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[Unconfirmed] UA Preparing to Sell E+ at Booking as Separate Cabin (like DL C+)

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[Unconfirmed] UA Preparing to Sell E+ at Booking as Separate Cabin (like DL C+)

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Old Nov 29, 2019, 2:10 pm
  #211  
 
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Originally Posted by findark
Looks like they were allowed to expire on 21-Nov and not replaced or updated yet. UA is probably evaluating the results of their "limited trial".
Hoping this little "trial" netted at most $0 in additional revenue, and that this is the last we will hear of it.
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Old Dec 2, 2019, 11:47 pm
  #212  
 
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Originally Posted by Aussienarelle
Understand unconfirmed, mere speculation, etc.

But I do think United needs to do something to make Platinum attractive. Currently, apart from the few PlusPoints they are throwing at Platinums next year the gap to 1K is too large and the difference between Gold and Platinum too small.

I will never make 3MM and at 1.3MM not currently incentivized to make 2MM.
I would say the biggest advantage of platinum over gold is that you get a lot more first class upgrades then us poor gold do. I'm just a lowly million miler and I have to beg for scraps.
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Old Dec 3, 2019, 12:19 am
  #213  
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Originally Posted by ztug
I would say the biggest advantage of platinum over gold is that you get a lot more first class upgrades then us poor gold do. I'm just a lowly million miler and I have to beg for scraps.
How often do you end up #1 on the waitlist? In general, there aren't all that many Platinum flyers. What routes you fly, and when you fly them, matter a lot more than the distinction between Platinum and Gold.
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Old Dec 3, 2019, 12:56 pm
  #214  
 
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Originally Posted by jsloan
How often do you end up #1 on the waitlist? In general, there aren't all that many Platinum flyers. What routes you fly, and when you fly them, matter a lot more than the distinction between Platinum and Gold.
Just to add to this, my upgrade % as a 1K last year (2018) was less than 25%.......... as a platinum, I would be surprised to see it much above 10%, and would bet on less.

With the pricing scheme for premium class, as well as DoD upgrade offers, I would be surprised to see these stats change for the better... likely for the worse as UA revenue management optimizes pricing.
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Old Dec 3, 2019, 3:05 pm
  #215  
 
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Originally Posted by jjmoore
Just to add to this, my upgrade % as a 1K last year (2018) was less than 25%.......... as a platinum, I would be surprised to see it much above 10%, and would bet on less.

With the pricing scheme for premium class, as well as DoD upgrade offers, I would be surprised to see these stats change for the better... likely for the worse as UA revenue management optimizes pricing.
Before I retired 2 years ago I was getting probably 50% upgrades in the summer and 25% in the winter between Newark and Florida with just gold. I guess it does depend on the routes and the day of the week. I tell my wife not to depend on it when we are competing with business Travelers between hubs obviously. tomorrow we're flying from Orlando to Las Vegas via Houston and they switched planes to smaller first class cabins and we're like 6 and 7th on the upgrade list with full cabins already. No joy. We'll be lucky if we have an empty seat between us in an exit row.

I earned my million Miler status 1,000 miles at a time between Florida and Newark mostly. Not with long haul international flights.
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Last edited by ztug; Dec 3, 2019 at 3:15 pm
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Old Dec 4, 2019, 12:17 am
  #216  
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Originally Posted by ztug
Before I retired 2 years ago I was getting probably 50% upgrades in the summer and 25% in the winter between Newark and Florida with just gold. I guess it does depend on the routes and the day of the week. I tell my wife not to depend on it when we are competing with business Travelers between hubs obviously. tomorrow we're flying from Orlando to Las Vegas via Houston and they switched planes to smaller first class cabins and we're like 6 and 7th on the upgrade list with full cabins already. No joy. We'll be lucky if we have an empty seat between us in an exit row.

I earned my million Miler status 1,000 miles at a time between Florida and Newark mostly. Not with long haul international flights.
1,000,000/1,000=1000. If you did 1000 flights then you must have buns of steel!
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Old Dec 4, 2019, 7:00 pm
  #217  
 
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Originally Posted by Silver Fox
1,000,000/1,000=1000. If you did 1000 flights then you must have buns of steel!
Just looked back at my travels and I've done 1000 segments in 6 years. Not so hard to rack those up with tons of domestic travel.
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Old Dec 5, 2019, 8:19 am
  #218  
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Originally Posted by jjmoore
Just looked back at my travels and I've done 1000 segments in 6 years. Not so hard to rack those up with tons of domestic travel.
See GSunitedloyal 's annual totals...

