I'm a long time CO Plat who's new to UA.
I thot UA companion upgrade was that my travel partner would have priority as 1p (my UA status).

Just finished PHX-SFO-PDX both ways with Dad (no status). We both had same PNR.
Looking at .bomb, my PNR never showed upgrade as pending/waitlisted/etc. I assumed it was because of the non-status companion.
At check-in (outbound via new Droid App, inbound via .bomb) I was asked if I wanted an upgrade. Answered yes both times.

On each of the 4 segments, I was placed somewhere in the top 3 for upgrade.
Dad was placed on the upgrade list, but at the bottom with several folks in between us. As the upgrade list grew, Dad stayed at the very bottom.
Seemed very CO style to me, though I rarely travel with a companion so really don't know.

I also wonder if the Agent that made this booking did something wrong.
I used VDB vouchers to purchase these tickets, so had to go to the airport.
The "Ticketing" Agent was clueless on how to book and ticket the reservation. I walked in with the specific flights/dates/fare basis and it took her a little over 40 minutes to complete. I kept showing my 1P card, but she wasn't interested until the tickets had finally been generated. I assumed she entered it ok since we were given E+ seating. Not what I was expecting from UA, given all the comments here how the UA Res sys is so much more advanced than CO's

Steve