boltjames

Thank you! Is it then true that my return flight a week later would also be 330 days out? So the redemption protocol is to book a series of one-way tickets instead of round-trips?

WineCountryUA

Yes
But in either case award inventory may or may not be available at 330 days out. 330 days is the earliest it could be available, not when it is actually available.

That is one approach.
It would mean not making use of excursion perk.
Additionally, it means if you had to cancel later, it would be separate cancellations fees (if subject to such fees based on status at the time of cancellation), 2x fees.

Kacee

Your assumption that award seats are released on a fixed schedule is not correct. That is not how award releases work. Space may be released 330 days out, 1 day out, somewhere randomly in between, or never. With "never" being a significant option.

Danski

I know this is an awkwardly worded title (Mods, please feel free to change it to something better).

Using Expertflyer (and looking at Aeroplan), I had my eyes on award space on a Star Alliance partner flight from Europe to the US for next July. Because United won't let you book as far ahead as Expertflyer can see, I was waiting for the magic 330 day mark to use my United miles. The last time I checked last night, the award space was still available on EF and Aeroplan, and United.com still couldn't "reach" the date. This morning, when United.com could "reach" the date, the award space was gone. I now realize I should have stayed awake until United.com opened up that day for booking.

Does anyone have experience with what time of day (is it midnight Central time, etc.?) United rolls over the 330 day mark to make that next day bookable?

Thanks!

Danski

Dannylingen

It Usually releases at 12 est if I remember correctly. In terms of your ticket, there are sometimes were the tickets will pop back a day or two later. If you could divulge the route that you want to book and the date I could help you look into it.

ChgoBob

I've been watching the C award space on UA to several destinations (Budapest, Prague, Florence, Munich) and returns for May 2022. The availability was pretty good even with the direct flight from MUC to ORD open for most of the month. I scheduled my outbound easily for 2 seats. I began to monitor the return flights for after Memorial Day, and the availability was still almost unbelievable. Maybe it was? On June 30 all of the UA flights disappeared from the May calendar, except for May 18th. Many of those flights had 5 or 6 seats open on most days, including weekends. My outbound tickets are still in my itin, so those seats were real.

What would cause the entire inventory to disappear overnight?

Kmxu

Inventory is only available at within +330 days (or 11 months).

cheltzel

Currently the UA award calender goes to June 3 2022. Any available May 2022 awards seats should show now.

For May 30 2022, I show C awards BUD-ORD (on AC ... BUD-YYZ-ORD). On May 22 2022 there are at least 2 C award seats on AC and LO (both 1 stop connections BUD-ORD). Once I g up to 3 C seats, the availability drops off. I didn't look for more that 3 C seats.

ChgoBob

Yes, I saw the inventory on LO and AC, but the UA award availability was substantial for the entire month of May until overnight on June 29th. I had my choice of C-awards on the outbound awards and had almost too many choices before purchasing. The options for the return flights also looked very good from any of several of the mentioned cities, including the MUC-ORD direct flight, even on weekends (I have to wait another week for my return flights to be entered) IMO, it's impossible for so many flights to be taken overnight, including connects in FRA, MUC, BRU and IAD. I wonder what they are up to?

HNLbasedFlyer

Somebody in revenue mgmt decided they could sell those seats - they had a window open for redemption and they've decided to close it.

dkc192

Sounds like usual RM fluctuation from wide open to zero at once. This far out, there's a decent chance that they will reopen award/upgrade space on some or all of the flights that were previously available, but it's anyone's guess when and which flights.

cheltzel

+1

And if you see an award flight available for a city pair and date you like, book it immediately. You can always get the miles back.

ChgoBob

Some UA return flights have opened up from BUD, PRG, and FLR early in May 2022, but no departures to these destinations in Europe, except for the 75K AC and 77K LO. It looks like they are blocking the Holiday weeks (before, during and right after) for revenue right now.

chicago747

I booked ORD-FRA-JTR for a Friday in late May the day it opened. The ORD-FRA had 6 seats available in J. There was also a ton of saver awards ORD-BRU/ZRH/LHR but no real connections available. I've gone to Europe the same week almost every year for the last 10 and have noted UA always has decent availability to Europe around the time they open the schedule. Then they tend to pull that space back. As others have said....book while you can.

Clarkcc1

I'm going to book SFO-FRA RT in October; been watching PZ space for a month or so. Should have acted earlier; they took away pretty much all ex-FRA and MUC flights at least in early mid October. So connecting it is! I also goofed in waiting because both daily SFO-LHR flights had lots of upgrade space, they 2 days ago they axed one of them going from 2 777s to 1 789 and zero'd out all the PZ. I expect they'll open more once they see they're overly optimistic about TATL biz travel coming back in a few months. Frequent schedule changes should allow for rebooking on more direct routes, and thankfully no change fees could do the same if fare difference isn't much. Takes more time monitoring the inventory but can be done. And Dang you UA for not allowing Expertflyer access to PZ inventory for alerts!!!