Xyzzy

As the previous pster stated, if your ticket is reissued for some reason it can live on for a year from the reissue date. Depending on what kind of further change you are attempting to make an agent may or may not notice and approve.

xmlsoa

Ok. Got that. Wish I'd known this earlier (or not confused it with travel dates).

So even if it was ORIGINAL booking, someone cannot book in ADVANCE i.e. EARLIER, any AWARD tickets that have RETURN/ COMPLETION DATEs that go past YEAR + 1?

Please share some tips/ thoughts on how to do it Mathew?
Can I still try this if I had put my RETURN on HOLD?
(after searching for flight lengths)

This was my original booking:

Booked a week before flight in
Nov '13:
Nov '13: BOM > SIN > NRT > SJC
Original return:
Feb ' 14:IAD > IST > BOM

In January/Feb I ended up heading to Latin America so I asked United to hold it (as I had no planned return dates) and every CHANGE costs $.

Thoughts/ Suggestions?

I'd prefer to now do a
SFO/ SJC > BOM for November '14
preferably
via ASIA (I might take a side trip to Bali or Thailand) or
or AFRICA (South Africa/ Cape Town/ Johannesburg).
If possible, with a 1/2 week stopover.

Hmm.. Suggestions please? Based on the above outlined RETURN I am trying to make happen?

MatthewLAX

I believe this is going to be a very difficult change at the old rate, because even though you are keeping regions the same, you are reversing the order and your new trip will likely end after the year.

I would call the RTW desk or call after 10pm PT to get HNL and be very specific in what you are trying to accomplish. Mention you booked this under the old chart and are not changing regions, so you would like the original rate charged. You will be at the mercy of the agents.


But this may give you some hope -- many agents are helpful and will not be so strict in even enforcing routing rules. I just changed a HND-FRA-YYZ-YUL with two segments in LH F to KIX-BKK-ICN-LAX in TG/OZ F. Hated to give up LH F, but wanted to fly two A380s in F and even though flying from Japan to the USA via South Asia and North Asia is a theoretical no-go, the kind agent made it work.

Bottom line, you just have to find an accommodating agent.

invisible

Here is the story - I made award reservation in Jan this year before number of miles for awards went up.

It is TBS-SIN round trip flight. Original return date is Dec 18th.

Today I called and tried to change the return date to 22nd of Dec. The route instead of SIN-BKK-IST-TBS is SIN-PEK-IST-TBS. However, I was told that I need to pay 30K miles more for this change.

All my reasoning that the flight was booked before the change of award chart and it was promised that as long as departure and arrival points are the same, now new miles would be required - were useless. Asked and and got very tired supervisor on phone who said me that 'you have been told multiple of times that you need to pay more miles, why you don't get this?'

Question to community - what is the most effective way to resolve this? Am I scammed or should I continue to do HUACA? I really can't devote all my time on this - this call lasted 53 minutes.

Please advice.

P.S. Mods, please move it to UA forum. Accidently posted here.

Ocn Vw 1K

For cases where FT members have been successful in award changes, here is a master thread for reference:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unite...eb-2014-a.html

willryu

Changed a same day one-way booking from:

BKK to FRA (TG J), FRA to YYZ (AC J) to

BKK to NRT (TG F), NRT to ORD (NH F), ORD to YYZ (UA J).

10K more miles. $1 extra charge. 10 minutes on the phone with a 1K agent.

mherdeg

Gosh. Do we need a sticky thread on "hang up and call again"? This is probably one of the core rules of dealing with UA Reservations by phone and is one of the key skills that differentiates an expert UA traveler from a novice.

When you are talking to a phone agent and asking for something which you know is by-the-book OK to do, and they say "no" for some reason, DO NOT ENGAGE. DO NOT continue the conversation. DO NOT KEEP GOING.

(1) 95% of the time it will not work; agents will become entrenched in their beliefs and often summon hilariously illogical explanations for things, and their supervisors will default to backing up their staff, which may put supervisors you escalate to in the position of adopting a hilariously illogical explanation. This can be amusing and I guess you are doing a public service to other customers by tying up a bad agent and wasting an hour of their time, but do you really have time for this?

(2) Agents who believe what you are doing is wrong may add a "note" to your record which means that future agents who look at the record will default to thinking that whatever is in that "note" is true. For example, someone once got a "note" in their PNR that said "trips to Hawaii cannot be upgraded using an RPU" and it took them a lot of work to find an agent who would re-examine the situation from scratch and remove this bad note. WHEN YOU SEE A BAD AGENT, DISENGAGE ASAP to avoid getting a bad "note"; it will cost you time later.

