One-Way vs Roundtrip (MileagePlus Award Travel)
 

Given that United allows one-way redemption... is there any advantage to piece a journey together as 2 one-ways instead of a round trip?

With a round-trip, you are allowed a stopover.

No stopovers on one-ways.

Change/cancel fees are per ticket. Cancelling two one-way tickets is twice as expensive as cancelling a round-trip ticket.

+1. Booking a RT from the US to SE Asia and I can have a stopover in Europe.

Thanks

All good reasons to book a RT. However, I'll give you a good reason for booking two OWs: If you can't get a RT booked far in advance, often you can get one OW and wait for the other OW award availability to open up in the future.

This is a bit risky, but I was able to to this for an ORD-LHR trip two summers ago (early July) with only a few months advance planning. To make it a little more un-nerving, I actually booked the return before the outbound. But sure enough, after checking every day, a decent outbound opened up after a couple of weeks.

If I had waited for both legs to open up at the same time, it probably would not have happened and I would have had to buy a ticket at high rates close to my departure.

As a 1K (and now PP), with no change/redeposit fees, I think the BKM (best known method) is to book two one way's (unless you need a stopover).

Often I'll change the outbound or the return (but do not want to change both). With two one way's, I can change one without impacting the other.

Corollary to this: If you are booking 331(?) days out (as early as the system allows), you can book your outbound (one way) the day you are allowed to book. Then book the return (one way) separately when the system allows you to.

So does this mean that stopover is allowed if your originating region/country is different than your destination region?

Learn something new every time I explore this board.

So, in my opinion, stop-over allowance is a big plus for booking RT. The cancellation charge will or will not be a matter based on your MP level.

On the other side, I prefer to book one way to avoid messing up the entire itineray when you just need to make change to one leg.

After all, it's really about how you prioritize all the factors.

So with a stopover, is there a limit to the amount of time you can be...stopped over? Like, can I fly from the US to SE Asia, with a stopover in Europe that lasts a week?

You can book two one ways and then combine them getting the best of both worlds. UA did it without any charge for me recently (not sure if being Gold helped).

I just did this. Outbound looked good but the return was standard only. Booked the outbound and a few days later the return as saver came available.

I also booked another trip revenue outbound (with R space) and saver global first for the return. The added bonus here is I can adjust the return flight at no charge assuming there is saver space.

I am trying to book a trip for Thanksgiving. No Saver F awards are available on the days I was to travel. So, I booked two O/W Standard F awards.

Later, if a Saver routing becomes available, I can rebook it without impacting the other. This is especially help if the routing changes.

Sure can. I just ticketed a flight yesterday that goes LAX-LHR (stop), LHR-HKT (dest), HKT-LAX. I'm at the stop 3.5 days and dest for 5 days.

On line?

Or do you have to call?