Moderators: Most of these posts deals w/ interactions w/ UA’s Mileage Plus (Chase stopped answering) and problems of using the card on UA’s WWW site, so I suggest leaving it on the UA site, rather than shifting it to a credit card forum. The tutorial focuses on how to use it on .bomb to maximum advantage. I defer to the mods if you wish to move it to another forum.

Overview: Signed up for the Chase Platinum Class Visa Signature card to get EQM’s for 2009. It has been a battle. These lengthy posts review problems dealing w/ Chase (they don’t respond) and UA Mileage Plus (they respond slowly), and the partial resolution. Learn how to spend over $4000 on UA’s WWW site and get 202 EQM’s! Discover how Chase, as a one time exception, did what they said they would do (5K EQM’s on first use).

For those that don’t want to review the minutia of the battle, I’ll start w/ tips on maximum EQM’s (and RDM’s) and note problem areas.


Decide when you need EQM’s – the offer says you get 5,000 EQM’s on first use, but Chase frequently posts ‘em on card approval, before you get the card. This has been noted by other posters. If you want 5000 EQM’s for 2009 (as I did), don’t apply for the card until 2009.

If you can, wait for a promotion w/ 40,000 RDM’s. There are sporadic 40K RDM promotions available but if you sign up for the card using the offer on .bomb it’s just 30K RDM;s

In theory you get EQM’s (1/$) for flights ticketed on .bomb. In practice, if there’s any involvement of a UA person, there’s a good chance you won’t get the EQM;s. In my case, I was getting tickets for China March travel and wanted flights where SWU’s could clear on booking. I found flights where SWU’s could clear immediately, asked the faux 1K desk to hold the reservation so that I could use my Chase Visa to purchase it on .bomb. Now, months later, Mileage Plus says my reservations were “ticketed” by the Detroit call center, so the purchase is not eligible for EQM’s.

The only sure way to get EQM’s for using the card, and checking on routing/SWU’s, is to call, ask for help, write down flight #’s, thank the RA for their help, DON’T HOLD A RESERVATION, hang up and make the reservation on .bomb.

If EQM’s don’t appear, calls to Chase accomplish nothing – two calls early in the year in pursuit of EQM’s led to promises to have a specialist research the matter and get back to me within two weeks, but it never happened. Send an email, at least there’s a record of when you attempted to resolve the problem and UA usually will respond in a week or so.

The card has been hard to use (in terms of getting EQM’s). It may not be worth it to some. Chase would not respond and UA Mileage Plus was slow and somewhat frustrating. It may be better to pursue another reward card, but if you want EQM’s, Chase is the only game in town…

The 8 posts which follow detail, chronologically, attempts to get missing EQM’s. They start on 17 April.