

a) The award tickets are not so great (i.e. not non-stop, early/late flights etc.)
b) The price of these not so great tickets is ironically really large!

Did anyone else find this pattern?

Lately, I've noticed that after a flight slips/transitions off the award list the price to purchase it drops greatly.

For example, I booked red eye award tickets SFO to IAD for 12.5k miles but they cost $400 to purchase at the time.

Today I found the same tickets are now $200 but they now cost 24K miles!

Did anyone else find this pattern of United increasing/dropping paid ticket prices to match award inventory?

findark

No, in fact if an award is available at the Saver level it almost always implies more discount inventory is available on that flight than if the Saver award were not available. Everything else equal, the same flight will cost less in cash when there is a Saver award available than when there is not. Any correlation observed in the inverse direction is likely a result of small sample size and/or confirmation bias.

jsloan

Yes, but not for the reason you're insinuating.

What's actually happening here is that UA awards always use an international fare construction, meaning that it allows any transfer less than 24 hours. So, the "not so great" tickets aren't available for sale on a through fare, which is why the price is higher. UA would actually prefer not to offer them at all, but few enough people book them that they haven't gotten around to fixing it.

No; that's a coincidence. IME, UA virtually never opens award space unless there is inventory in all fare classes. How far in advance were you looking? It's likely that UA simply hadn't published any discount fares for those dates at the time that you looked.

There's not some grand conspiracy against people who are trying to match up award with paid travel. It's too much of a niche for UA to worry about. Furthermore, your hypothesis falls apart for anyone who's not looking to mix paid and award travel together, as in both of your instances, they were offering a considerably good value for their points.

Believe me, UA isn't offering outsized value with points in order to try to get one over on people who are mixing award and paid travel.

SFO_LOW_CLOUDS

I recently did the same with my family. Points were actually more expensive than my cash price to Singapore. 80K points round trip economy from the US vs $750 cash. Same flights and everything.

Kacee

No. That's just not how it works. Fare pricing and award inventory releases are entirely disconnected processes. If you've seen that apparent correlation, it is sheer coincidence.

Yes, this is literally true. But it's worth noting that because awards are not subject to AP requirements, last minute domestic saver awards can make for really great redemptions on a cpm basis.

findark

I weasel a little bit because it's not strictly true. XN space is finicky and I have seen T0 XN9 as well as K9 XN0 on occasion.

jsloan

So, I had every intention of replying with a snarky, "Yeah, for three more days..."

and then I checked.

I am stunned to find that I actually see some 12.5K saver awards past 11/15. For example, AUS-DTW: walk-up fare is $407 one way, and I fully expected to see 12.5K through 11/14 and then ~40K for a few days. Instead, I see 12.5K in the calendar every day through 11/22 save Sunday (20K).

I wonder if UA will shift their inventory / pricing model once the 15th arrives.

Kacee

Either they've concluded that these awards do not meaningfully cannibalize full fare business travel sales, and the benefit will remain available, or they just haven't gotten around to shutting the door yet. I'd like to think it's the former.

Air Houston

I am hoping they continue to offer some good values. Air Houston MIL lives near MCO and I have seen tickets from IAH next year for as low as 8,000 miles one way. So there are a few good values out there.

jsloan

I hope you're right, but I have my doubts. I suspect they may just be waiting until the program is fully transitioned on Friday.

Sure -- IAH-MCO, months in advance, may well remain a bargain. The question is more about last-minute fares, which have been a good use of saver awards for years -- UA often opens saver space close to departure, particularly if you have access to XN (Premier status or a qualifying credit card). I suspect we're going to find that you only see cheap mileage amounts when you also see cheap cash amounts.

symphonicman

You can't get reimbursed by your employer—or even, I believe, a client—for a miles ticket.

Mama

I think most people here would agree that the best value for reward redemption is saver premium cabin reward. Economy class purchase price fluctuates widely based on market demand and competition. And more often than not, you will see very cheap economy class that do not justify miles redemption.

jsloan

Value is going to depend upon people's circumstances. If the best value in the system is an F award from NRT-BKK-SYD.. that only helps you if you happen to need/want to fly from Japan to Thailand and on to Australia. Saver premium cabin awards are great, but not everyone has enough miles to redeem them, and it can be hard to find inventory, especially if you're traveling with a family.

On the other hand, while economy awards aren't as exciting, if I needed to take the next flight from Austin to Allentown, PA, I could spend $479, or I could spend 12.5K miles. That's a 3.8 cpm valuation without even trying (it was literally my first attempt). IAH to EWR? There's a special $412 fare for the first flight of the day, but if I can' make that one, it's $609. With miles, I have six choices at 12.5K (4.9 cpm).

It's these redemptions that I worry might end tomorrow. I very much hope to be wrong.

Kacee

That boat sailed long ago. You're several years behind with that comment.

The consistent best value for UA award redemptions on a cpm basis these days is domestic saver economy inside the 7 day AP window. I can get 3.7 cpm (or higher) all day long doing that on west coast routes.
Yes. The lack of available inventory seriously devalues these awards.

Mama

Of course last minutes (or very close to last minute) saver redemption almost works out to be great value if you can find availability for it, otherwise you are at the risk of purchasing higher fare out of pocket by waiting so late. Last minute (or very close to last minute) ticket purchase price are guaranteed to be high by system default regardless of availability. But if your travel patterns are always short notice anyway, this redemption is great value for you.