Originally Posted by Dr Jabadski

I’ve only done UA pet fee for reservations which I plan to fly (vice cancelling). My UA profile has several credit cards, I use one (UA Explorer, Sapphire) to pay for the ticket and after ticketing use another (AmEx Plat, AmEx Hilton Aspire) for 2 pet fees ($125 each direction). Airline fee credits usually post 2-3 days after the pet fees post. Sometime thereafter I cancel the pet fee which gets credited back to the card used to pay for the pet fee. AmEx has never clawed back the airline fee credit (although I would not be surprised if they did).

Your profile arshi007 states “UA Platinum”. Presumably you fly a bit on UA, if you’re going to do the pet fee thing, you should do it for a reservation you intend to fly. If you like exit row seats, be aware that once refunded by UA the pet fee may remain on your reservation in some fashion thus precluding you from choosing exit row seats on-line. For that reason, I usually ask for exit row seats during the same conversation in which I cancel the pet fee, UA phone reps have been happy to assist.