Many months ago, we booked and purchased flights between Pittsburgh & Honolulu, and redeemed miles to upgrade (two of us traveling). All our upgrades were confirmed. All were United flights.

Problem #1 – United changed the flight from Pittsburgh to Chicago to be a Continental flight. So, we lost our upgrades, and were told we would not be placed on an upgrade list. An upgrade would only be secured at the airport on the day of departure. It is no big deal because this is a short-haul flight, but does this make sense? So much for redeeming miles and upgrading!

Problem #2 – Itinerary and random flight listings. If I pull up our reservation on United, I get varied results. It lists the flights, and (sometimes) the seat assignments. For our outbound flight from Pittsburgh to Chicago, it sometimes lists a flight with a United # and says it is a code share with Continental. Sometimes it lists the flight with a Continental # (and does not reference a United #). And sometimes, we have two flights from Pittsburgh to Chicago. One for United and one for Continental (both the same flight – just listed twice, as separate flights on different carriers). We get about 5 emails a week from United informing us of flight changes. I call United on a quasi-regular basis to ask them to confirm our flights. I usually get put on hold for a few minutes and then told everything is OK…. And of course, after every phone call, we get another email.

Problem #3 – Continental Itinerary. On our United reservation, it lists both a United record locator and a Continental record locator. So, to be adventurous, I pop over to the Continental sight and try to pull up my reservation. Depending upon the phase of the moon, I get the following information:Problem #4 – Seat assignments. It is probably related to Problem #3, but our seat assignments change randomly. Sometimes we have seats, sometimes we don’t, and sometimes we get moved around or split up. I can always select seats for my United flights (because I always change the seats back to where we want to be), but never for my Continental flight (which I may or may not be ticketed for!). I have called United and they will assign Continental seats, but usually about 2 days after they are assigned, they disappear.

So, how nervous should I be? I have called United several times and asked them to confirm everything is correct. I always get “Well yes Mr. xxxx, your reservation is correct”. I have called Continental a few times and have been told it is not correct, we do not have valid tickets, and to talk with United.
How many others are having United / Continental ticketing problems? Any ideas on a resolution? I sent an email to United, but got a response that states they will not address future flight / reservation issues via email, to please call…. We still have 3 months before our trip and are not that confident we will get there without aggravation…. But are enjoying the comedy