GYEWorldTraveler

Over the weekend, UA removed the 787-10 from December and January schedule in LAX-PVG which removes the PP cabin from the market. It appears that UA is just downgrading pax to Economy (based on the app) but haven’t received an official schedule change notification email and PNR is showing segments waitlisted.

Any idea what options I will have here? Will UA provide downgrade compensation? Will UA be like DL on SEA-PVG this summer where they upgraded PP passengers on impacted flights to business class? If not, is it possible to get them to confirm GPU I had previously waitlisted?

Often1

It is not compensation, but a refund (to the original form of payment) of the fare difference. As an EXP, AA may also throw some miles your way as a customer service gesture.

Kacee

Minimal, based on initial reports on how they are handling SFO-HKG. You can cancel for a full refund. You can fly economy, and get a refund of the fare differential. You can reroute on NH in PE, but it's not clear that UA will waive any fare differential.

Extremely unlikely.

GUC? That's DL. Do you mean GPU? If so, you can ask, but again, extremely unlikely.

GYEWorldTraveler

How long should I wait to call in? Just wonder when the additional segments will clean up and when I’ll get an email advising I’ve been downgraded. Seems strange they aren’t more proactive about this - do they really think just rebooking into United Economy for the PP fare is acceptable or will they send an email with options at some point?

Kacee

There's no definitive answer to that question. The options UA offers may improve if you wait, or they may not.

I'm a bit surprised to read this from a 1K. No notice is SOP for UA. Maybe they'll send an email at some point, but it's at least equally likely they will not.

GYEWorldTraveler

The last few schedule change notifications I received rather shortly after the Saturday load - and some very insignificant (4 minute later arrival, etc). Generally don’t book very far out (usually < 30 days) so haven’t experienced many changes but for as large as this one is with a downgrade in cabin I would have thought it’d for sure trigger an email.

JimInOhio

You're a UA 1K (according to your listed info) so just call them up and ask for your options. If and when you get an email from UA is pretty irrelevant to your particular situation, IMHO.

dinoscool3

I tried calling in on Sunday, was told either keep the B class, downgrade to S class, pay a fare difference for NH, or cancel. I decided to HUCA. I'm calling in again probably today, to push again for NH NRT-HKG, and request them to eat the fare difference. Otherwise I'll most likely just cancel.

Kacee

I've never heard of UA sending the email you're describing, i.e., one that lists your options when they've swapped aircraft for your flight.

Did you challenge over from DL?

findark

In my experience with previous schedule changes (routes getting dropped, usually) some kind of reasonable published guidance for agents usually lags the actual GDS update by a week or two and it usually pays to wait for the guidance (eg they adjusted seasonality on SFO-AKL a while back and IIRC after guidance was issued they would rebook even award tickets in the same cabin on NZ metal, but before the memo agents would do a lot less). No guarantees of course - I'm not up on how HKG is getting handled.

GYEWorldTraveler

I did not challenge over from DL - ended up booking way more UA itineraries this year (~210k PQM to date) than I’d planned on since they fit my schedule and had business class fares with lower bucket inventory access coming in far lower than DL/AA.

The schedule change email I was referring to is one like the below. It doesn’t list options but at least alerts you something is up and came one day after a change last month.

GYEWorldTraveler

This is kind of what I was thinking from past experience - sometimes taking action right away limits options because no agent bulletin has been posted. I know from personal experience that in July with DL, they delayed 339neo start date on SEA-PVG and I was booked in premium economy (DPS) one way as a DM during the impacted period and was moved to business class on the 767 a few days after they loaded the swap. I also have heard from colleagues that if downgraded, the offer seems to be around $500 on DL - so figured with UA things would be handled similarly. It sounds like that is potentially not the case and UA could care less about 1Ks experiencing PP downgrades and would prefer you refund if unhappy and buy a presumably more expensive ticket.

It just strikes me as odd that UA loaded a 787-10 on LAX-PVG in August for December/January and one month later is swapping it back to a 787-9.

AceReport

Another thing to bear in mind is that UA will likely have 1 to 3 of the Polaris/PP retrofit 789's in the fleet by the end of Jan 2020. While it's a slim chance they could still end up on LAX-PVG for the days OP is flying and UA won't load a 'real' polaris seat map until T-48 or t-72. At least based on the way the Polaris mod 772's were done.

Not saying that I would count on this very slim chance but UA knows that at least a certain number of PP seats will actually be flying on the 789 fleet in Jan of 2020.

✨ Polaris (& PP) Retrofits: Schedule, ....

Aussienarelle

Rather than call, email 1kvoice and ask what will be the official options for the change, suggesting the option you would like be one of the official options

I pay for PP (or equivalent OALs) for a reason and E+ would not be a viable option in my mind.

BTW I book in advance and the majority of the time I only become aware of schedule changes when I look at my reservations. I say majority as occassionally there will be an email but that is the exception.

Kacee

Got it. So you probably haven't yet been inured to UA's way of handling these sorts of things (i.e., haphazard notice and fend for yourself in terms of getting a satisfactory resolution). I'm not saying your expectation is unreasonable in the abstract; in practice that's just not how UA does things.