All:

I am enjoying the UA board after many years populating the US board. I have a question for the experts here since I am out of ideas.

A colleague and his wife bought 2 biz class tickets on UA (PIT-IAD-EZE) a while back for a trip next month. These were "50 day advance" fares (not sure of class letter - Z?).

He just found out he has to be at a meeting in DC (he is leading a government advisory panel) the same day he is ticketed to go IAD-EZE, and thus needs to get to DC the day before. This means he cannot get on his ticketed PIT-IAD flight (his wife can) and of course his original trip is invalid if he misses the originating flight. AND he needs to buy another PIT-IAD ticket. He called UA, and since the tickets are the 50-day advance variety, and he is changing it, the "change fee" is the fare difference to a full-fare business class ticket ($4k I think he said).

So I am wondering whether anyone has ideas on how to make this work out without a $4k change fee? I am surprised there isnt a more modest change fee for what is, while discounted, still an expensive ticket!