Thanks guys. It seems like a decent mileage booking if it wasn't for the nearly $200 in fees I'm still paying vs. just shelling out an extra $420 to buy the ticket and then earn miles. I do occasionally fly united, just not every year, but i mean I just signed up for the united business card for the fat 150k mileage SUB, so i do value united miles. and with 3 kids they will defn get used eventually so i don't want to just toss them away. I'm buying 2 tickets bc it's me and my wife so it saves me $840 to not pay cash, but I do see it probably could be worth waiting and booking the flight thru my Chase UR portal and earn 5x there vs using my united miles here. just tossing it around in my head so thanks for offering your takes