Question has been asked before but no-one then seemed to know.

UA has stated award redemptions are up sharply last Q. (30-40% IIRC?) No suprise there.

So there must be some real MONEY changing hands lately as the usual "balance" of intra-accounting among partners is now way out of skew. (And this is NOT the time needs to see additional cash outflow of course.)

When we "spend" UA miles and "buy" a First Class award with those miles on LH, or TG, or RG or NZ, does anyone know what that actually "costs" UA in cash?

Is it a fixed % of the published fare class? Or based on distance flown or some other computation?