rasheed

I don't use UR for booking travel, but I do encourage anyone considering using United for their points redemption do so as quickly as possible if not already mentioned earlier. While corporate customers like Chase might force Expedia to make a United deal, it is very possible that United will not be available on the portal. Expedia could also subcontract with another OTA (seems most feasible such as Priceline/booking.com or another) for United access, but again, unclear on that aspect. Yes, I know Chase and United have a relationship, but that is not too relevant at the moment for the outsourced travel portal (aside from the possibility that Chase might switch vendors again to manage the UR portal). I also would not depend on the 9/30 stated deadline.

One of the big advantages for using Expedia I've noticed is they have extensive availability of opaque and private fares for many hotels because of all of their umbrella contracts (hotels.com/hotwire) even with no points accrual on the third-party bookings for most chains. They just re-signed a deal with Marriott that includes opaque inventory. Although, this just means the margin on the room rate listed via Expedia might be much higher than what Chase/Expedia actually pay for the room. However, Expedia is not getting much love on the airfare distribution side as seen by the United dispute.

https://skift.com/2019/05/02/expedia...-to-the-table/

breakthrough37

I noticed that some flights are listed as Economy in the Portal Booking and in another location of the Booking the flight is listed as Basic Economy. Just make sure the right class of service is being purchased.

edgewood49

Thats a great point!

Weekend Away

I'm back from my trip and thought I'd share my experience with my schedule change and resulting headaches.

I booked about 2 months in advance, so not really early at all. It was a simple one-stop iten, JFK-PVG-KUL-PVG-JFK. I've had much more complex and lengthy itens with MU and booked through Chase, had a 8 leg iten two years ago with MU booked through Chase, and more like 8 months booked in the future. I guess I got lucky that time.

My first calls with Chase were pretty straight forward. They had no idea there was a schedule change. I just happened to check the MU site and saw the change. The options from Chase were 1) rebook with MU on the day before, later the same day, or the day after, 2) cancel for a full refund, 3) rebook onto a different airline and pay the fare difference. Note, they require you to give them the FULL Credit Card number on each call, which seems extremely excessive, and very intrusive, especially over the phone, and given how no one can seem to keep our credit cards safe these days, but I digress.

I tried HUCA 5/6 times to get onto KLM flights through AMS that would've left 2 hours early and gotten me into JFK about the same time. MU refused, I had to stick on their flights. I then requested, to no avail, to get routed on the DL flight from PVG to ATL and then JFK, with the plan of ditching the final leg as ATL was my final destination. I eventually capitulated to the idea that I was going home a day late or a day early. I chose a day late.

This is where things got screwed up. I gave Chase my new flights that I wanted. I had to be escalated to a manager to get this to happen. The first call ended with the agent saying that I would receive a confirmation email within 24 hours for the new flights. That came and went and nothing. She gave me a direct line back to the super desk, which left me on hold for 45+ min each time I called before someone answered. I had a case number, which I provided to the next two calls, but that didn't help as I had to start all over again each time.....

At the conclusion of each call, I would be told that I would get a confirmation email within 24 hours. At the end of the third call, the agent told me that they needed to send this to the ticketing department. This was a new piece of information.

At 8pm that night, I received a random call from Arizona. They claim to be from the Chase Ticketing Department and want me to give them my credit card number before they'll discuss the reservation with me, even though they called me... I hung up of course. I called the next morning, the regular line, not that sh***y super line that doesn't really work. I asked them for confirmation of the prior night's call, it was legit, even had notes about me hanging up on them. I liked that note. Anyway, I was told by this agent that she would transfer my request to the ticketing department again. I received another call from them, I answered, and provided the information. Was told on this call that I would get a confirmation email for my new flights within 24 hours.

This has taken about 10 days so far, and I've gotten no where with Chase by this point. My reservation on MU's website still shows the incompatible flights. Though I finally see movement now. I received the promised email from Chase with my new flights. YAY!

But, heck no. This story aint over yet. We got like 10 more calls to Chase before we're good and I can actually go to the airport feeling good about getting home...

I check the MU site again to confirm, using the ticket number I had to call in for to begin with. Now my reservation is showing ONLY outbound flights. The return flights are gone. There's space for them, showing the cities pairs, but no flight numbers, dates, etc. So I call again. The poor agent who answered, bless his little heart, told me I was okay. I had new flights. Poor fool didn't know what to do. I asked him to confirm with the airline. He did, now MU's not answering. This call's been about 2 hours in length. We give up. I call again the next day. Start all over. They see that Chase never got some code from MU that grants them the ability to do free schedule changes. After being on hold for forever with agent, I tell her to call me back when it's done because I'm over being on hold and want to eat; I've already left the office, fought traffic, ordered food, and it's at the table at this point.

