jhangilp

I've been trying to get this fixed for a couple weeks with no luck after talking to a couple agents.
Here is the scenario. I have a multi city flights like this
1) TUS - Denver - Panama City - Lima (Mixed Cabin Business)
2) GRU - EZE (Economy)
3) EZE -TUS (Economy)

the problem is that they changed the second portion (GRU - EZE) to a time that won't work for me at all.
There is another flight that goes from GRU - EZE by Turkish Airlines at the time I need, but the problem is that they only offer business class tickets for this flight.
Technically I should be eligible for this flight due to my first flight being business, but I am running into a couple issues.
First is the website actually does not show the second flight as free under excursionist perk because the first is a mixed cabin not full business. (From what I have read you can call agent to still book this without paying if booking initially)
Second, is that from talking to a couple agents they tell me that they can not change the second leg to a business class because it was originally booked under economy.

To me it seems like I should be eligible to get the flight I need even if it's business class, and I feel like they should be able to do a change flights like how I can do it through the website and change the second flight even if it means that I would have to pay the 125 change fee.
But I can't seem to find a way to do this. Anyone ideas on how to explain the situation to the agent that would help them figure out how to do this? The only other option they offered me is for me to fly a day earlier which would mean that I would be separated from my family's flights and very inconvenient.

Diogenes1789

Sorry if this seems like a dumb question, but

Does the Chase Saaphire card have this perk?

and - Is just having a UA card (like the Explorer card sufficient?) Or does one also have to purchase the ticket with the UA branded card?

WineCountryUA

No, not a UA MP branded card

Yes
No

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unit...dit-cards.html

topshot

It's not worth the bother trying to change anything now, but I am curious how I could have accomplished what I desired. I had searched United's site late last night for one-way Business Saver award flights as:
IND - FCO
FCO - ZRH
ZRH - IND
I had assumed I could get the middle segment as excursionist and that was the only real reason I decided to add Rome to our trip. However, when using the multi-city selection instead of one-way to actually book those legs, the business saver awards for the first leg never showed up. I did everything I could to filter it to find the flights (on TAP) but no luck. The only business awards showing were not saver. I went back to one-way and verified they stilled showed there (5 seats available). Went back to multi-city again with no luck. Finally just booked everything as separate one-way awards with the middle leg from the Chase portal so I could get economy that I could select the seat that only cost us 20k total, which I why I don't care too much about not getting the perk of business on such a short flight. I am sure things will change by the time we fly again, but what should I have done differently?

jsloan

You could have called -- or, if they appeared, booked the first and last legs as a single ticket and then called within 24 hours to book the middle leg.

Unfortunately, UA's search engine isn't particularly good at multi-city searches.

WineCountryUA

Welcome to FT, topshot
The UA search limits the number of results. So checking an OW, you check X results. Check a 3 part multi-city itin, you get X results, so the number of choice for any segment is less in a multi-city. It is believed this is the cause of what you see.

Sometimes you can talk to an agent and give them the 3 segments and ask for help from the rate desk on the excursion segment and you might get lucky.

Otherwise, there isn't much else to do. If an agent declines trying HUACA.

alanjudy

I have SFO-Windhoek booked on June 8, 2020 in C. Doing a search, I see a better flight on June 6 also in C. Hey, 2 extra days in Namibia. Woohoo!

But when I go to modify my booking, the available flight doesn't show up as an option. Is this a glitch in the system? Do I need to call UA to make the change?

jsloan

Yes, you'll need to call UA. You'll also want to follow up with the partner airline(s) involved to make sure that United correctly pushed the ticket over to them.

Note that some agents won't make the change unless there is availability on the return flight too, even though you're not changing it.

mjoeroy

I wanted to share my experience booking 2 Business class Excursionist Perk tickets with United. My itinerary HND-YVR-YUL-NRT.

I've been researching this for a while & I was just waiting for the seats to be released as my trip will be early June to Late June 2020. I'm very happy with the result, 320000 miles & $189.40 for both tickets. I get a lot of help from others sharing their experiences so I hope my experience can help others.

