I no longer see option to book an earlier or later flight in app (same day flight change), 1k, travel in F, first flight of the New Year!

Yes, that's the only approach that will work for SDC, although note that there's no guarantee you'll find space on both of your target flights.

Is there an alternative flight with inventory in your fare class? Connecting? Any non-UA segments?

Are these still the current/officially allowed? I think the language may have been modified in https://www.united.com/ual/en/us/fly...t-changes.html or am I misremembering:

I was flying DEN-DFW-ORD and DFW-ORD cleared PZ. At DFW, the app and kiosk offered no SDC option for PZ or my ticketed fare class as usual when segment is upgraded. Did a flight search in the app and saw DFW-EWR-ORD was selling for V-W class with my ticketed fare class at 8. Went to the gate and GA said confirmed changes were not allowed (even though I showed her the website above) but she would try putting me on standby. I instantly cleared standby into my original ticketed fare class and she was puzzled. She called over a supervisor and the supervisor said "direct" flight cannot be changed to flights with connections. She deleted the cleared-standby segments and told me to call reservations.

I called reservations and the onshore agent said she couldn't see DFW-EWR-ORD option in her system even though flight search in the app was displaying the option. She also said that changing from non-stop to connections will require fare difference.

My question is :
If my fare only allows DEN-HOU-CHI, does that mean if I'm at IAH and see IAH-IAD-ORD, I'm not allowed to change to that? or was the agents simply unfamiliar with the SDC policy?
per
The weird thing is that the routing rule was DEN-HOU-CHI but I was still able to change to DEN-DFW-ORD.

On a side note, Kirby was sitting a few rows ahead of me on DFW-ORD and I got to talk to him for a sec lol

Noted the same last week. Has the system changed?

Thanks for the feedback! No alternative ways to get there from SFO. Just SDC'd for the later flight on the same day (step 1) and it rebooked me into Y! Now, I need to wait until tomorrow morning and I should be good for the following day SDC. Assuming it keeps my Y fare, I would assume it would be easy to confirm if a single seat is available for sale on the following day's flight.

What you've quoted has always been the rule. It's just that the app used to ignore routing rules willy-nilly, and it seems that it no longer does.

That is always how the system was supposed to work, yes. Certain fare rules (advance purchase, minimum / maximum stay, day of week / time of day / seasonal restrictions) were ignored by policy, but the fare was always supposed to be valid for the new routing. It's never been the case that you were supposed to be able to turn IAH-ORD into IAH-HNL-NRT-EWR-AUS-DEN-ORD just because UA flies all of those sectors. :D

Also my experience with the upgrade list. Recently, I was the one passenger upgraded on an MCO-DEN leg. It was an 014 stock, G-bucket fare, so not a chance other than for the 014 ticket. The ticket was purchased only ~30 hours in advance, was way cheaper than the UA options and also gave much higher PQM's than the $$$ paid would have implied. The same impact on the upgrade list was not evident on the DEN-YVR leg. A good experience except for the futility of trying to standby on an earlier DEN-YVR flight operated by AC.

There is zero reason to believe that a 014 ticket has any better upgrade possibilities than a 016 ticket.

Rather, I suspect you were not the only passenger upgraded; you were just the last passenger upgraded. Unless you saw a ton of 1Ks walk past you on the way to the back, I'm not buying this. The only other thing I can think of is that AC messed up the fare (see below) and put you into Y.

Flights operated by UA earn PQPs based upon the fare paid to UA. If you got a large bonus, it might be that AC somehow messed up its fare table in a way where they paid UA for a more expensive ticket.

Checked in for flight tomorrow, no options for same day flight change! Definitely something has changed.

Need cities and fare class to help figure out if SDC isn't available because of fare inventory or because there might be an issue. But I'll bet right now it's simply your fare class not being available for flights within 24 hours of check-in.

-RM

Fully missing, or when used no options offered?

Believe whatever you want, but there were at least 2 that boarded as Global Services. I recall one "GS" whose boarding pass gave the exit row beep, and the owner headed back into coach. I initially concluded that maybe the GA wasn't monitoring pre-boarding closely until a woman behind me came barging out of the zone 1 line claiming to be 1K and got turned back as a non-1K by the same GA. All in all just a regular day at MCO. I paid little attention to where the others behind me claiming 1K pre-board ended up, because to be honest, I don't care that much. I do know that only one pax, me, showed as cleared on the upgrade list, but I also know I often don't show up on that list after an upgrade has processed a few days earlier.
As for the PQP's earned, you may recall there were many posts on this board when PQP's were first introduced about the possibility of "gaming" the system by flying UA metal on partner airlines to get a higher PQP yield. An error with this ticket seems likely, as I've done the itinerary on 014 stock several times this month, with upgrades and PQP results all over the map. Plus there was the instance where irrops occurred and I ended up with a "J" bucket ticket. So :confused:

The GS could be on a BE ticket (but wouldn't likely get an exit row) or traveling with multiple companions and not willing to use instruments. Otherwise, there's no realistic scenario that holds water.

Exactly. Upgrades ahead of the gate haven't appeared on the list in years.

AC almost certainly screwed something up and put you into Y. That would put you first on the list ahead of other 1Ks, and waiting for PN, but wouldn't put you ahead of a GS. The only way you'd be ahead of a GS is if they listed you as a paid J customer, which seems borderline impossible since you'd have been on a Y ticket and SHARES should have tried to validate when AC pushed the record across. As for the PQP -- the calculation should have been based upon the fare stored in the ticket. So, if AC pushed across a Y fare in order to match your Y seat, then that might have gotten stored, but I assume AC is going to have to make that good with UA when they reconcile. Maybe if enough people are in the same boat, AC will decide to prioritize fixing its systems….

Considering the regularity with which people post complaints about AC screwing up AC-operated segments, I guess I'm not surprised that they're screwing up UA-operated segments too. I'm not sure it's some panacea, but for people who have the option to book 014, it's a shot at a jackpot. (The price, of course, is having to deal with AC customer service if anything goes wrong with the ticket. :D) In general, there's no point to trying to "game" the system by putting UA segments on non-UA tickets, because they routinely get it correct. There are posts about once a month from someone who says "I used the calculator for my ticket and I didn't get the right number of miles," and, when people investigate, it's often UA on non-016 giving a fare-based, rather than distance-based, result.

SDC with checked bag -- allowed?
 

I am getting some limited SDC options with checked bags. It lets me move to earlier flights, not later. However, maybe related, maybe not: I already had seemed to be cut off from pushing to later flights before I checked a bag (already did several SDC). So basically I am getting all the same SDC options before and after checking bag.

Is this normal now? I do not actually want to move to an earlier flight, but if I did would I have to wait for my bag when I arrive?

SDC with checked luggage has always been allowed, provided you have at least one hour before the flights to move your bag. SOP for domestic travel would be to deliver your bag on the next flight anyway, whether you're ticketed on it or not. Whether or not UA would agree to deliver it after an SDC? I've had them do so in the past, after SDCing DEN-IAH-AUS to DEN-AUS after rechecking my bag upon arriving from NRT. My bag went to IAH anyway (I wasn't thinking -- I should have made the change at the recheck counter), and UA delivered it to me the next day.