jsloan

I have never failed to be added to the upgrade list automatically; I even clear in advance sometimes. I wonder what's different...

Were you on the same PNR? Whenever I've tried it, I've been the only person on the PNR. Maybe their logic for splitting PNRs is broken.

notquiteaff

zombietooth

We always fly on separate PNRs. We do a lot of award travel and this problem has plagued us for years. Made numerous calls to tech/website support over the years and no one could fix it. The most aggravating thing, however, is how difficult it is to be added manually, and how few agents know that we are entitled to be added to the waitlist with 1K priority. I've had many agents put us at the bottom of the list, below Silver, but almost no one has been able to do it right.

BearX220

The MP currency managers must feel a little like the German economists who ran the Deutschmark supply after World War I.

First you print up a bunch of money, so your people feel rich. Then hyperinflation kicks in and it takes a suitcase full of cash to buy a loaf of bread. Then your people lose faith in the currency because nobody knows what it'll be worth next time they need bread. Then you panic and start wars.

The original strategy was to alter the buying behavior of the giant middle-of-the-spectrum customer cohort, that was neither totally price-focused, nor already in the tank for UA -- owing to corporate contracts or captive-hub residency or whatnot.

That strategy died years ago. The idea now is to lavish piles of miles on the few super-profitable customers at the top of the spectrum, and dare everyone else to shop around.

The effect of MP is the polar opposite of original intent: it just drives more customers into the non-aligned, non-loyal consideration pool. Where price was less of a motivating factor, because MP rewarded incremental extra spend with UA, it is more of one now, for more people.

Talk about calling in an air strike on your own position.

MikeW_ORD

GUWonder

jsloan

BE earns the exact same number of redeemable miles as non-BE, and always has.

BE is a fantastic product for people who don't care where they sit and will never change the ticket. It's a bad product for people like me who do care where I sit, who occasionally make use of SDCs or changes, and who (gasp) have a reasonable upgrade rate.

The reason that I was hoping that BE would fail is that it was essentially a fare increase for those of us in the latter boat, and frequently a large one. But, yes, I don't doubt that it makes sense for some people.

mr8

jsloan

Thankfully, CR2 flying is never more than half of my trip; I don't think I've ever seen one at AUS. (Knock on wood...)

Kacee

The difference is it's a completely closed system, because UA controls inventory and the pricing. So analogies to "printing money" in a market economy are not fully apt. Within the MP system, the result of increased miles float, in the absence of increased prices, is increased scarcity. We've certainly seen that the past few years. So, unlike government economists, who have little control over the consequence of increased monetary float, UA can decide whether to either (a) allow increased scarcity, or (b) address scarcity by raising prices, increasing inventory, or both.

J.Edward

My take is the instant UA pegged their currency directly to USD (if fiat can even be said to be a real currency but that's a different thread) they opened Pandora's box as they now had to directly compete with other loyalty variants.

Chase/UR + Amex/MR, the two behemoths, each offer a redeem-for-travel-with-minimal-restrictions-par-value of $0.0150* per point or a $0.0100 - $0.0125* cash-deposited-into-YOUR-account. Setting aside the literal cash-out option, one can easily get the floor value of a MR/UA point is $0.0150 meaning UA (or any transfer partner) needs to offer at least $0.0150 of their native loyalty currency value, arguably more to justify the loss of fungibility when points are moved from a flexible program (e.g. UR, MR, TY, etc.) to a captive program (UA, DL, WoH, etc.)

But if UA adjusts their value of a M+ point to be worth $0.0150 to remain competitive with the market-rate-reward-for-credit-card-spend it's going to imply a 16.5% rebate for 1Ks/GSs, 13.5% for Plats, 12.0% for Golds, 10.5% for Silvers, and 7.5% for GMs on the rebate-reward-for-paid-travel side. Not sure if that's sustainable for UA. Meanwhile, if UA does nothing (besides whine) M+ will continue to lack the value proposition to otherwise seduce a Chase UR customer to shift spend onto a UA cobranded product when the clearly discernable value of a UR/MR point is $0.0150.

So boiling this all down I just don't see what leverage UA actually has here if they want to capture spend. Even if they were to walk completely away from Chase - which they won't can't do - a UR/MR is inherently more valuable for securing (paid) travel at $0.0150 / point than a M+ mile. Nor do I see UA as being willing, let alone able, to support a valuation of $0.0150 per M+ mile in terms of rewarding $1.000 of spend considering the 11x/9x/8x/7x/5x of mileage earning on base fares.

True, UA might offer a kicker on an existing card(s) or new card(s), related to travel or redemption (e.g. the 25% flown RDM bonus the old PresPlus card use to offer) and while that might compel me to carry the card and pay the annual fee, it still won't drive me to spend on it as $1.000 of spend on an updated/new UA card earning UA miles MUST offer at LEAST $0.0150 of direct value to compete with UR/MR.

*Chase UR points are easily redeemed via the Chase Travel Portal for $0.0150 per point for customers holding a Sapphire Reserve. American Express offers a similar value by offering a 35% MR point rebate for all front cabin, and select economy, fares booked with points through AX's travel portal for customers holding a Business Platinum card. Furthermore, Chase will direct deposit $0.0100 / UR point into a customer's account and AX will offer a $0.0125 direct deposit into a Schwab brokerage account for customers holding a co-branded Schwab Platinum AX.

Kacee

I agree. The elimination of the fixed award chart is causing anyone who looks carefully at value to seriously reconsider the value of UA miles compared to other options. This has implications not just for credit card choice and usage, but in the broader market for air travel, since the MP program has traditionally been one of UA's more attractive features.

ctownflyer

Always been automatic for everyone I know. Which card do you have? Did you check to see if your accounts were properly linked with the card for benefits on your my account page?

Kacee

Yeah, while I haven't gotten much use of this benefit the past few years (barely get any CPUs on paid tix), I've never had an issue with not being added to the list.

ctownflyer

Joys of being SFO based

Gotten plenty on awards based out of CLE as 1K and GS.