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UA forces POS to credit card billing country -- restricts which site/card can be used

Old Mar 1, 2020, 10:34 am
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Last edit by: WineCountryUA
POS ==> Point of Sale. For UA, this determines pricing, inventory, fare rules, (in some cases - change fees) ....

Originally Posted by emcampbe
united handles point of sale by credit card billing address. So will change the price to the local point of sale, based on billing address. If your CC is Canadian with Canadian address, and you start searching from US site, you’ll get the pricing swotcheroo. Sometimes, it’s not much of a difference. Sometimes it is. There can be different class availability, and exchange rate isn’t necessarily up to date.

Online OTAs should let you bill to whatever card you want, so that’s one solution.
Related threads
Different pricing/fare buckets depending on billing country / point of sale
Price delta between united.com/ United app / second phone? (Guam is billing country?)
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UA forces POS to credit card billing country -- restricts which site/card can be used

Old Mar 24, 2019, 5:39 am
  #31  
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Originally Posted by cfischer
well-know problem. Search is your friend.

Your solution is likely https://www.expedia.ca/ or similar OTAs which will process your reservation in CAD.
Will I get 5x from AMEX Platinum if I book with Expedia or any other OTA?
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 9:20 am
  #32  
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Originally Posted by lsquare


Will I get 5x from AMEX Platinum if I book with Expedia or any other OTA?
yes
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 10:49 am
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Originally Posted by lsquare
So I was trying to purchase airfare from United's Canadian website with my credit card (USD) and United won't let me proceed with it. The reason why I want to do that is because there is about a $10 difference after currency conversion. When I put in my billing information and click "purchase", United would stop processing the transaction and tells me that they have updated the pricing to reflect the billing information that I had entered. Anyone here experienced this before? Now I know it's only $10, but money doesn't grow on trees...
Have bought 3 round trips. YYZ-HUB(ORD/SFO)-HNL direct on UA website in the last 9 months. Mix of direct search and Google flights. No issues. US citizen, US credit card. When using Google Flights, the display comes back in CA $ when sent to UA.com. . Select the drop down at the top for North America//US English. Reprices to US$. Proceed with purchase... never a problem. Are you selecting US/English?

Last edited by xzh445; Mar 24, 2019 at 11:16 am
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 10:50 am
  #34  
 
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Originally Posted by lsquare


Will I get 5x from AMEX Platinum if I book with Expedia or any other OTA?
If it’s the US personal Amex platinum, you would only get 5X if Expedia passed along the charge to United to process. If Expedia processes the charge themselves you will not get 5X.

most OTA’s pass along standalone airfare in my experience but I’ve never tried a foreign OTA.
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 11:41 am
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Have gotten things to process in the origin currency by using PayPal (with US CC) and a random address (on United.com) in that country before. See if that's an option?
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 11:43 am
  #36  
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Originally Posted by cfischer
yes
Originally Posted by Shadowfactor


If it’s the US personal Amex platinum, you would only get 5X if Expedia passed along the charge to United to process. If Expedia processes the charge themselves you will not get 5X.

most OTA’s pass along standalone airfare in my experience but I’ve never tried a foreign OTA.
There are a few websites that says Expedia doesn't give 5x back on the Platinum and I'm better off buying direct from the airline. I guess my question is how often does Expedia or Orbitz pass the charge to the airline to process so that I get the maximum amount of points?
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 12:45 pm
  #37  
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I've done this before but in the reverse (use a Cdn card on US website.) Obviously, you can't sign in to your account. You must use guest mode. IIRC, I entered my correct street address, but used a fake state and zip code. Can't remember what I used for the city. I believe it worked for either MC or Visa, but not both. You'll have to experiment. But the transaction went through. Once I had my PNR, I just added my UA number and it appeared in my account. No issues.
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 1:06 pm
  #38  
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Originally Posted by cfischer
well-know problem. Search is your friend.

Your solution is likely https://www.expedia.ca/ or similar OTAs which will process your reservation in CAD.
its not a ‘problem’, but the way that united enforces point of sale. Most airlines do this by simply using the country of the departure city, charging in that local currency, and allowing you to use a card from virtually any country. UA does it by billing address. Not sure why, or what the benefit of doing it that way is - there must be some for UA to continue to use it. But it does bring exactly the problem described by the OP, which means the prices can change, more than just based on exchange.

Correct that an OTA should process it just fine. Expedia.ca should price in CAD using CA POS and also process a US card.

Have bought 3 round trips. YYZ-HUB(ORD/SFO)-HNL direct on UA website in the last 9 months. Mix of direct search and Google flights. No issues. US citizen, US credit card. When using Google Flights, the display comes back in CA $ when sent to UA.com. . Select the drop down at the top for North America//US English. Reprices to US$. Proceed with purchase... never a problem. Are you selecting US/English?
not sure the relevance of this. OP wants to pay with a Canadian price on a US card. If you start searching on United.ca and enter United States in the billing address, will reload on United.com with in USD using prices on US POS and only accept a US card. Google flights will route you to .ca based on the YYZ departure, but UA will take you back to the US site when trying to use a US card, and price in US. Standard UA website behavior. In fact, you are having essentially the same thing done to you that OP is having done to them, except they want the Canadian price that saves them ~$10. UAs site does t allow it, probably because they don’t want the OP doing what hey are trying to do.

Originally Posted by lsquare
There are a few websites that says Expedia doesn't give 5x back on the Platinum and I'm better off buying direct from the airline. I guess my question is how often does Expedia or Orbitz pass the charge to the airline to process so that I get the maximum amount of points?
OTAs aren’t leaving processing to the airlines so the passenger gets more points - they are doing it to save $. When United (or whatever carrier) processes the charge, they pay the card processing fees. Instead of the agent. So they will let the airlines process it every time. Airlines still allow this, since it’s an incentive for the agents to use their carrrier (guess what would happen if AA tells Expedia they will process, and UA says they have to do it themselves...who is the agent going to try to convince you to book with).
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 9:11 pm
  #39  
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Originally Posted by emcampbe
UA does it by billing address. Not sure why, or what the benefit of doing it that way is - there must be some for UA to continue to use it.
For one thing, it avoids customers complaining about currency conversion.
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 9:28 pm
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Originally Posted by mahasamatman
For one thing, it avoids customers complaining about currency conversion.
It does? Seems that’s pretty much what the OP is complaining about.
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 10:28 pm
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United is planning to drop Expedia.
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Old Mar 24, 2019, 10:45 pm
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Originally Posted by mahasamatman
For one thing, it avoids customers complaining about currency conversion.
For another, it also simplifies (from the airline's perspective) determining the relevant govt taxes/merchant terms/consumer protections that apply to the reservation and ticketing.
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Old Mar 25, 2019, 1:12 am
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Originally Posted by chriskuo
United is planning to drop Expedia.
For real?
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Old Mar 25, 2019, 11:13 am
  #44  
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Originally Posted by lsquare
Originally Posted by chriskuo
United is planning to drop Expedia.
For real?
https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unit...st-united.html

United Airlines mulls pulling fares from Expedia amid contract dispute
lsquare likes this.
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Old Nov 4, 2019, 12:18 am
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I was just very frustrated to discover that I couldn't enter my Canadian billing address in the UA app. Check out FT to see there's a solution. Further disappointed to find that the prices are all in USD rather than departure city, meaning a ~30% increase. But still 10% cheaper than I was seeing on the UA site/Google Flights/etc.

Seems UA is still not verifying billing addresses as I used the Houston address of my old employer and it seems to have gone through okay. Thanks go to FT once again

Now if only there was some way to get the US price but billed in CAD...
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