Originally Posted by DanTravels

Indeed. A year later, UA will happily give you ET flights... but it may neglect to mention that oh, by the way, ET has all these rules about third-party purchases. Yesterday I got an intinerary booked (purchase went through) which includes LH from Frankfurt to Kenya (well, Privatair) and back from Saudi Arabia, with NBO-ADD-RUH on ET. UA promptly emailed me to say that they were waiting for confirmation on the ET segments, and that "This process may take up to 24 hours."

24 hours came and went; I looked at ET's website and quickly found:
http://www.ethiopianairlines.com/inf...rd-restriction

"third party payment with credit/debit card through the internet is possible for individuals other than the card holder. However, for security reasons, the holder of the credit card may be contacted by email to verify the credit card used at the airport or at nearby Ethiopian ticket office for in person verification."

I'm unsure that my flight coordinator's email address is anywhere on my reservation - I certainly don't see it. So I may have to get both of us on the phone with United and/or Ethiopian to either sort it out, or to turn it into an open-jaw itinerary sans the ET segments, and then separately book Kenya-Saudi Arabia somewhere else...