jsloan

Yes, it's within the rules, as they're written.

However, it's very much a "kill the golden goose" kind of scenario. It's obvious that these aren't the scenarios that UA was contemplating. Some agents tend to find this kind of loophole personally offensive, based upon your report and others, and the more attention that gets called to it -- and the more time UA agents spend dealing with tickets like this -- the more likely UA is to close the loopholes.

I've taken advantage of this on multiple occasions, and I've even had to call to change the last leg a couple of times, so I get where you're coming from and I don't blame for you trying it. Heck, the more UA squeezes MileagePlus, the more I expect people to look for value wherever they can.

The only rule that I have is that I always fly the last segment. While I'm breaking the spirit of the rule, I'm adhering carefully to the letter. And obviously you were trying to do the same thing, or you wouldn't have been trying to move your last flight in the first place.

Right, and we're all really hoping they don't add that disclaimer; plus, the additional disclaimer they'd add that you needed a cross-region flight at the end of the trip also. But, I suspect they will, as soon as they find some way to spin it as an improvement or simplification.

findark

It's basically like backdoor Roth tricks, except Congress is even less competent than UA (and cares less).

petes

OK, now I understand, thanks for clarifying. I certainly don't like it, but I get it. Seems pretty stupid and short sighted on their part, since nobody would want that, so it just gets people annoyed at the airline when they notice it, which seems to be a poor practice, especially given we all have a choice. Whatever happened to f/f programs being a loyalty incentive (as opposed to a reason to be angry).

GUWonder

jsloan

I expect it to be tweaked, but I don't expect them to kill it entirely. It helps to keep the awards aspirational, and the cost to UA is fairly small -- especially if it makes people more likely to save up and redeem awards at the new uncapped rates.

I suspect we'll see requirements that the first and last leg of an award must be interregional, and perhaps that if the middle leg is more expensive than the last leg, it's the last leg that becomes free instead -- something like that. They'll try to curb abuses without killing it entirely -- just like the Excursionist Perk itself was an attempt to curb abuses of the old stopover policy.

PVDtoDEL

Not necessarily. I'm having a similar issue right now on an AA award, where MDE-MIA-CLT-SEA is all available in award classes booked separately but not together.

alanjudy

I am trying to use miles for the following itinerary:

- SFO to Windhoek
- Windhoek to Lusaka (should be free as excursion perk)
- Lusaka back to SFO

When I use the multi-city to build the itinerary, the Windhoek to Lusaka flight is never free. Any ideas why? I've used excursion perks in Europe and Asia without problems in the past.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Khabibul35

Strange, I've priced out lots of similar itineraries (not Lusaka/Windhoek) and it's always priced out intra-aferica at 0K. Can you give more specifics?

alanjudy

Not sure how to be more specific. I'm using the multi-city search function. I want to travel next June, so the flights are not loaded yet. I'm just using dates where flights are available. For example:

May 13, 2020 SFO-IAD-ADD-WDH for 80K miles
May 21, 2020 WDH-JNB-LUN for 30K (should be zero)
May 25, 2020, LUN-ADD-TLV-SFO for 80K

jsloan

Is ADD-WDH in coach, by chance? It looks like you're doing a business class redemption. The website has been acting up for several months now, getting confused by mixed cabin flights -- it will only allow the same class of service as the very last flight in the outbound -- so if it's SFO-IAD (J) -ADD (J) - WDH (Y), it'll offer WDH-JNB-LUN for 0 miles in Y but still charge full price in J.

alanjudy

I finally called United. It's a bug in the website. The agent said I am entitled to the free WDH-JNB-LUN. They just need to do it for me.

Another question. I would like to book the outbound as soon as it becomes available (my travel dates are actually June 2020). I will then need to wait about 3 weeks for the return flight to become available. Can I pay the change fee and modify that ticket into an open-jaw that includes the excursion perk? I think so. Yes?

jsloan

In theory, yes, although some agents will refuse if there is no longer space available on the partner flights outbound.

Note that not all airlines will release space 330 days in advance. United, in particular, almost never does.

alanjudy

Yes, I do see that the availability is a lot better if I wait another few weeks, mostly because of the United connecting flights. The partner airline flights (ET in this case) have plenty of availability. I'm kind of nervous to keep waiting though....

jsloan

In general, if you see something you like, you should book it, because you never know when it might disappear. However, you need to weigh the importance of getting the excursionist perk for free vs. the problem of potentially missing out on the long-haul flights that you want.

There are mixed reports about making changes when there is no further availability. Some people have reported that agents flatly won't do it; others haven't had much of a problem at all. I've also seen reports of people making changes successfully online, although since it's not pricing properly for you online, that doesn't seem like a great idea.

The underlying problem is that UA sometimes fails to communicate the updated ticket number through to the partner after a cancellation. When this happens, the partner believes that the itinerary has been refunded and will therefore drop the reservation. They were running into enough problems from this that they eventually changed the behavior to be closer to a cancel-and-rebook, which has fewer issues.

If you decide to go this route, and you find a willing agent, you need to make sure to follow up with Ethiopian after the change and ensure that they have the same ticket number that UA does -- a ticket number that needs to have changed from the one that was originally issued.

alanjudy

Well, I'm thinking it doesn't hurt to try to make the change. The economy ticket from Windhoek to Lusaka is around $350, so that's $700 we'd save, not insubstantial. The worse thing that could happen is the agent refuses to do it, in which case I'll either try again, or book it as 2 separate one-ways. The one I spoke with last night said it should be OK to make the change esp. since I have to call them to book anyways.

Now, British Airways waives the fee when you want to turn a one-way into a round-trip if the availability for the return is not available when you book the outbound. I wish United would do that!

Good advice on verifying with ET. I will do that!