TravelManKen. Can you provide more info regarding your experience concerning no longer flying same day standby (same city pairs) on UA Shuttle? I've done 100+ Shuttle flights annually for each of the last five years and, except as noted below, I've never had a problem with same day standby on any discounted UA Shuttle ticket that had "SX" in the fare basis code (and did so as recently as February 13). I've never had to buy up to a higher fare.

This is not true with Southwest. All discounted non-refundable Southwest fares require buy up if you fly standby, as stated in their rules, excerpted as follows:

Southwest Airlines Fares (BW7NR)
Roundtrip Fare Mon-Fri 7PM-5:59AM, Sat & Sun:
Roundtrip travel required. Seats are limited. Seven day advance purchase.
Ticket must be purchased within one day of reservation. One night stayover required. Nonrefundable. Any change to this reservation (flights, dates, cities, and/or names of passengers) may result in a fare increase. Ticketless Travel Online may only be purchased with a credit card. Funds from a previously unused reservation on Southwest Airlines or any other form of Southwest Airlines travel credit (e.g., travel voucher, gift certificate, discount coupon) may not be used as forms of payment for Ticketless Travel Online. Nonrefundable tickets may be used as credit toward the purchase of other tickets. This credit may not be used for Ticketless Travel Online purchases. Ticketless Travel funds from previously unused reservations on Southwest Airlines are valid for 12 months from the original purchase date and may not be extended. Standby travel requires an upgrade to the full unrestricted fare.

* * * * * * *

The old exception for UA Shuttle: When "Shuttle by United" first started (1994), they copied the Southwest rule and same day standby did require buy-up to "YSHUTLE" fare. UA discontinued that practice and began permitting same day standby without additional charge on Shuttle discount fares within about six months of starting the UA Shuttle service.

After reading your post this morning, I called the 1K desk and asked if there had been a change in policy. The agent assured me not: same day standby is permitted without additional charge on UA Shuttle.

I also checked the fare rules on Travelocity for various Shuttle fare basis codes. Many of those rules are silent as to standby, but several explicitly permit standby in the "misc" section. The following is excerpted from the rules for a WOE14SX1 fare between LAX-SMF-LAX (upper case used because that's the way it appears on their site):

"NOTE - ANY SERVICE CHARGES FOR SAME DAY STANDBY WILL BE WAIVED/ / THE TKTG AFTER RES REQ WILL NOT APPL WHEN FARES ARE COMB W/ OTHER FARES TO CONST THRU INTL TRANS T/ F PTS OUTSIDE THE US/ CA/ MX/ BM/ BS/ WEST INDIES PROVIDED AT LEAST ONE INTERNATIONAL SEGMENT OUTSIDE OF THIS AREA IS VIA UA. STANDBY PERMITTED FOR SAME DATE AS ORIGINALLY TKTD PROVIDED ANY FLT/ TIME SPECIFIC PROVISIONS ARE MET."

TravelManKen - you were right to challenge the UA Shuttle agent who wanted the buy up for same day standby. She/he was wrong.

[Edited for typos and coding.]

[This message has been edited by Nevada1K (edited 02-23-2001).]