Nov 1, 2013, 4:08 am
Last edit by: aacharya
Moderator Note: Please keep the wiki post limited to just the facts.
New UA Award/Upgrade Chart (vs. Current Chart)
Changes took effect for travel booked starting February 3, 2014. See UA Insider's post linked here for more info about the date change. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/22263212-post2366.html
Awards with *A partners now cost more than similar awards flown only on UA metal.
See below for the round-trip increases on partner metal :
Changes to upgrade policy for intra-Asia and northern South America flights
Questions and Answers
Q: If I book an award in January 2014 and then make changes in February or beyond (in routing, airline, origin, destination, etc), will it be repriced according to new mileage requirements, or will I keep the old pricing on that ticket?
Additional details on changing tickets booked prior to 2/3/14 per UA Insider:
Full details are in post #2588 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/22283437-post2588.html
Q: Do these rates apply for tickets purchased after Feb 3 or for travel after Feb 3? That is,if one purchases a ticket now, to fly on Mar 15, will that be new or old pricing?
Q: How will award pricing apply to mixed-carrier Saver Awards?
(reverted to J.Edward's rev)
New UA Award/Upgrade Chart (vs. Current Chart)
Changes took effect for travel booked starting February 3, 2014. See UA Insider's post linked here for more info about the date change. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/22263212-post2366.html
Awards with *A partners now cost more than similar awards flown only on UA metal.
- F awards on partners went up 40-80%
- J awards on partners went up 20-40%
- F and J awards on UA metal (or mixed carriers where UA metal is in premium cabin followed by partner segment in lower class) as well some Y awards increased by 5-20% (US to Europe in F up 19%, US to Middle East in F up 20% for example)
See below for the round-trip increases on partner metal :
US ✈ Southern South America: +10,000 J, +5,000 F
US ✈ Europe: +40,000 J, +85,000 F
US ✈ Northern/Central/Southern Africa: +40,000 J, +110,000 F
US ✈ Middle East: +5,000 Y, +40,000 J, +130,000 F
US ✈ Central Asia/India: +5,000 Y, +40,000 J, +120,000 F
US ✈ South Asia: +15,000 Y, +40,000 J, +120,000 F
US ✈ North Asia: +5,000 Y, +40,000 J, +100,000 F
US ✈ Japan: +5,000 Y, +30,000 J, +85,000 F
US ✈ Oceania: +30,000 J, +70,000 F
US ✈ Australia/New Zealand: +25,000 J, +100,000 F
RTW: +20,000 Y, +90,000 J, +100,000 F
US ✈ Europe: +40,000 J, +85,000 F
US ✈ Northern/Central/Southern Africa: +40,000 J, +110,000 F
US ✈ Middle East: +5,000 Y, +40,000 J, +130,000 F
US ✈ Central Asia/India: +5,000 Y, +40,000 J, +120,000 F
US ✈ South Asia: +15,000 Y, +40,000 J, +120,000 F
US ✈ North Asia: +5,000 Y, +40,000 J, +100,000 F
US ✈ Japan: +5,000 Y, +30,000 J, +85,000 F
US ✈ Oceania: +30,000 J, +70,000 F
US ✈ Australia/New Zealand: +25,000 J, +100,000 F
RTW: +20,000 Y, +90,000 J, +100,000 F
Changes to upgrade policy for intra-Asia and northern South America flights
- Complimentary Premier Upgrades and instant upgrades are not applicable
- Regional Premier Upgrades (for any fare class) and Global Premier Upgrades (for flights booked in fare class Z, P, S, T, L, K, G or N) can no longer be requested on or after November 1, 2013
- There is no co-pay exemption for MileagePlus Upgrade Awards requested on or after November 1, 2013
- The above changes do not apply to Copa-operated flights.
Questions and Answers
Q: If I book an award in January 2014 and then make changes in February or beyond (in routing, airline, origin, destination, etc), will it be repriced according to new mileage requirements, or will I keep the old pricing on that ticket?
Our existing change process will apply. Changes to awards that require a change in date do not result in a change to the award price. Any other change will require an add/collect in miles and fees for changes or cancellations will still apply as per our existing policies.
Changes that will not trigger a re-price for itineraries ticketed before February 3, 2014 include:
- Date/time (cabin, region, and award type can't change)
- Carrier on one or more segments (cabin, region, and award type can’t change)
- Origin/Destination within the same regions (carrier and cabin can’t change)
Q: Do these rates apply for tickets purchased after Feb 3 or for travel after Feb 3? That is,if one purchases a ticket now, to fly on Mar 15, will that be new or old pricing?
