Been on vacation for the past 10 days and successfully ignored FT. When I returned yesterday I was, needless to say, surprised I couldn't see the "fare buckets" on my two reservations in "B" and "Y" to KWI and NRT over the next two months. It's rare that I book in Economy (Plus) without the ability to guarantee the GPU (assuming I haven't used them all) or mileage upgrade, but for these two reservations I was forced to.

Going forward, though, does UA seriously think 1Ks are going to have any interest in maintaining that status if the one "real" benefit (the 6 GPUs) is no longer transparent and thus generally "easy to use"? Instead of spending a few minutes (or even hours) online researching my options for ticket purchase and upgrade availability, then actually purchasing my ticket and being done with it, they really want me spending hours of their agents' time on the phone, risking that the (often uninformed) agent can't or won't help me find GPU-available flights, and then having me hang up the phone--not purchasing a ticket throughout the entire process?

Seriously? For the past 7 months I've been one of those UA die-hards that has put up with UA's pitiful integration into UAdbaCO and hoped for better things to come. I didn't status match with AA, and I've continued to fly my 1K+ miles annually and gladly use my 6 SWU/GPUs. But if I can no longer do that with some modicum of ease, forget it. As a 2MM flyer with "lifetime Platinum" (until they take it away), UA has literally taken away my sole practical reason for flying their airline 100,000+ miles per year. If this isn't changed back in fairly short order, I'll finally liquidate my 800,000 miles and take my "Y", "B" and "M" international fares to a different airline.

Did they seriously do this? Has anyone in the Willis Tower ever attended "Problem Solving 101"? Rather than fix the "R" inventory issues with IT, they just kill the functionality?