She calls me, and says good new. It's confirmed you'll get your new email within 24 hours.

HA. Still wasn't done correctly. I call again 2 days later. I make them call MU, get the code, then call the ticketing department, walking all of them through how to do this, and told them I wanted my new flights. Everything seems good. I check the MU site again, this time the status of my ticket is "exchanged" instead of valid/open. I call Chase again. I ask for the ticket number for my reservation. I get the same one they gave me at the start. I explained that one doesn't work, and to look up my reservation with airline using that. She did, saw the problem. She had to call the ticketing department to get the new ticket number as that was never linked to my reservation... I get it, we're good, I have flights, the ticket is open and ready for use. However, now I can't select seats and neither can Chase...

At the end of the day, I was able to resolve everything, but only because of my persistence. Chase/Expedia's agents really aren't equipped to do much other than book new tickets, that's about it. If they don't drill down and make them confirm with the airline, they won't and you'll be screwed.

Thankfully, most MU customers don't select seats, so if you get to the airport right when the counter opens, you can get good seats still. What's more, my FFN somehow wasn't attached to my return flights, even though it was on the outbound.

Moral of the story, don't rely on others. Do the leg work yourself and make sure all the T's are crossed and I's dotted.

I hope this doesn't happen to others, but it will, and I hope this helps.

Thanks!

edgewood49

This is the very reason since Expedia I simply transfer to the airline or hotel I pan to book using my account!! Makes it so much easier.

Weekend Away

This only works if the point redemption is cheaper than booking with points. My flight, JFK-KUL on MU was $490 round trip. I can't transfer the points to MU or DL, so it would've needed to have been AF/KL or KE, and their redemption rate on this route was way more 33K points. Plus, I needed a revenue ticket for the DL MQM's.

mia

You can redeem Virgin Atlantic miles for flights operated by Delta -and- the number of miles may be less than Delta requires for the same flight.

edgewood49

Agreed I understand the previous post that their redemption didn't work, however I am sure that many of us that travel way too much have more than one account across the travel spectrum and many of us have a "lifetime status" and also use an alternative account as I did when I reached my airline mm account. In any event my feeling will be transfer when your booking a major trip.

Weekend Away

And pay hundreds in fees, fees that would've been as much as my cash flight. Not to mention I wasn't flying Delta, I was flying China Eastern, and I can't redeem VS miles for MU flights.

Not everyone is lifetime anything, especially those of us who are young and just starting our careers. I have multiple accounts, across airlines and hotels, but not enough of those miles to do much of anything with. Additionally, find me a NA to SEA flight for as little as 33K points round trip and I'll hush. But I highly doubt you'll find a one way for that cheap, let alone a round trip...

edgewood49

I was not "talking down" and if offended you sorry, but there are a lot of us out there that travel a lot for business. Suggestion continue to use the portal and I will use my method

mia

This may well be true on your specific route, but It is not true on all routes. Someone may find it useful to be reminded that VS miles work on DL flights, even if it isn't applicable to your circumstance.

monitor

That still does not help Weekend Away's MQM problem.

g289t

So if I follow you correctly, you simply chose new flights and they would be booked (if there weren't so many issues) regardless of price?

I have a potential similar situation to yours; that is why I'm asking.

edgewood49

I have to modify my previous posts regarding the issues in booking with Chase Rewards strangely I am now seeing more available inventory for several of the places we are planning on visiting, point requirements seem to have risen but then that's nothing new these days. While I am still transferring some to airlines using others to book hotels especially where majors are not present such as Italian coastlines.

Travel safe all

Weekend Away

Correct. I was booked on MU9862 on Monday morning, Sunday night. Shanghai Airlines stopped flying the Monday morning flight. The options given to me were A) the Monday afternoon flight, with a long overnight layover in Shanghai, and a new Tuesday afternoon flight. B) Leave Sunday, any combination of FM/MU flights. C) Leave Tuesday, and combination of FM/MU flights. I wanted the KL flights via AMS, but they refused to route me on another airline, even the DL codeshare flight to ATL.

So I capitulated and chose Tuesday return flights. Originally, when I booked, the MU9862-MU587 was twice the price the of the MU9862-MU297. But because of the schedule change, I was able to get the MU9862-MU587 combination for no additional charge. This allowed me to eliminate a long layover (12+ hours) in PVG and a long over night at JFK (connection to a separate ticket DL flight to ATL). Downside, I came home Tuesday night instead of Tuesday morning. C'est la vie.

Generally speaking, schedule changes are fantastic if you weren't able to originally book the flights you wanted because of price. Schedule changes allow you, if you don't violate MCT or Routing Rules, to any other flights you want, assuming you stick with their flights.