As you all know, UA charges $25 extra if you use the phone to purchase a reward flight (online it's free).

Multi-city routes and partnered airlines cannot always be made online... yada yada.

My point: You can avoid paying this fee if you get a nice rep. Or, you might instead land a reward option!

-I called to use my miles for a reward flight for a friend. Since I was using my miles and I was paying the purchase fees, they had to have some ticket person confirm and verify the ticket... and they didn't charge me the $25 fee.

-I called online support for United.com, and while talking with them on technical difficulties, they told me I could ask for a one-time fee waiver when talking with reservations on the phone. I called reservations on the phone and they said they couldn't do that for me, but they instead offered me a $100 e-voucher.

-I called another CSR and asked for a fee waiver because I previously made a reservation for a friend and wasn't charged the $25. They looked it up to verify, and then proceeded to not charge me the $25 for my ticket as well.


Have you had any similar experiences? Have you avoided the $25 phone booking fee? Do you have experiences with any airlines on how to avoid the extra fees when booking flights via the phone?