5khours

No of course not. They raised the cost of award trips so people will buy fewer RDMs until they lower the price of RDMs (unless someone recently made a change to the most basic principles of economics).

The don't have any room to vary the rates anymore. RDM sales are down because they have raised award redemption prices so a) they can't raise the rate without a further loss of RDM sales, and b) if they lower the rates, it will make management look stupid for devaluing miles earlier this year.

skyflytime

$0.021/mi RDM (lowest I've seen in this thread)
$0.12/mi PQM (pretty high)
$0.14/mi total

zdog2x

Two upcoming domestic flights

#1
+11,000 miles
0.024 RDM
0.09 PQM

#2
+ 15,000 miles
0.026 RDM
0.09 PQM

RNE

I have YTD Premier qualifying miles of 42,907 with paid bookings that will net me 71,637 PQMs by November. I have plenty of FPQMs to bump that up to 75,000.

Here's what United is offering.

Paid Domestic: 2/3000 miles. RDM=2.6¢, PQM=15¢
Paid International: 2/30,000 miles. RDM=2.1¢, PQM=10¢
Paid International: 2/30,000 miles. RDM=2.1¢, PQM=10¢

My analysis:
In theory, I might be interested in buying 2000-3000 miles to help me get to 75,000, thus United is demanding a lot for that amount of miles. Because I don't need 20,000-30,000 miles United is demanding a lot less.

Conclusion: United knows what it's doing.

IADFlyer123

If you are going to only look for 2k or 3k miles, i suggest a small award booking from DC to Boston or EWR. You should see cheaper options than 15c/ PQM. Same goes to some intra-europe awards (I bought some PQM at 8c/PQM for an IST-ATH award booking). Just a suggestion

Soccerdad1995

Don't forget to also reduce the cost by the value of the miles you get (including miles from the purchase price using your credit card, etc).

ps9a

I'm guessing there's no chance you hit $10k in spend? Otherwise, they seem like pretty friendly offers.

RNE

Agreed. Ten-cent PQMs are pretty friendly. If accelerator PQM purchases counted toward PQD I would probably make the required $10k spend. As it is, I doubt I'll make $7.5k for Platinum which I am on-track to make. PQD is waived for me up to that level.

RNE, reminding everyone that this year's requirements can be changed for 2015. And those changes probably won't be ones we like.

KenInEscazu

I have made two purchases of PAMs this year, both at $0.08/mile + RDM cost. Even at that, it's much more expensive than taking a good MR. If I were not doing an international move that is preventing me from having time/accessibility to MRs, I would not have purchased them at all.

While I have taken a few same day MRs in my life, I prefer to use them to actually go somewhere I will enjoy visiting for a couple of days. That drives the cost up, but it is somewhat offset by the savings compared to buying the accelerators, and I get to do something interesting.

IADFlyer123

^ to that my friend!

SGFlyer1

Hi - could use some advice/reality checking.

Family of 4, two already 1K and kids will be platinum by year-end (SIN-based with frequent tpacs). We are all getting offers of 7 cts for pqm plus 2.1 for rdm, which is awfully tempting. Right now all our tpac reservations have this rate, but of course for 40K miles which is way more than they need. Anyone have experience with how rates change halfway through the itin?

In my perfect world, the offer would switch to 20k miles at 9.1 all in, so for about $1800 each I could get the kids 1K. Obviously 12 more GPUs would be great and no doubt we would use them for a redemption value well above $3600, so that looks good to me. We have been pretty successful clearing GPUs. But in your experience do rates jump halfway through? I know they spike year-end, and when you're close to the next level. We are flying in two weeks so I'm trying to get a sense of patterns others have observed.

Thanks in advance for sharing your experiences.

KenInEscazu

IME, I have never seen, nor have I ever heard from other UA Premiers, of rates below $0.07/mile. Mine were at $0.08 for a minute earlier this year , and I bought some (as stated above) due to some restrictions making my 1K qualification questionable this year. They are now at $0.09 or higher on everything I have booked, including international, which are usually cheaper than domestic. Like you, I live outside the USA.

We are approaching mid-year, and they seldom (but not always) stay flat or get cheaper as the end of year approaches. Unless they change something this year, I'm pretty sure you are seeing the cheapest you'll be offered.

FTstudent

Dummy ticket routine?
Contains all the necessaries: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unite...ted-miles.html

jz52057

Is this a good deal? 17,500 miles for $368 with the following conditions:

Mileage purchases are nonrefundable and are subject to the MileagePlus® program rules. A federal excise tax is included in the Award Accelerator® price.

Miles purchased with Award Accelerator are redeemable miles only. To receive Premier® qualifying miles, you must add Premier AcceleratorSM to your purchase. Mileage purchases do not count toward Premier qualifying dollars or lifetime miles.

Premier Accelerator alone will not result in Premier status qualification. All qualification criteria still apply.
Miles will credit to your MileagePlus account within 24 hours of purchase.

RNE

That's 2.1028571428571¢/RDM, which is a good deal.