Consolidated "Maximum Segments on UA Award Travel"
 

A few questions.....

1.) What is the MPM for LAX-JNB or LAX-CPT....also is it MPM+15% or 25% that is allowed now on a award?

2.) Once travel starts, I can still pay to make changes to flights and or routing from stopover on.... and then again (assuming last minute releasing) at point of turnaround for the flights home right?

2.) What is the most segments (flights/connections) that could be booked into a current post-merger UA Award? I know ANA is 12, and some past posts pre-merger said Continental didn't care.

I'm trying to go LAX-TLV-JNB-LAX with TLV being the stopover and JNB being turnaround

Assuming the MPM is high for LAX-JNB, I think this should be ok. The only problem is that availability pretty tough right now, and in order to get a "placeholder" ticket booked that I can then finesse as better seats and routes open up, I am really going to up the segments.

Right now I'm looking at something hokey like LAX-YUL-MUC-TLV//TLV-VIE-FRA-DOH-JNB-VFA//JNB-DOH-GVA-EWR-LAX
That actually looks exactly like 12 segments but I think the LAX-TLV mish-mosh needs another segment if I go DUS or ZRH...Don't ask ;)

Thanks for any input.

RCK

MPM doesn't matter anymore for award rules.

Yes, you can make changes while en route. gleff was once told of a 24 hours in advance rule but that may vary based on operating carrier and I have never experienced it even with some last minute (like <2 hours to departure) changes.

The absolute maximum number of segments on a ticket is 16, including any surface sectors. For a one-way award I've heard 8 or 9 is a limit. I'm not sure for a return trip.

This is not true IME. Do you have a reference for your claim?

As recently as 3 days ago I had an itinerary rejected by the system and after the agent and I went over the routing it turned out that it was over MPM+15%.

As far as MPMs that the OP asked about:

LAX-JNB - 12446 (TATL)
LAC-CPT - 12495 (TATL)

This should give enough room to play with although the proposed routing LAX-YUL-MUC-TLV-VIE-FRA-DOH-JNB is 16527 miles and well over the MPM+15%. I'd suggest trying to find a connection to SA from Israel or somewhere in Europe w/o going to DOH.

Just my personal experience. What routing did you try to book which was denied? There are plenty of routings which won't auto-price and I wouldn't be surprised if an agent didn't know why and blamed MPM, but AFAIK that's not actually part of the rules any more.

Todorovic, can you give me the MPM for LAX-VFA (Victoria Falls) since that is where I want to go on one side of the open jaw..... maybe that is more miles since it is 500+ from JNB.

Thanks

RCK

12886

The DOH segment is why it won't work. From USA-S SAFRICAthere are routes via N.TL, S ATL and even PACIFIC but not mid east.

So many false statements here. MPM, no DOH ....

sbm12 has so far offered the only correct advice.

There is no MPM

I have several awards currently booked that are way over MPM (if there is tell me how I am going from LAX to BKK via LHR and DOH)

The problem with defining the rules for award travel is that there dont seem to be any rules. Its more of whatever the system prices out - if it does - great - you may need to get creative mutlicity searches. If it doesnt and its anything of any complexity - good luck getting an agent to book it.

oh yeah - how is this for a direct route using a fairly simple multicity search:

YUL-DOH-DXB-ADD-LOS-JNB
business 60000 miles and $54.20

I also have a trip to JNB booked, and the return routes through DOH. Specifically, CPT-JNB-DOH-FRA-EWR. Was able to book online using multi-segment approach (I believe I searched CPT-DOH, and DOH-EWR).

LAX-LHR-DOH-BKK is 12002

LAX-BKK MPM+15% is 11393

definitely NOT way over the stated limit ...

YUL-DOH-DXB-ADD-LOS-JNB is 13517 miles

YUL-JNB MPM+15% is 11378

this one is over by a lot ...

CPT-JNB-DOH-FRA-EWR is 11373

CPT-EWR MPM+15% is 11873

this one's actually under.

Apparently, the MPM+15% is not enforced based on your examples although that was stated as the policy by UA Insider last year. Anyways, the above examples are not that outrageous although they certainly look like it. I guess going forward I'll have to be bolder when proposing routings to the reservations agents.

It was the old UA policy because the online system on .bomb was incapable of doing anything useful when it came to awards.

CO rules were always "looser".

Open Jaw must be in same country or zone?
 

So with some phantom availability showing up online, I had to do a online booking of LAX-IAD-FRA-MUC // JNB-DOH-IAH to lockin what the phone agents couldn't see on their end.

Then I called and spent 2 hours on the phone bickering with a girl who said that a itinerary can only have 8 segments.... so I get a supervisor and the fun begins..

I end up with the following:

LAX-IAD-FRA-MUC-TLV/Stopover/TLV-ATH-DOH-JNB//Destination-openJaw/PLZ-JNB-DOH-IAH-LAX

All C except for the ATH-DOH despite it showing available online. So 120K miles and $439.76

The stickler was I wanted to go to VFA (Victoria Falls) on the inbound from DOH via JNB. The supervisor said that if I did that, it was treated as a second stopover as he said that either it was in a different country (whihch I don't think was the issue), or the fact that Zimbabwe is considered Central Africa on the awards chart zone... thus, maybe the Jaw has to be in the same Zone.... though they are right next to each other.

The crappy part is that I can use ANA miles to get to VFA and then CPT on the way back... BUT, evidently, you can't start a ANA award from JNB, then transit back through JNB somewhere else (ie: CPT).

So now for the fun part, to sit back and watch what gets released, hoping to upgrade to First on Swiss and LH where possible.

THanks for all the help.

You're giving the TPAC mileage which is 11393. The TATL+ 15% is 16347 which is another 25% above the mileage that rankourabu has booked.

Unfortunately this example says nothing about whether MPM is still in play or not.

that sounds like a hell lot of taxes! I am at a loss what makes up all that money.

Also, it is possible to start from another zone - but again, if it doesnt book online - you ll have a hard time convincing an agent to do it.

Maximum Segments on UA Award and MPM LAX-JNB
 

My bad. Those taxes are for two tickets.