Originally Posted by
Traveling man spokane
I'm a relatively new member to the UAL mileage plus program. Live in Spokane. Haven't flown UAL much over the years, but just racked up 19,000 miles flying to Melbourne and back. Anticipate flying Spokane-Denver Spokane-SFO routes over the next few years. Would appreciate a basic understanding of UAL'S mileage plus program, award levels....any mistakes NOT to make, that sort of thing. I'm a newbie, please take it easy on me. All advice appreciated!
Some very basic frequent travel tips:
* If you fly at least 25,000 miles or take more than 30 flights in a calendar year, consider concentrating your travel on one airline or within a single airline alliance. (United, Continental, and US Airways are all "Star Alliance" carriers, so for example if you're careful to give your United frequent flyer number to US Airways when you take a US flight, you'll get credit on United for your travel.) Some perks of status include better seats, priority treatment during irregular operations, free checked bags, and a shot at an upgrade. The obvious benefit of accruing all your travel to one carrier is that a 50,000-mile award ticket will probably take you somewhere more interesting than three 16,667-mile tickets.
* Be careful about codeshares. When you book a ticket on any airline's Web site, look for text like "United flight 9999 operated by United Express" or "United flight 9999 operated by US Airways". Understand how, if at all, codeshare travel is different (the # of miles you get for a flight is different on different carriers and you can always look it up on united.com -> Earn Miles -> Airline Partners; always check in with the operating carrier; avoid codeshares in general; if you want to save money, be aware that sometimes codeshares can be cheaper than UA's own tickets on their own metal)
* You can change the date or routing on a United award ticket for free.
* You can cancel a paid or award ticket
within 24 hours of ticketing for a full refund of your $$ / miles. ("Ticketing" is usually about the same time as "purchase", or "when you hit buy at united.com".)
* If you travel frequently from one airport (for example GEG), it can be really nice to get to know the folks who work there. This isn't so much because they'll do anything special for you, it's more that travel is a little more interesting if you understand the faces behind the counters.
* It's really thoughtful to write to the airline's customer service about positive experiences you have on flights -- it doesn't get you anything, but it might help out someone else's career, and it hardly costs you any time.