David
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Old Dec 5, 2019, 8:53 am
  #219  
 
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Originally Posted by DELee
See GSunitedloyal 's annual totals...

David
Yeahhhh I'm definitely not in that league
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Old Jan 2, 2020, 11:37 pm
  #220  
 
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I followed the directions in the OP and did an advanced search for B fare class for a number of different routes, LAX-ORD and also LAX-DEN (which is not supposed to be in the trial) and in both cases, selecting the B fare pretty much allows a non-premier user to select E+ seats for free. So i don't know what to make of it ?
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Old Jan 3, 2020, 12:22 am
  #221  
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Originally Posted by arshi007
I followed the directions in the OP and did an advanced search for B fare class for a number of different routes, LAX-ORD and also LAX-DEN (which is not supposed to be in the trial) and in both cases, selecting the B fare pretty much allows a non-premier user to select E+ seats for free. So i don't know what to make of it ?
Well, they seem to have dropped the discount B fares that had been appearing before, so I don't think a customer who buys a B fare fore "free" E+ would be getting much of a deal. That said, I don't see the text about "Economy Plus" in these fare rules, so if they're still giving E+ on a B fare, it may just be leftover behavior from the trial.
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Old Jan 3, 2020, 8:28 am
  #222  
 
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Originally Posted by jsloan
Well, they seem to have dropped the discount B fares that had been appearing before, so I don't think a customer who buys a B fare fore "free" E+ would be getting much of a deal. That said, I don't see the text about "Economy Plus" in these fare rules, so if they're still giving E+ on a B fare, it may just be leftover behavior from the trial.
Yes, i agree that the B fares pretty expensive (so the E+ isn't free from the cost point of view) but my understanding was that, previously purchasing any economy fare (even a Y) would still require you to pay separately to select an E+ seat (if you weren't a Gold+). Now it seems like, certain economy fare classes comes with free E+ selection which could possibly indicate that those fare classes have now been "re"assigned to E+ as a separate class (and i'm just hypothesizing here).
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Old Jan 3, 2020, 9:46 am
  #223  
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Originally Posted by arshi007
Yes, i agree that the B fares pretty expensive (so the E+ isn't free from the cost point of view) but my understanding was that, previously purchasing any economy fare (even a Y) would still require you to pay separately to select an E+ seat (if you weren't a Gold+). Now it seems like, certain economy fare classes comes with free E+ selection which could possibly indicate that those fare classes have now been "re"assigned to E+ as a separate class (and i'm just hypothesizing here).
There was a move earlier to give free E+ on domestic flights that connect to Premium Plus; UA is booking those tickets into B. So, I suspect what you're seeing is a side-effect of that. This is different from the B fares that they set up that were using a differential price structure to track with the lowest economy fare. Nobody is paying a $700 fare difference on a domestic fare in order to get E+.

Now, you could still be correct -- this could be a precursor to DL-style "upgrades" into E+ -- but the simplest explanation is that it's just the way that they found to give E+ to PE customers.
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Old Jan 3, 2020, 7:50 pm
  #224  
 
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Originally Posted by jsloan
There was a move earlier to give free E+ on domestic flights that connect to Premium Plus; UA is booking those tickets into B. So, I suspect what you're seeing is a side-effect of that. This is different from the B fares that they set up that were using a differential price structure to track with the lowest economy fare. Nobody is paying a $700 fare difference on a domestic fare in order to get E+.

Now, you could still be correct -- this could be a precursor to DL-style "upgrades" into E+ -- but the simplest explanation is that it's just the way that they found to give E+ to PE customers.
i sure hope you are absolutely right and i'm absolutely wrong
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 10:24 pm
  #225  
 
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New column "Economy Fare + Extra Legroom"

I couldn't find this in another thread but as a 1K when I do a domestic flight search, usually the results come back with columns "Basic Economy, Economy, Flexible Economy, and Business/First". However today is the first time there was a new column "Economy Fare + Extra Legroom" with higher fares posted than the regular "Economy" column.

Does this mean United is no longer offering Economy Plus to their 1K members for free, and now we have to pay extra for Economy Plus?

Thanks
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