Originally Posted by
JimInOhio
This brings up a question every frequent flyer has to answer for themselves: What award travel is important to me?
Several years ago I ran into some guys in a UC participating in one of those Mega DO junkets. In chatting with one, he told me to not spend any miles on a domestic ticket… you can always find cheap ones to buy if you dig just a little. Instead, he said save your miles for where they really count: INTL J. It’s been commented *A has more to offer in that regard (historically) than OW but everyone has to examine that against their own needs and wants.
While UA intl J award availability is not always there, you can often find seats on partners and that way experience airlines you would not normally take. That is one aspect of the Star Alliance I really appreciate.
Originally Posted by
Kacee
Yup. We used to make fun of SkyPesos. Now UA miles are the sad joke.
Agreed. DL was really bad with premium award inventory pre-pandemic but during the pandemic UA has been giving DL a run for their money. Hopefully we will see soon how things shake out post-pandemic. Either program can be useful if you are flexible in your travel dates. But if not, hard to find any decent redemptions in classes above Y. On UA from this month on availability is loosening up a bit.
Originally Posted by
zombietooth
Just don't expect to catch CPUs on UA for hub-to-hub routes. They are non-existent. Even using PlusPoints on transcon routes is impossible. I imagine that the same is true at AA, so likely no difference between them in that regard. Sometimes, I think those leaving other carriers believe that they will be treated better as a 1K on UA than as a ExecPlat or Diamond Medallion. This is not the case.
UA had cut their schedule back too far. Schedules for the fall look better, let's hope they stick.