AC/UA Codeshare Question
 

For the folks out there who have more knowledege than I do on this.
I am booking a trip YYZ-MIA via Travelocity. My question is why does UA price out $22 cheaper than AC does even though it is AC metal that I would be flying on? Is there any disadvantage to booking the UA flights?

thanks

Since you are flying on the cheapest fare, I assume, you would not be considering elite certificate upgrading from either carrier. [You give no indication of your status in Aeroplan, or if you are even an Aeroplan member or a Mileage Plus member.] I cannot see any material differences, so go with the cheapest fare.

On a related matter, flying UA metal on AC "paper" next week, how can I tell which 735 seating config is being used for the specific flights? Specifically can I determine in advance if I'm in a regular seat or one of the "economy plus" seats?

SH--I'm Prestige, but was not planning on using any certificates. It was more just a curiosity question as to why the difference.

You could ask UA but this is not always reliable. Pull up a seat chart on itn.net or travelocity and see how many rows there are - non-E+ aircraft will have more rows, the UA site has aircraft diagrams showing each configuration.

AC and UA maintain separate inventories (by fare class) for the (same) codeshare flight. looks like AC has already sold it's cheapest seats, while UA still had availability in a cheaper fare class. This happens more often than one would imagine!

I have similar experience.
My company has an agreement with UA which offers a straignt 15% discount on all flights.

So on the same flight, UA fare will be 15%cheaper than AC, even when the flight is operated by AC.

The same thing happenned to me no later than yesterday trying to book a YYZ-FRA-MAD. The FRA-MAD part was sold out with LH for the cheap fare. My TA (yes, they can be helpful more often that we think http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif) got the cheap fare under the Spanair code share whereas it is LH metal. It was also cheaper to book the YYZ-FRA under LH whereas it is AC metal.