Originally Posted by
maldivesbound
Ive found a UA business award for myself and a revenue ticket just under the allowable cap for my wife who is traveling for work. Is it safer to book the award ticket first then book the revenue ticket?
All else being equal, book the award ticket first.
Originally Posted by
maldivesbound
Does award space have any impact on ticket prices? I assume there is no real way to book the tickets simultaneously.
There is no way to book them simultaneously, no.
It is possible that award tickets can have an impact on fares, and vice versa. You can get an idea of how likely it is by looking at the flight inventory in expert mode. If you see P1 PN1 PZ1 IN1 I1, they're probably only selling one discount ticket, and it's likely (not certain) that the price would increase if you bought an award. (All four of those buckets likely refer to the same actual seat). The much more common inventory pattern is something like P9 PN9 PZ5 IN1 I1, in which case the award ticket (in the IN or I bucket) is unlikely to cause a problem for the paid ticket (in inventory bucket P), but the inverse isn't necessarily true: if UA sells one more P ticket, they may subtract one from each bucket and thus eliminate the award space.