UA mileage earning on TP (TAP / Air Portugal) operated flights
 

I just booked a Discount Fare (the lowest) on TAP for an intra-European flight. It looks like it's an A fare, which does not show up on the UA mileage earning page.

Any experience earning UA miles on these TAP discount fares?

If the fare class is not shown on the partner mileage earning page, expect to get zero RDMs, PQMs, PQDs, .... and no Lifetime miles.

Only experience I've had with TAP is the following: Flew MAD-LIS this past Aug on an A fare as well - somehow got bumped up to biz but no mileage credit to UA.

Flew LIS-BOS this past Sept originally on an L fare (should be 50% UA credit). Got upgraded via their PlusGrade paid auction system to biz (ticket reissued as P) - three attempts to get the (L) credit all failed so I gave up.

I wouldn't hold your breath - if you really want the miles perhaps call TP and see if you can do a "buy-up" to a higher fare class.

With the lowest fare classes on TAP, including A, you earn zero on UA. The only program where these classes earn anything is TAP's Victoria, where they earn 10%. But it's probably best to keep on UA number on file with TAP, because then you get *G benefits, which will likely outweigh the puny value of 10% of Victoria miles you might get if you use that.

Just had some miles post from a TAP flight and noticed there was no premier bonus applied. I am UA Platinum and thought that a mileage bonus of 75% applied on top of the base miles earned. Fare was U class which earned 50% RDM and PQM.

I don't think there ever was a premier bonus on TP when crediting to UA.

:confused: why did you expect to earn a bonus?

I've never flown TAP before and thought the premier bonus applied to all *Alliance partners. Learnt something new.

From UA Website:
Flights ticketed and operated by select MileagePlus partner airlines, including Air Canada, ANA, Austrian, Brussels, Lufthansa and SWISS. See our Airline Partners and Global Alliances page for partner-specific information.

United denying miles for my TAP Air Portugal flight
 

I flew from RAK-LIS on a TAP Air Portugal flight with with fare class M. A few weeks after the flight I used United's website to request mileage credit. The request was immediately denied with a message saying: "The ticket number you entered is for travel that is not eligible MileagePlus credit or Premier qualifying credit." I thought that was odd as United's website says they give 100% award miles earnings for fare class M on TAP Air Portugal.

I decided to call United and the rep told me to use their online system to file a problem request. I did that and provided a printout of my receipt (that shows fare class M) and a photo of my boarding pass. A couple days later I received this message from United: "This e-mail confirms receipt of your ticket receipt from Tap Portugal. I'd like to help credit your flight; however, it is shown on your document that the flight was operated by Portugalia, which is a not a partner in the MileagePlus program."

The thing is nowhere on any of my documents (receipt or boarding pass) does it show "Portugalia". It always says TAP Air Portugal and fare class M. Is there anyway I can confirm who actually operated my flight? Also, even if it was operated by Portugalia, does that mean I don't get any miles from United?

I know it's a matter of a small amount of miles, but I just want to know if United is being fair with me or not. Thanks in advance for any help.

Service between RAK and LIS appears to be operated by Portugália, operating as TAP Express. That information should be on your receipt somewhere. I won't speculate on whether or not you'll eventually get miles, as I'm not familiar with their arrangement. Whether or not regional carriers count for UA earning purposes seems to vary by carrier -- AC Jazz does, as it's considered part of AC; Silk Air doesn't, as it's considered independent of SQ. Someone with experience flying Portugália / TAP Express may be able to chime in on that.

Sounds like crud. Portugalia is a TAP-owned regional sub. This sounds like an uninformed agent hitting the same issue another poster hit with LZ allegedly not being eligible for credit ("Swiss Global" sub operating the 773s).

Could be wrong here but would HUACA.

Does it not have an "operated by" in the receipt line? This is a pretty rough situation, as Portugalia is a regional subsidiary of TAP. The alliance crediting rules for the regional and LCC subsidiaries are a mess, but absent any specific language I would push that a TP-marketed, NI-operated flight should accrue like a TP mainline (just like OO accrues as UA). But this is a messy situation, like MI being "not part of Star Alliance" despite being a subsidiary of SQ.

First, UA did not deny you credit, TAP / operated by Portugalia did. UA waits for the operating airline to notify UA to credit the miles. And if you make a missing mileage credit request, it is send to the operating airline for confirmation. To credit or not is TAP decison.

United.com & Orbitz list TAP 1451 (A319) as Operated By TAP Portugal and TAP Portugal 1453 ( ERJ-195 ) operated by / Portugalia / White Airways S.a

This is almost the identical situation with EVA Air and UNI Air, a wholly owned subsidiary that only operates with a BR code, but does not award MP EQMs nor RDMs. Must exercise extra care when choosing flights at booking.

The mileage credit situation with TP crediting to partners is a mess. This has nothing to do with it being TP mainline or an affiliate such as TAP Express or Portugalia.

Every economy fare code on TP is sold as one of four products: Discount, Basic, Classic or Plus. See TAP product line here. No matter the booking code (M in your case) what matters to TAP is what product of M fare you bought. If you buy anyfare-Discount you get 0 miles. Even full Y-Discount would get 0 miles. If you buy anyfare-Basic you get 50% miles on UA. anyfare-Classic you get 100% miles. And I think anyfare-Plus is also 100% but have never tested. The other day I bought E-Classic and got 100% miles, even though E is a dirt cheap class and theoretically would not earn anything on UA, but I uprated the product to E-Classic and got 100% miles on UA.

At TAP, the booking code is used for yield management only, and the product class is used for ancillary services such as baggage, seat assignment, and yes, mileage earning.

This is not understood at all by UA agents. They go by booking class only, but booking class is meaningless to TAP for the purposes of mileage earning. To TAP, mileage earning goes only by the product.

If you buy directly from flytap.com is is very clear which product you are buying. If you buy from a third party, they will typically only always sell you Discount, because it's cheapest and, well, to a third party an M fare is an M fare is an M fare. But it's not. On the RAK-LIS one-way, the M fare codes are:

Discount M25DSC0B 141 EUR (+YQ +taxes) -- bare bones, no miles
Basic M25BSC0B 155 EUR (+YQ +taxes) -- gets 1 checked bag and 50% miles on UA
Classic M25CLC0B 159 EUR (+YQ +taxes) -- gets 1 checked bag, seat assignment and 100% miles on UA
Plus M25PLU0B 203 EUR (+YQ +taxes) -- gets 2 checked bags, seat assignment, priority handling, and (I think) 100% miles on UA

What you have to look for are those characters DSC / BSC / CLC / PLU in the fare basis. That is what will determine your mileage earring. The common consumer does not know this.

I know, this situation is not explained like this anywhere on the UA site. And UA agents don't know about it. But it is what the reality is. If you want miles when flying TP, upgrade your product on TAP -- which means you probably have to book directly with TAP.

You could argue with UA agents as much as you want, TAP will not grant the miles for a DSC product. If you ever get miles, it will be because UA gave them to you out of the goodness of their heart.

Now, all the above applies to TP fares, which I assume if what your RAK-LIS was. If you fly TP on someone else's fare (e.g., you fly ORD-LHR-LIS on a UA fare, with the LHR-LIS segment operated by TP) then indeed the TP booking class as shown on the United earning table is what rules.