sbm12

I'd take aircraft reconfiguration over the mess of dealing with airport management, contractors and the other suppliers involved in a lounge rebuild project. The Polaris retrofit is slow because of the work required on board and getting the planes out of service long enough. Even when it was just the 2-class 763 conversions those were supposed to take a long time because of all the deferred maintenance items being worked on. I would bet that the sUA 772s had a similar task list on top of the cabin mod.

If the changes make the company more profits then the work gets done faster. You think they care about customer comfort? Ha!

ermintrude

My guess is this is very likely to happen

caverunner17

Honestly, it should be. The whole Y+ thing is pretty dumb at the moment. My last few UA flights, Y was packed to the gills and Y+ was not even half-full. Heck, I paid like $30 to upgrade to Y+ on a late night DEN-PHX flight and ended up getting the entire row to myself (poor man's flatbed). IMHO, there's too many Y+ seats on a lot of their fleet.

e53nyc

"United Continental Holdings Inc. is considering whether to add an upgraded economy section to U.S. flights -- a feature typically reserved for overseas markets."

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...mestic-markets

My guess is this is for the 772-HD going to Hawaii and on PS routes. Makes sense, if it's 10-across in the back.

drew in the air

Its route specific. Most flights I'm on is full in E+ and it's a struggle at times to get a Non middle E+ seat

jsloan

UA used to think the way you do. Then, they found out how much money they were making from E+. Who cares if the seats are empty? There are going to be empty seats somewhere. If they have too many passengers for E-, they put some in E+.

The ability to select E+ at booking has been a major reason that I've stayed with UA. Going to a DL-style system would make me seriously reconsider that. I'm simply not interested in flying in E- for anything longer than about an hour.

EWR764

I think you have this backwards. The Polaris business class cabin retrofits and lounge buildouts are completely different animals.

It's reasonable to be skeptical (jaded, too) about United's ability to execute ANYTHING these days, but the objective facts about the difference between the three programs we discuss make a different outcome a reasonable expectation.

Make no mistake, PE is not about an 'enhancement' to the customer experience. It's about extracting more revenue from a cohort of travelers who are not revenue business class customers either due to corporate policy or personal discretion. The fact that United largely does not capture this segment at the moment makes an expeditious rollout the product (and thereby being able to sell it on a broader basis) more important. OTOH, a new business class product is more about retaining an existing, profitable segment of customers rather than generating new revenue. On paper, it sounds nice to posit that an improved business class product will lead to a revenue premium, but in reality, that's not often the case. I think a PE product can offer a faster ROI.

Interestingly, Jamie Baker asked Kirby if his experience at United had changed any preconceived notions about the industry acquired during his time at HP/US/AA, he immediately responded that he was most surprised by the success of United's Economy Plus product. Reminiscent of Smisek, he relayed that AA management didn't think much of the concept, but he was convinced of it shortly after starting at UA when presented with demonstrable fact.

Let's hope he doesn't try to fix what ain't broke...

dilanesp

I only regret that I have one "like" to give to this post.

JBord

Yes, but my understanding is that it doesn't work the way that UA elites get E+ at booking (except Silver of course). It's more like how we get upgraded to F on domestic flights. I could certainly see UA create some type of CPU system from Y to PE for elites. But it's not just going to be provided free to elites as some posters have hoped in this thread.

Even if they made it like E+, but only for 1K's, that a HUGE downgrade for Plats and lower, who may very well be sitting in E-. And I'm guessing there are a lot more Plat thru Silver to piss off than there are 1K's and GS.

uastarflyer

My comment about the lounges is we have seen this movie before.

Re PE, the proof will be in the pudding - when will they have PE to SIN (SQ direct compete), HKG (CX direct compete), and LHR (BA direct compete). Perhaps the 787-10 can replace the 789's to SIN, but what about the Polaris infused 77Ws plying SFO-HKG or IPTE 777s running to LHR? Are they going to use a 787-10 for those too?

If they don't have these specific direct compete routes up and running in the fall at launch then everything else ("extracting value...does not capture this segment at the moment") is just blowing smoke. .If you have specifics here please advise.

CHOPCHOP767

If anything, I suspect UA's Y+ will first start to mimic AA's MCE with AA Golds receiving 50% discount on MCE price at booking. I have to think Kirby is salivating over the prospect of allowing comp Y+ at booking for GS/1K, 75% discount for Plat, 50% for Gold, and 25% for Silver. As for PE, UA will follow DL's lead. As soon as DL makes upgrade instruments from Y book to Comfort Plus, UA will follow.

Race to the top... FOR REVENUE

EWR764

(Emphasis mine) That's just a thoroughly unreasonable expectation. Can you think of any similar examples where this has been the case? It certainly wasn't nor hasn't been for DL/AA's respective PE products.

I think one reason UA is waiting until fall to officially launch the product is to take advantage of the downtime in the widebody fleet to accomplish the retrofits. Once a STC is achieved, installation of PE cabins takes hours to a few days, not the multiple weeks of a full-gut cabin mod.

Like I said, UA has earned well its reputation as an industry laggard and worked hard for the scorn of its customers. But to extrapolate the Polaris lounge buildout and major cabin mods into an expectation that the PE rollout will ALSO be interminably slow doesn't exactly line up with reality. It's sort of like a gambler's fallacy, but of course, time will tell. What's also a truism is that no matter the pace of retrofits, it will be unacceptably slow for some, especially to the extent the product isn't available on one's route on one's day of travel.

milypan

78J doesn't have the range for SFO-SIN, let alone LAX-SIN. It doesn't even really have the range for SFO-HKG. I guess they could fly via NRT again. The whole point of the 78J is that it trades range for passengers vis a vis the 789 (which itself doesn't even really have the range for SIN).

uastarflyer

UA set the Fall expectation. Those specific routes are what you referred to as where UA is missing out. So what is a reasonable expectation - a full year? 2 years?

SBM12 has already said this PE product will show up first on the 787-10, not a widebody mod but direct from factory new. Nothing comes out of service.

Huh? The lounge and cabin mods ARE reality. It's just ugly.

SIN, HKG, and LHR aren't "my routes". That is where direct comp is flying PE today.

sbm12

They are a different reality from what it will take to swap PremY into the planes. AA's J upgrades were slow. Not as slow as Polaris (because they didn't have the same deferred MX issues) but relatively slow. The AA PremY install was smoking fast. It is a different beast of a project. That doesn't guarantee that UA's will be similarly fast, of course, but it can be. Projecting one timeline from the other is not a rational decision.
Those are "your" routes, though.

UA also faces direct competition to CDG with PE. And to FCO. And to NRT. And to SYD. And to ICN. And to TLV. And to lots of other airports. You cherry-picked three but there are dozens of destinations served by PremY today where UA competes directly without it.

The first 4 planes - the 78Js - will go on some routes and they'll bring UA's PremY competition to those routes. I wouldn't be entirely surprised for them to be on JV routes where the partner also has PremY. And then the others will roll out with some pace and eventually the 767s and 777s and other 787s will get them, likely 3 rows each.