Originally Posted by
TrayflowInUK
Not sure if this helps much, but here are some excerps from the fare rules for a transatlantic saver award in business, boldface is mine.
WAS = DCA and IAD
It seems quite clear to me that UA did the OP no favours on the routing, his originally requested routing was well within requirements. However, the rules on the website state the $25 booking fee will be assessed regardless of whether the itinerary COULD have been booked on united.com in the first place.
OP here...thanks for the info on this...it's helpful as it's quite likely I'll make some changes as flight time gets closer and I expect the routing may cause future problems when I try to do so.
Re the in phone fee, I had expected to pay it, although I think it never hurts to ask them to waive it since I couldn't make the reservation online. And I was taken aback when the reason they said they wouldn't do it was because they were letting me slide with a non-conforming itinerary.