WineCountryUA

Checked bag waivers are based on status at time of travel, not at time of booking (although it will initially assume you will have the same status at travel).

As your status has expired and you are doing a purely domestic itin, you will not have checked bag waiver and the first checked bag for each passenger will cost $25. You will have a free carry on and free personal item.

Kacee

No. That would be an N fare. You have an S, which is regular economy.

Reduced PRASM would be much more meaningful than empty seats.

jsloan

Yep -- but empty seats are more obviously visible. Of course, people may tend to extrapolate, but frequent travelers on a route may notice patterns before PRASM will be made available.

Kacee

I've noticed an uptick in CPUs on a route with which I'm very familiar, but that's a statistically insignificant observation.

jsloan

That's an interesting point. I would find it amusing if UA found that BE messed up their ability to sell TODs. The TOD strategy is based, in part, on the idea that it's easier to get people to part with $200 and then $100 then it is $300 up front. The BE strategy is diametrically opposed to that -- if you don't spend $220 (vs. $200) up front, UA will refuse to take your $100 later.

spin88

. The extra $$$ from the be fare increase should - per Ua and the analysts prop up prasm short term. I would expect the initial impact to be to old factor, with the prasm hit only coming when the book away and loss of elItes swamped the extra $$$ from the be fare increase.

Alas we appear to be seeing both loss of load factor and underperformance in prasm.

I actually received an upgrade, which has not happened in over a year. And I was not the only one, nearly all of fc was upgraded. My sample size is small, but I would expect some elite book-away, and as others suggest it may impact tod upsells since fewer people get the offers. 😄

zdog2x

Anecdotally I've noticed that prior to BE on my frequent routes the planes were packed to capacity and cpus we're impossible. Now I've notice that flights are not as full and if they are the seat map is 50% empty at t-24. CPUs are still tough. So in this anecdote, it apppears they took t were jamme to capacity with higher non-BE fares and replace them with lower priced fares. Appears as well they've lost some elites (or e-ups) on the routes as E+ is now less fulll, whereas before it was packed. If that anecdote bears out, don't see how this can be a win for UA.

spin88

Well a lot of us predicted Ua would shed traffic from elites (or their employers) who did not want to pay an elite tax on every flight, particularly expensive flights.

Ua has now admitted that offering be head to head with regular y was not competitive, and further that it was seeing bookaway. Kirby claimed not to know the net impact of how much of the extra be fare increase was offset by traffic loss. I happen to think united knows very well as they have been backing off be by slowly limiting the fares where it is available from all fares to just up to midrange fares, and they seem to be doing more what aa is doing - just offering it on the bottom of the fare structure.

This - combined with the low prasm guidance for 3Q - says to me that Ua did itself some real damage. I would hope they would see the light and back off the "no status credit for be" part of thIngs, I.e. Do it like DL does, and give more status credit for BE. However, the story of UA since 2012 has been sticking with self-destructive approaches to their customers even in the face of evidence it is costing them $$$.

TCD

Because they haven't replaced them with lower priced fares. As has been much discussed here BE is often pricing the same as E was before, so if anything they've increased fares for many passengers (and added some extra baggage fee revenue). The question is about the balance of that versus any lost elite revenue.

And of course we'll only really see the final elite movement after September when the AA BE is implemented. If there has been meaningful UA to AA elite movement solely because of BE that may reverse at that point.

Kacee

Pax paying the same for BE as they were previously paying for cheapest available regular economy would result in revenue neutral, not an increase in fare revenue.

And UA would be foregoing E+ revenue, TOD revenue, and change fees with these fares, which may well neutralize or even outweigh any uptick in checked bag fees.

nycityny

The idea is that those avoiding BE fares are paying extra and generating more revenue. They are looking for the lowest non-BE fare and therefore are paying more than before BE existed.

But your point on the loss of E+, TOD, etc. revenue is very valid and probably greatly offsets any additional revenue from non-BE fares.

Kacee

That's what UA planned for. But the reports of very large BG5 and lots of unassigned seats at T-24 suggests that UA may be selling more of these tix than they intended.

Exleftseat

I have heard something like this happen to us. We looked for a domestic flight to LAX on Google Flights and found a BE fare. Since it's a short trip less than 500 miles, we don't need the miles or LT miles and were ready to book it. But since we live in Japan, UA.com switched us to the Japan website and there BE is not available so they wanted the regular Economy fare which was $ 40.00
more. Didn't bite, probably try to call and have it booked that way. Unless they deny overseas members to book BE fares?!?!?!

Kacee

From the fare rules:

Exleftseat

Did not know that. Thanks^