First post here so please excuse any mistakes.

My family and I are traveling from Newark, NJ to Bozeman, MT on a combination of Continental and United flights next month for a ski trip. Outbound we are connecting in Denver. Coming back we connect in Chicago. We are using mileage and I am not an Elite member on Continental or United. I am trying to determine if there is a reasonable way to save on checked baggage fees. I already have a Chase CO Mastercard, so I've been told that the first checked bags for each of the four of us are free. This will take care of each of our large duffel bags which will primarily hold clothing. We will also each have an oversized bag with our skis and poles. We will also each have a bag containing our ski boots and first days clothing that we plan to carry aboard, along with a small bag containing books, mp3 players, etc.

Besides shelling out roughly $400 for the upgraded Presidents Club Chase MC which offers 2 free checked bags per person, is there any way to reduce or eliminate the checked bag fees? My understanding is that the first checked bag per person is $25 and the next one is $35 per person. These fees can add up quickly for a "free" flight.

Any advice from the experts would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Yes you are correct. However, remember that this is only on CO operated flights. So on your outbound flight, you will be checking in with CO at Newark and you should get the 1 checked bag free per passenger in the same PNR. On the outbound however, you are going to be checking in with United and I don't believe currently the CO Credit Cards provide baggage fee waivers on United operated flights (which your Bozeman to Chicago flight would be).

Not really an answer to your question but it might be cheaper and easier to ship the stuff UPS. At $400 you can ship an awful lot both ways and have less aggravation lugging the stuff around.

I do this with my golf clubs to Hawaii pretty often.

Also make sure to check the operator of EWR-DEN. That could be either CO or UA, and the OP's bag fee waiver works only on CO.

I'll post here as a thread search gave this as the best title

goalie-parents (no status on UA or CO) are flying SFO-IAH-PBI/PBI-IAH-SFO and being the good son and wanting to stay in the will , I upgraded them using my UA CR1's. 3 of the 4 legs (SFO-IAH, IAH-PBI & IAH-SFO) are mainline UA & CO but the first leg of their return (PBI-IAH) is a CO-ex Er4 with no first class so my question is-

If they are planning on checking bags*, will they be charged a checked bag fee? If they were on a mainline flight with f/c, they would not be charged if in F but in this case being a CO newbie , I don't know. Also, and even without checking bags, with the flight being an Er4, they will probably have to gate check anyway and I'm wondering how well it is handled at IAH. I know how UX handles it which can be both good and bad but wondering about IAH (tho if they do gate check, I might just tell them to gate check thru to SFO and be done with it [tho that might ruin any VDB opportunities but I digress]). And as an aside, will they be allowed to use any elite check-in and/or security lines at PBI? (my gut says no to this part but still curious)

*they know better but this is one of those trips where they will be bringing stuff home from their getaway place in PBI

I think they should, at check-in, show the onward boarding passes. Technically, since they're not flying in F, they may not have free bags (unless the award is ticketed in full-fare Y).

But they should be able to use the Elite check-in due to the onward boarding, and those agents are probably more likely to waive any checked-bag fees.

As for security, if the first leg BP doesn't have Elite Access, have them try to get in flashing the 2nd BP.

Thanks ^ and it's a paid ticket with a coach ticket for the first leg with an u/g on the second leg