Condition One

How much will this opt-in feature cost per year?

mherdeg

This is great news! Once this feature is available again, I look forward to being able to make more effective same-day confirmed changes, decide intelligently among options for upgradeable flights, and help agents find good protection flights during irregular operations.

I worry about, as they say in Canadian political parlance, the "optics" of this announcement. It looks for all the world like UA executed a take-back of a customer-favored feature, listened to the feedback, and then restored it, hoping to make themselves look customer-friendly. Even when this behavior is backed by the absolute best of intentions, it's really easy to hurt customers' morale.

Working a customer-facing job is an emotional roller coaster at the best of times, and I don't envy the position of staff at UA right now. Awfully, awfully kind of them to stick around here and keep us in the loop.

abaheti

I really wish their PR folks would be more engaged.

This appears to have been the plan UA Insider alluded to when this all started as there is no way they could have planned, programmed, and implemented this from scratch in a few days.

If they had just told everyone upfront what they had planned, a lot of angst and ill will could have been avoided -- heck they might have even received credit by spinning it as an "enhancement" (bringing back expert mode).

ryder1650

Good news.

Far From Home

Fantastic - am very happy to hear this functionality will return. Thank you!

endrond

Very happy to hear that expert mode will be back. Even though many of us probably overestimate the amount of certainty it provides when planning our itineraries/upgrades, it still is an incredibly useful feature. ^

atk5015

A step in the right direction!

GoAmtrak

Very promising news. Thank you, Shannon! ^

We'll all be waiting with bated breath to see exactly when/how the full functionality will return.

UA-NYC

Three cheers for a return to existing PMUA functionality enjoyed for many years!!!

(don't forget, nothing new & improved here)

transportprof

For me, it's the uncertainty of what is going to improve and when it's going to happen on the IT side that is most annoying. That's because I spend more time on UA's computer system than I do on its planes. This needs to change!

Maybe there is indeed a communications solution that can take some of the pain out of UA's IT recovery. If United has a workplan to 'fix' SHARES, could they consider posting it on the .bomb web site?

Perhaps there could be some listing of upgrades and a timetable of when they would be implemented, or perhaps a gauge of how far they are along in implementing them. This could be analogous to the flat bed seat conversion program on various aircraft types that United used to post updates on.

And CO used to share detailed info on the menus of each of their international flights, so there is a precedent on both sides of the merger for putting out information that makes (some) customers happy.

Billiken

LOL!!!
^
Don't give them any ideas...

mechteach

This is fantastic news. A big thumbs up! Thanks!

nevansm

This is indeed great news. Doesn't explain why it just couldn't be done with a quick cutover. Anyways, I guess this is better than not having it at all. Also, I'm of the opinion that this was not the plan initially. This is a quick backtrack because of the backlash. Though seriously as I pointed out in the other thread, implementing a checkbox and some code is about the simplest thing in the world.

IainC

Hi Shannon,

Very thankful that you have taken the feedback from FT back to United to bring about redress to the proposed changes to "Expert mode". This is indeed a change we like! However, as you will appreciate there have been a number of post-merger changes that have provoked the ire and driven away many of UAs's most loyal customers. A particular example are the changes to the Million Miler program http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unite...ng-2012-a.html. I truly hope that FT feedback on this regressive change is also receiving the same attention that the Expert mode policy change has obviously received.

Iain

uastarflyer

I can see how getting something we already had back is seen as a huge win during the COdbaUA regime.

Others see it simply and clearly. This is just another of so many things PMUA did correct all along that CO is finally admitting to itself.