GS Sponsor: PN or R if does not clear immediately?
 

If a GS sponsors someone with an RPU and it does not clear immediately (no PN), does the RPU continue to clear into PN if that bucket opens up later? Or does is fall back to requiring R?

I've gifted RPUs to friends which were waitlisted, then eventually cleared into PN when it became available.

T-24h: Checked into a TPAC flight, GPU hadn't cleared so I was put on the visible standby list. I'm 2nd on upgrade standby and no one has been upgraded (as far as the confirmed list says).
T-20h: Had a look on the list again, I'm now 4th down, still no one upgraded.
T-19h: Get an email from United saying my upgrade cleared. Looking back on the upgraded list, there's a total of 2 people upgraded, me being the second. On the standby list, I see people still waiting who were previously ranked above me.

Any explanations on what happened here? It was my understanding that even if R space opens up, the pecking order should still take the first people off the upgrade standby list.

The visible list is only used at the gate, until T-3 or 4 the invisible list can still be used. The time criteria is different between the two list -- those above you likely had the same status and fare class but had requested an upgrade after you did (so lower on the invisible list) but checked in before you did (so higher on the visible list).

Ahh, so they're just out of sync. That makes sense then. Thanks!

Probably a glut of 1Ks on W fares. In some instances, paying a little bit more for a V could really pay off.

Its also possible that people on the standby list showed above you, but since they werent cleared on to the flight, you got the upgrade. On both of my flights on Wednesday, I was #3 on the list. #1 and #2 were also on the standby list. When the standby list was cleared (both flights were oversold and checked in full), I moved up to #1. Everyone else moved up a few notches too. I am guessing these were upgrades from another flight, or someone standing by for the flight with a fare bucket that would put them right in to F.

RPUs worked as they were supposed to, mostly, for me this morning. I was still annoyed that they had never cleared in advance, but chalk that up to stingy R inventory + aggressive P fares.

Once we hit 24 hours, the message about the RPU having not cleared yet but carrying over when we checked-in was much more clear than it was last time I experienced it (the old infamous "waitlist expired" e-mail).

On the app, we were #1 and #2 the entire time up until about T-1, where we fell to #2 and #3. At the gate, we did not appear on the waitlist at all, oddly enough, but the GA paged us and said that there were 2 pax who hadn't checked in yet and had 6 minutes before she was giving away their seats.

I don't know what happened to the new-#1--maybe he/she was a NRSA; I didn't double-check the standby list--but as boarding began, 2 of the 3 prior upgrades for the flight disappeared, and we got the seats. Only 3 upgrades on an A320 on a leisure route seems "light" to me, but hey, I will take it every time over a long flight in Y.

An NRSA wouldnt have been above you on the list, but something I noticed recently is that revenue standbys from first class will show on the UG list if they havent been cleared in to a seat yet.

Another side note as well, I know NRSAs, if cleared in to F, do not show anymore on the standby list as being cleared, like they would if given a coach seat. They show on the UG list though.

Flying phx-iah-sat on Tuesday. This morning I went online to redeem a RPU for the flight. The short useless iah-sat cleared right away but of course the phx-iah is waitlisted. I called UA and asked if I am waitlisted with RPU priority and she said yes. I called because I didn't see the "rpu applied" tag next to the reservation, only a CPU. She said I have higher authority than a CPU. Is this true? HUCA?

By the way does UA use an offshore call center? I could barely understand this woman's English.

per UA
Note GS are on a different priority and clear into PN (and effective preempt all of the above)

Thanks. How long should I wait until I call United to yank my RPU if I see my phx-IAH leg doesn't clear? I don't want to waste an RPU on a IAH-SAT leg

Downgrading an upgraded segment requires your original fare class to be available, which become less likely the closer you get to departure. However day of travel it usually does become available but the remaining choice of economy seats can be limited.

Upgrades that don't clear at booking tend to sit and the next best chance is commonly fairly close to departure.

The best strategy for an AAA-BBB-CCC itin is to only request the upgrade instrument for the longer segment and only add the short segment when the longer clears.

Extending RPU into Next Year
 

Nobody has any experience with this?

UA traditionally will not extend RPUs. Whether you might get a one-time exception is YMMV, but I personally would not expect it.