Some FlyerTalk approved phrases you may hear are:

* HUACA -- hang up and call again -- the best way to handle a bad agent. Politely disengage ("Oh, thanks, I won't change anything, hope you have a good day *click*" or "Oh, sorry, I have to go water my hedgehog, I need to run, thank you for your time, *click*") and get the agent away from your record ASAP. Call again and get someone who knows what they're doing.
* MOLA -- misinformed or lying agent -- a common explanation for why agents may make up rules that don't exist.

95% of the time, you will not change a "bad agent's" mind. Don't waste the hour; wait until you get someone good.

After hundreds of hours on the phone with UA you will eventually develop the ability to recognize people who know their stuff and will build a rapport with the people you talk to. To start developing expertise early, be like Pacman: huaca huaca huaca.

As you get better at this, you will learn the difference between a "soft no" (I don't think the policy allows X … are you sure? I read at yyy that it's OK…), which is a recoverable situation, versus a "hard no" (you can't make this change because of a crazy reason I made up to explain why my computer is throwing an error … Oh, gee, thanks, I didn't know Chicago was no longer in America).

It sounds like you almost certainly hit a 'hard no' in this call and should have huaca'd at the first "this will cost more miles" and CERTAINLY after the first round of "are you sure? policy xxx says it does not cost more miles" => "No, because of reason I made up."

By the way, if you know something is *not* by-the-book OK, or if you are totally ignorant about whether something is OK and you haven't bothered to read the relevant rules, and you practice huaca to get things you don't "deserve" (not part of the contract of carriage etc.), you are not doing excellent things; please don't do that.

Kacee

lol

Great post. This should be a reference for all new UA newbies. As well as those not so newbies who have not yet figured out when it's time to cut losses and hang up.

My guesstimate is that 75% of the posts on this forum complaining about UA phone agents could be avoided through HUACA. Is it an ideal solution to poor agent training and supervision? No. Is it the best workaround if you're just trying to get something done. Yes, absolutely.

As for OP, he has almost certainly had his record notated, which will make it infinitely more difficult to change this award at the old rate.

Peregrinus

I made an online change and got the error screen after payment. My credit card has been charged, but the ticket hasn't been reissued.

I saw one report upthread of a ticket eventually being reissued in this scenario -- has that been a general experience if the credit card is charged, or do I need to make the dreaded call to United?

abaheti

CALL. Try web support which is friendlier and more efficient IME.

xmlsoa

Award Option? Break RT, refund miles for OW or Extend RT return past 1yr w good agent

I had booked a RT award ticket a week before the flight in Nov 2013:

Flight In:
Nov 2013: BOM > SIN > NRT > SJC (in Business)
Original return:
Feb 2014:IAD > IST > BOM (in Coach)

In January/Feb I ended up heading to Latin America so I asked United to hold it (as I had no planned return dates) and every CHANGE costs $.

Thoughts/ Suggestions on which of the following I can do?

I'd prefer go this way:

SFO/ SJC > BOM for November '14
preferably
via ASIA (I might take a side trip to Bali or Thailand)

If possible, with a 1/2 week stopover or direct.

PS:
Looks like old(map) and new(pdf) award chart both are 42.5k for 'India (Central Asia) to US'. Was it not 45k before?

OPTIONS? Are both do able?

1. Break the itinerary and reclaim the miles for a OW trip?

With the RT, I have the benefit of Stopover, but if I cant get a later ticket (beyond 1 year), can I "pull / apply" the miles to another OW itinerary ? (with or without a stopover?)

2. Try for a friendly / flexible Agent and get a ticket beyond the 1 year Award limit ?

WineCountryUA

No allowed by the rules and would take unusual circumstance (hospitalization, death in family, ...) to get an agent to do this.
....
as discussed earlier, this is outside of the rules but you may get lucky. But if declined and noted in record, that would be the end.

xmlsoa

I asked because this was confusing here:

1. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/23733352-post899.html

2. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unite...l#post23765725

WineCountryUA

Splitting in those discussions reference taking a two or more person PNR and splitting them into individual PNRs. The MP rules are clear you cannot split an existing RT into two OWs.

xmlsoa

http://www.united.com/web/en-US/cont...s/contact.aspx

Based on this link it says they close at 12 am CT.

Can you please share what numbers to call for your suggestions?
- The RTW Desk
- The post 10pm PT HNL Desk

I have a bunch of International Calling Card Credit, so if there is a better location/ direct number besides US then please do let me know and I can call them.

I am now looking at this:

SFO > FRA > BOM (Stopover) > BLR

Doable?