Originally Posted by
3marmots
When I told rep that I would wait until United cancelled the flights so that my miles would automatically redeposited without a fee, the United Rep said that I would still have to pay the $125 per person redeposit fee. She then said that a cancellation for Coronavirus reasons was like an act of god, that the airline wasn't responsible, and that there was no way for me to avoid redeposit fee.
This is definitely the position that they're taking.
Originally Posted by
FlyingHighlander
I called them. That's exactly what they did. I chose to leave the miles sitting with them. My flight was 12 May 2020. The booking was made July 2019. What do you mean by "when tickets expire"? Just trying to understand what key dates I need to be aware of regarding reuse/redeposit.
Also, is there any scenario where if I did nothing for long enough I'd forfeit all the miles?
Thanks for your help
Tickets expire one year from issuance, so sometime in July 2020 for you. (You should be able to find the actual date on the receipt).
There is a lot that's still up in the air. This week is the first time that I've ever heard of this "we'll do a refund when tickets expire" stuff, so I can't say with any certainty
what will happen. I don't think we'll really know until some people's tickets start expiring. I also suspect that UA will follow what seems to be an industry trend and extend the validity of the tickets. That
probably also extends the amount of time before they'd do a refund / free redeposit.
What I would do in your situation is (a) look up the exact issue date; (b) make a note to call UA a couple of days before they expire to discuss options; (c) use these miles for any upcoming trip that you might end up taking; and (d) keep an eye open for further updates, as the situation evolves rapidly.
Note that there are multiple reports, pre-COVID-19, of being able to use a ticket for travel after the expiration date as long as the change is effected before the expiration date. I don't know how flexible they will be with that in the current environment, although for travel credits caused by UA schedule changes, where they've promised this refund anyway, I can't see why they'd argue.