Pharmaphly

laxmillenial

If UA sees two reservations, they have every right to cancel one arbitrarily and without notice. I'm not sure how far apart your flights are, but for example, if I am on:

6AM-9:30AM IAD - SFO flight (booked revenue)
and
4PM-7:30PM IAD - SFO flight (booked mileageplus)

There's no way I would be able to make that second flight, even if I departed SFO at 9:30AM destined for IAD on the dot.

Also, your plan fails to take into account two words: fare classes. If the flight is that sold out, and you booked a cheap revenue ticket, what makes you think your fare class will be available for you to SDC into? If you booked full fare Y, then....oops my bad.

jsloan

No, but they would let you cancel your account and revoke your status.

What you're attempting is (a) explicitly against the rules, and (b) unlikely to work even if you don't get caught. Cancelling the award seat doesn't necessarily mean that it will go back into inventory. If they're already oversold, they may decide not to open up a new seat; if they're not oversold, they might open it back up, but not down to whatever fare class you're currently booked into.

Incidentally, if there was only one seat left on the later flight, it's highly unlikely that there would be saver inventory. What inventory did you see for the flight in expert mode?

PS: Welcome to FlyerTalk!

jhayes_1780

And here is an old thread where a GS had his account closed for booking and cancelling too many award tickets:

UA is as Loyal as a 3 Dollar Bill [account closed]

Pharmaphly

jsloan

If it was Y1, I'm really surprised they'd open XN inventory, but I agree that sounds like the "last seat."

And, I agree; if you can't make the morning flight, I'd cancel it now before UA notices.

Bonehead

As long as it isn't the first leg of a RT; If it is, UA will cancel the return as well.

chavala

Often1

I would not worry about posting these details. Even if someone at UA read this thread, all she would know is that at some point, someone flying between two points in the UA system is considering a fraudulent use of his MP account and a violation of the COC.

UA knows that already. That is why it spends on the software to find the conduct.

I will infer only that the change fee + fare difference costs <$200 (presuming standard domestic penalty fare). Which narrows this down to how many tickets in the coming time?

augias84

I would tweak the strategy: Within 24 hours of the second flight (the award flight), see if the app gives you the option to same-day confirm your original ticket to the new flight (but don't cancel the award seat, and don't call UA yet...). Just start by checking on the app. Probably it won't give you a same-day confirm option,so next you can see what fare-classes are available using expert mode; if a slightly higher fare class is available, UA will let you same-day confirm by paying the difference in fare (no change-fee, since still a same-day confirm). it might be $50, it might be $200... but much cheaper than changing it now. In that case, before you call UA to do it, cancel the award ticket, THEN call UA (so they don't see the double-booking, which they wouldn't be happy about).
If no additional seats are available, then I would call UA to cancel your original flight -- don't mention the award ticket, but if they ask about it, just mention that you wanted to make sure you got space, before you call to cancel the first flight. You'll get away with that. In this scenario, you'll lose some miles, but if the new flight is that full, the likelihood that inventory opens up in the fare class you need once you open the award ticket is very low. I doubt canceling the award ticket will have a meaningful impact, in fact. It is useful only as a backup option, not as a tool to give you access to the fare class for same-day changes.

Generally, it is true that one should not book extra award tickets if it's not physically possible to make the travel... personally, I would have just waited and then same-day confirmed, since in my experience there is almost always space opening up on a flight I can use (sometimes in a higher fare class -- but with same-day confirm I would still avoid the change fee).
If there is a short "overlap" for a day (during which you have two flights booked), I think you'll be fine. It's when people really push it, and book 5 or 10 tickets and then wait to choose which one they'll use, or cancel at the last minute then you will have a big problem with UA sooner or later :-) Those kinds of tactics are also majorly messing up travel plans for everyone else, so I think UA would be just in punishing that.