I am trying to understand the Star Alliance award chart. The chart say says it will cost me 90K miles to get from North America to Sri Lanka for a business class ticket. No asterisks!! Simple and clear!

But when I call United MP, they will only route be through the pacific IAD->LAX->ICN-> CMB = 48 hours of travel.

However, using Austrian Airlines, they can route me from IAD->VIE->CMB = 20 hours of travel. United wants 115K miles for this routing.

Has any one come across this issue? Is there anyway to get them to honor the 90K number?

Thanks in advance