Originally Posted by Kacee

That doesn't matter, a P is a P. Despite the fare rules restriction already noted, I've made this change via SDC on the app, though it's been a couple of years.

That said, with fares where they currently are (very low), I'd just book the premium t-con to start with.

Originally Posted by ryman554

If anybody has tips on how to fly business PS with a connection on Chase points, I'm all ears. Otherwise, the "SDC onto the lieflats" becomes the primary option.

Originally Posted by emcampbe

i thought (at least pre-COVID) most domestic fares on ‘normal’ routes had fare rules specifically not allowing changes to premium TCON. Someone check me on that. If that is the case, and still so, fare class availability wouldn’t matter. If not, While P may not normally be available on SFO-EWR and vv, in that case, couldn’t someone on a regular Z fare still make the change if availability was there?

of course, who knows what the app will allow or not allow on any specific day. And in IRROPS, of course, mostly anything goes. But absent the latter, likely would not be an option. At least I’d personally see that as the expectation.

UPDATE: I just checked myself. Looked at a RT PDX-SFO in F on a random April midweek, and found the following in the fare rules..at least for the outbound (bolding mine). So seems I remember correctly:

Originally Posted by Kacee

That's a UA routing restriction, rather than a Chase portal problem. The only fare UA sells that allow that routing is a full fare J or F.

I wasn't focused on the fact you're trying to route from PDX as opposed to originating in SFO/EWR.

Originally Posted by ryman554

That's not right... I can buy a "round trip" ticket on a P/Z fare from PDX-SFO-EWR just fine. I can price it out on matrix/ITA. I can even buy it on united.com. What I can't do is get anything more than 2-3 options from the Chase portal, a subset of the stuff that I can see elsewhere, and none of which I want.

Anywhere else, I can go to multi-city and pick out the flights I want and it ends up pricing properly. On the chase portal, when you choose multi-city, it asks for "buisness" or "first" for the entire itinerary (instead of leg by leg), and since the fare between PDX-SFO is "first" and SFO-EWR is "business", it can't find either and either sends me to economy of PDX-SFO-EWR (if I choose business) or sends me non-PS PDX-SFO-XXX-EWR (if I choose first).

Originally Posted by Kacee

UA won't sell PDX-SFO-EWR as a throughfare, only as an end-on-end combination. You'll get the exact same pricing buying two separate tickets (PDX-SFO, SFO-EWR) from Chase.

ETA: Which means you probably will not be able to SDC this itinerary if you purchase through UA.

Originally Posted by ryman554

Wow, you know what, you're right! Been doing this a long time and still don't appreciate the nuances. That was very helpful.. and buying two tickets on separate PNR will defeat the purpose of extra $$ for the DPQM run. Drat.

Originally Posted by Kacee

Yeah they call this a "broken fare" and it requires a manual exception to SDC. I'm not sure they'll even consider doing that anymore.

You could book PDX-SFO with miles.

Originally Posted by VWang1111

But there should be no need to do the SDC if you book an end-on-end combination with PS on a single PNR and protected from mis-connects etc.