First, I think it has already been mentioned here or in some other forums but I can confirm that not as many award seats availability shows when searching Multiple cities vs searching one-way. When searching one-way many more dates & seats are open. It is a bit of a problem as United says to book the Excursionist Perk using the Mutiple city feature on their search engine. So don't despair if you don't see availability when searching your itinerary with multiple cites.

So what I did is first find the exact flights I wanted that were showing availability using the one way feature on their search engine & made a note of the dates, airlines & time of departures. I then called United customer service. I had to be on hold for 50 minutes. When an agent came on the line I explained the problem & asked if he would help me book.

For some reason, he could not see the available award seats but when I would give him the exact departure airport, date, time & airline, he would find the available award seats. He even told me that I could not return to NRT since I was departing from HND & he saw no award seats on direct flights YUL-HND. I told him that the rule was that as long as I would come back to the same region, I should be fine. I told him HND & NRT are both in Japan & near each other so surely it would qualify. He put me on hold for about 5 minutes & came back to say I was right & that he could see award seats available on the direct flight YUL-NRT on the date I wanted.

Then he said that I did not have enough miles in my account so he could not proceed. I told him that as soon as he would confirm the flights & the proper amount of miles needed, I would do an instant transfer. He did not believe I could do this but I insisted. He warned me that if the points did not arrived within 24hrs, I would lose my booking.

Once he confirmed everything, I was already signed in my Chase Reserved account & I press the "submit transfer" button. Almost instantly, he was surprised to see that the points needed arrived in my United account & we proceeded to finalize the reservation.

I had read to never call United to book this type of award ticket but I did not see anyway around it. Either the available seats were not showing or the engine would just spin forever & never get me to the last step of the booking. I had to pay an extra $25/ticket for using the agent but it was all worth it for me.

One more thing that was really unerving. When I receive the email confirmation, it showed that all 3 of my flights were in class "economy". At first I was furious, thinking the agent had booked me in economy but charged me for Business class. But when I went to each of the airlines involved (ANA & Air Canada) with my reservation codes, it clearly showed that our bookings were in Business class. As a precaution, I also called United again & spoke to an agent. He said it was a glitch in the email. He had me sign in my United account & I saw that there as well, it showed that all my seats were in Business Class.

So it pays to do a lot of research to understand how things work & be prepared before calling an agent.

Thanks to all who have shared their experience & knowledge here & on other forums!

threeoh

Glad you got the trip you wanted for the price you wanted!

I would definitely call if the crappy new search engine is not giving you what you want. For next time: if you say the magic words "I tried to book this online but it didn't work", they will 99% of the time waive the $25 fee.

Truer words were never spoken.

san88

WineCountryUA

gene2632

More Excursionist Perk questions... Do all flights have to be on UA metal? or just 016 ticket stock? Do I need to call in to get this perk? or how do I request it to know what I am actually getting?

Finally, not EP related, with the new award rules are Air Canada flights no longer showing up? Looking at a LAS to YVR and then AKC to LAS trip next year for a family cruise. AC does have non-stops from LAS to YVR that are much easier when traveling with grandchildren under the age of 5

jsloan

No, all flights do not have to be on UA metal. They will be on 016 ticket stock because all MileagePlus awards are necessarily on 016 ticket stock. You do not necessarily need to call in, but you may find that you cannot get the inventory you want to appear online.

The excursionist perk is a free one-way, intraregional award that cannot take place in your origin region. So, as one simple example, if you were to get an award ticket from LAS to HKG, you could spend some time in HKG, add an HKG-SIN flight as your Excursionist Perk, spend some time in SIN, and then return SIN to LAS.

I suspect you mean ANC, not AKC, the IATA code for Akron Regional Airport (not to be confused with CAK, Akron-Canton Airport).

Anyway, no, the new award rules are not suppressing Air Canada flights. I suspect Air Canada simply isn't releasing inventory.

747FC