You would cancel for a variety of reasons, it just has no residual value. For example if you wanted to take a different flight, or decided to eat the cost and book a higher fare.

welcome to ft!

unless I’m missing something, it’ll allow you to cancel the ticket, but that’s not the same thing as allowing you to cancel the ticket and get a refund for it. Sure, you can cancel...but that doesn’t mean there will be residual value for doing so.

i’d agree with previous posters—no need to cancel now, wait until closer to date of travel and hope for schedule change.

edited to add: I have a transcon BE itinerary coming up as well, and just checked—there is a cancel option, but I have no reason to believe I’d get anything back for canceling. quite the opposite.

This - canceling and getting a refund (or keeping the value in the PNR to use on a future itinerary) are two different things. You can do the cancelation without refunding, for example. At least thats what agents have told me when, for example, I’ve canceled in 24 hours for a full refund, but been told I did the cancelation but not requested the refund (agent finished it up, but told me I never did it, even thought im sure I did).

There may be no changes/cancel on a BE ticket, per the rules, but all that means is that you won’t get $/value back (if you try to make a change). This is different from other tickets sold, most of which aren’t refundable but are changeable/cancelable, where you pay a fee and keep he rest in the PNR which can be used later. On BE, you get nothing. UA would probably prefer you cancel your reservation if you aren’t traveling, since they’ll know they have an extra seat to sell.

Domestic BE also is marketed as you can’t put a bag in the overhead bin. But again, there’s no real enforcement of this. The point is you can’t bring a rolerboard/full size carry on onboard, but only the smaller items that fit in the seat in front of you. FAs don’t know which passengers have BE and ‘access’ to the overhead. However, it’s generally assumed the smaller bags onboard are going to go under the seat in front, so that’s one way it makes sense. Sure, if you’re taking up the space in a bin that can be occupied by a rollerboard, especially if someone is looking for that space and can’t find it, you’ll likely be asked to move it. I frequently put my small backpack in an overhead - I just typically wait until there isn’t any more room for the bigger carryons in the bin above me or across from me, but there is for my backpack. Can’t remember a time ever where I haven’t been able to find that space - or sometimes less full flights, and particularly UAX where rollerboards get checked, where there isn’t 1/2 or a full empty bin to put it in. FAs aren’t going to stop BE ticket holders from doing that, either.

This is what I was going to say. While the risk is low that they would cancel if you had another flight you decided you wanted to take a couple hours later, it’s there. And if you decided you wanted to say, take a first class seat on the same flight (lottery win? Inheritance?) you’d have no choice but to cancel your original ticket in order to rebook.

Point is there are legitimate reasons why someone would want to cancel a BE ticket and that’s why they allow you to.

uh yeh as soon as UA is courteous to paying customers and give them reasonable credit in this case then I would then no about doing THEM a favor.