I have a LAX-YYZ-FCO saver award ticket on AC for this July which I booked back in September. In the meantime there have been some schedule changes and an unfortunate upgauge from an A330 to the dreaded 77W HD on the YYZ-FCO leg. The original schedule had us arrive in FCO at 10:45 am. Now we are scheduled to arrive at 8:30 am which means we're going to have to pay for a hotel room for the night before so we have a room ready when we arrive. (I've checked with 3 hotels and early checkin doesn't seem to be a thing in Italy.)
The only current one-stop availability are standard awards on United metal, with a 10:30 FCO arrival if we route through ORD. Will UA open up saver availability on their metal for me because AC changed the arrival time to be 2:15 earlier?