Hanalei

Hello,
It's been a couple years since I redeem an award; and it was with Continental. I will be booking my reservation using online award redemption in a few weeks. Because the tix are for mainland US to Hawaii, I want to make sure I get them as soon as they are available.

Let's say the outbound date has seats but return seats are not available yet. I would book the award tix online, picking the outbound flight I want and any available return date. Then wait for the return seats to be available and call in to change the return date? I can't remember if in the past I changed award tix online with Continental or not. Does UA charge a fee if agent helps me change my return date? TIA.

makhdoom

Have not changed an award itin before, but I have a current award booking so I logged in and and I see a 'change flights' button at the bottom of the page showing my current booking. I get the following when I click on 'change flights' button:
"Error
! united.com is unable to initiate your flight change request at this time. Please contact United Reservations at 1-800-UNITED1 to make changes to this Itinerary."

edcho

What seats are you waiting for? You could waitlist for seats -- (i.e. get standard award but waitlist for saver first).

As for changing flights online, i've never been able to change award tix online. Just unmodified rev tix.

flyer4512

You have to call to change the dates

A couple things though, the new flight has to be available for the same miles or you have to pay the miles difference. If you change from a United flight to a US Air flight there is a charge and there is a charge now for making change close to your travel date althought I am not sure of the exact days out

ToJ

there is a button to change online but as stated before, it just gets you to an error message with a request to call.
What really frustrated me when calling (in addition to being on hold for so long until the first agent picked up):
The agents don't seem to have access to (or are unable to find) the same availability for available rewards seats I can see online. It took a lot of coaching/convincing until the lady "saw" the same connection I had pulled up in my browser.
Shares and all they should put the customer first and try to help instead of acting like there are no seats.
I also learned that it is really important to ask "Did this get ticketed?" as twice now a change was made by an agent in the reservation but the ticket did not update...that then takes another call!

demsdots

Changed an award flight last week (two days before actual flight) because they don't allow you do it online. They do not charge a fee if you are Gold or above, I think. You can change and cancel awards all you want, I do it all the time. You will have to call United Reservations because the Mileage plus rep will not be able to help you with this.

One thing you could do is cancel the award and then book a new one when you see it available (make sure though that your status allows for cancellations at no charge). If you do this online, it would take a few days for your miles to redeposit, if you need those miles to make the other booking. If you cancel over the phone, the miles are deposited right away.

Hanalei

Thanks all for your replies. I have no status with UA. That is why I don't want to pay any cancellation fee for changing, etc. Picking "any" return date just to hold the outbound leg and then changing return leg was my original strategy. I guess I will find out when I call in the return change if they charge a booking fee. If I cancel over the phone or online I would have to pay redeposit fee.

Does anyone have any better strategy? Thanks.

gusd

You can find out here.

geeprice

As long as you are not looking to have a stopover UA has one way awards nowdays.

gusd

However, if you book it as 2 one-ways as opposed to a round trip, then if you end up having to change or cancel both, you will have to pay the fees twice.

geeprice

I don't know anything about that as a 1K

clintonuws

My experience... not having any status.

Change of route but no change in origin and destination... need to call to make it happen... but no charge.

I had HNL-IAH-EWR First reserved. HNL-EWR opened up a week later. I called, it was changed within 5 min and I even got $2.50 refunded.

I was waitlisted for this change but it did not automatically happen. I saw the availability and called in and it was done.

Hope you have the same experience.

CloveLeaf

Did you change the carrier?

clintonuws

Was on united, still on united.

Rules/fees are here:
http://www.united.com/web/en-us/cont...ticketing.aspx

Only fee for someone changing flights to same origin-destination is if change is <21 days from departure.

gusd

Of course you don't However, the OP has no status, so the fees apply.