Updated handling for mixed UA-Partner United/partner award itineraries: As we shared with the initial announcement, the Star Alliance/Partner partner award pricing will apply to Business or First awards for itineraries that include at least one flight segment operated by a MileagePlus partner carrier in Business or First.
However, as a customer benefit we have made an exception for most itineraries which require connecting onto a MileagePlus/Star partner in First or Business for a short distance. Specifically, if a United/Copa award itinerary contains a connecting segment on a MileagePlus/Star partner that is wholly within one MileagePlus award region, then the United award price will apply.
However, as a customer benefit we have made an exception for most itineraries which require connecting onto a MileagePlus/Star partner in First or Business for a short distance. Specifically, if a United/Copa award itinerary contains a connecting segment on a MileagePlus/Star partner that is wholly within one MileagePlus award region, then the United award price will apply.
- For example: IAD-FRA in United BusinessFirst connecting to FRA-FCO in Lufthansa Business, will be priced at the United mileage award amount.
- Note that this exception will not apply to a few specific regions and routings, such as intra-Africa connecting segments and certain fifth-freedom routes (e.g. BKK-KUL operated by Lufthansa)
Changes to MileagePlus Award and Upgrade Policies - Eff. 3-Feb-2014
Nov 1, 2013, 12:00 pm
#481
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posts: 1,277
Yeah. That's the biggest problem with this for me. While I like flying partners, my United GF flight was just fine returning from my honeymoon... but without partners, there was no getting to JTR or JMK, and likely no way to return from GVA due to availability (went GVA-FRA on LH before FRA-SFO on UA). It severely limits available options.
Nov 1, 2013, 12:00 pm
#482
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: DEN
Programs: UA Gold-MM, AA Gold-MM, F9-Silver, Hyatt Something, Marriott Gold, IHG Plat, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 6,392
the life of upgrades for me is basically over and that is bound to be a hard adjustment. i guess the plan from here on out will be to fly TCON twice a year and pay $1000 r/t for F, rather than 10x a year on N/G/K/L fares and get upgraded 70% of the time. maybe now i'll actually plan my trips better and stay out on the east coast for a week, enjoy real time with my family, instead of spending more time traveling than i do at my destination. i'll get to know my own neighborhood better, and take some fun road trips around the western USA. we'll take a big international vacation every couple of years, and either do it when C is on sale (thanksgiving/christmas) or just fly in Y and focus on the destination. the more i think about it, the more i think i should call $mi/J and thank him for liberating me from the hamster wheel so efficiently in the last 18 months.
Nov 1, 2013, 12:00 pm
#483
Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: Denver, CO
Programs: UA 1K 2.3MM, Hyatt Gold, Hertz PC, Hilton Gold, Marriott Lifetime Platinum
Posts: 371
Having just blown 270,000 miles for 2 F tickets to Europe and cancelling the rest of my paid C in Business to Europe (2) and India (1) on United for the balance of the year I shall be returning after 22 years to BA, ANA and Lufthansa for my travel needs. Domestic will probably remain UA but they lost me for International!!
Nov 1, 2013, 12:01 pm
#484
Join Date: Nov 2011
Posts: 6,385
AC has already devalued for next year. And with this UA deval AP still has better award chart levels for MOST regions. Not saying that they're won't be a change in 2015, but atm AP will soon be better than UA.
Nov 1, 2013, 12:03 pm
#485
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2013
Programs: DL PM, MR Titanium/LTP, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 10,130
I think they're putting some of their corporate contracts at jeopardy with this move as well. I work for a consulting firm and we're supposed to use DL or UA (thankfully AA prices the same and I know how to get around the system and just book AA).
Getting to keep all the miles we earn and use them for our personal travel is one of the big perks of traveling M-Th every week and they know that and use it as a selling point when recruiting. I anticipate that there will be significant complaints going to our own corporate travel department over this move by UA and there may be a push for them to approach AA.
Getting to keep all the miles we earn and use them for our personal travel is one of the big perks of traveling M-Th every week and they know that and use it as a selling point when recruiting. I anticipate that there will be significant complaints going to our own corporate travel department over this move by UA and there may be a push for them to approach AA.
Nov 1, 2013, 12:03 pm
#486
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: LAX
Posts: 10,906
I am not sure what changed - perhaps some *A agreement got revised and all those freloading in F started costing UA real money or perhaps other airlines followed SQ and asked for significant $ for each award seat.
Since UA printed so many miles for CC they were on the hook to either block partner awards like SQ and old starnet or increase mileage and decrease demand. The latter makes more sense.
It is foolish to think this is UA-specific. SkyTeam doesn't even have F (and carriers there hit you with crazy charts and fees) and OW has major partner copays.
Nov 1, 2013, 12:04 pm
#487
Suspended
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: BOS
Posts: 15,027
If you hold a Chase card, give them a call. I called up the Sapphire Preferred team, voiced my concern over the increase cost of miles, and I was given 5,000 courtesy points for my trouble. I spit out all of the numbers (like the 63% increase to fly non-UA J to Europe) and that feedback is going to be passed on to United.
Are you a long-term Chase Sapphire holder?
Nov 1, 2013, 12:04 pm
#488
Join Date: Oct 2012
Location: SAN
Posts: 487
I bet Barclays has the most to gain from this, the gap between Chase and all others has significantly gotten smaller. They should expect to see much more applications for the Arrival card..
Nov 1, 2013, 12:05 pm
#489
Original Member, Ambassador: External Miles and Points Resources
Join Date: May 1998
Location: Digital Nomad Wandering the Earth - Currently in LIMA, PERU
Posts: 58,586
Is anyone else racing to book award flights to burn off the last of your miles before the award space is all used up by people racing to book award flights to burn off the last of your miles before the award space is all used up? 
Nov 1, 2013, 12:06 pm
#490
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: DEN
Programs: UA Gold-MM, AA Gold-MM, F9-Silver, Hyatt Something, Marriott Gold, IHG Plat, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 6,392
On the plus side -- I guess -- is that it seems a revenue-based reward chart will not be happening anytime soon. If that was implemented, C/F awards would have been impossible. Now they're just expensive. I guess that's something.....
Some have posted that the space is either already gone or UA is blocking....
Some have posted that the space is either already gone or UA is blocking....
Last edited by iluv2fly; Nov 1, 2013 at 7:56 pm Reason: merge
Nov 1, 2013, 12:07 pm
#491
Suspended
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: HKG
Programs: DL FO, UA, AA, AsiaMiles, SPG, HHonors
Posts: 7,982
I normally post on the DL forum but someone over there linked this thread. Feeling sorry for UA FFers. This devaluation is even bigger than anything DL has done recently and I thought those were bad enough. This is what happens when the airlines are allowed to merge into bigger and bigger bullies and get down to 3.5 (US being the .5, c'mon they suck) and soon just 3. The consumer gets screwed big time. The grass isn't any greener anywhere else.
Nov 1, 2013, 12:08 pm
#492
Original Member, Ambassador: External Miles and Points Resources
Join Date: May 1998
Location: Digital Nomad Wandering the Earth - Currently in LIMA, PERU
Posts: 58,586
Nov 1, 2013, 12:10 pm
#493
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: London
Programs: UA GS
Posts: 2,438
You can still use EF to search for awards, and the United.com search engine is pretty good for this too.
Nov 1, 2013, 12:11 pm
#494
Join Date: Aug 2010
Programs: AA EXP
Posts: 599
I don't understand these posts citing the bogeyman blogger and followers that "inevitably lead UA to do this". I think this vastly overestimates the impact of this crowd on the bottom line, plus it underestimates the scale and intention of these changes to the award chart.
There were many alternative options to shake off this particular problem if that was the impetus, but the sweeping changes announced today go way beyond that. I'm inclined to apply Occam's razor here and agree with the earlier posts citing the 10K and the obvious accounting benefits of drastic increases in redemption prices. We have an executive team looking for short term wins in an area of the business typically tied to long term loyalty. We'll see how that goes over the next year or two...
There were many alternative options to shake off this particular problem if that was the impetus, but the sweeping changes announced today go way beyond that. I'm inclined to apply Occam's razor here and agree with the earlier posts citing the 10K and the obvious accounting benefits of drastic increases in redemption prices. We have an executive team looking for short term wins in an area of the business typically tied to long term loyalty. We'll see how that goes over the next year or two...
Nov 1, 2013, 12:11 pm
#495
Join Date: Aug 2010
Location: Bay Area, CA
Programs: AA Plat, UA Gold, AS MVP Gold, HH Diamond, SPG Gold, Club Carlson Gold, US
Posts: 956
If you hold a Chase card, give them a call. I called up the Sapphire Preferred team, voiced my concern over the increase cost of miles, and I was given 5,000 courtesy points for my trouble. I spit out all of the numbers (like the 63% increase to fly non-UA J to Europe) and that feedback is going to be passed on to United.