May 1, 2021, 4:06 pm
Last edit by: WineCountryUA
This is an archive thread, the active thread is "Dynamic Award Pricing" by UA; questions, experiences, .... {Archive}
The details:
Award travel updates
Introducing a broader range of award prices
Updates to award travel are on the horizon. For flights on or after November 15, 2019, we’ll no longer publish an award chart listing the set amount of miles needed for each flight.The details:
- Some award prices will be lower than what’s currently published in our chart. You may have already seen these prices, and you’ll be able to get them immediately.
- Other award prices may be higher than what you see today, especially if you’re traveling at a popular time. These prices will take effect immediately for travel November 15 or after.
- Starting November 15, we’re removing close-in fees, so you won’t be charged the extra fee of up to $75 for booking last-minute award travel.
- A flexible award travel calendar is available on united.com or in our app.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is changing?
For travel on or after November 15, we will no longer publish an award chart listing the set amount of miles needed for award flights. Award pricing will now fluctuate based on a variety of factors, including demand. Additionally, starting November 15, we will no longer charge a fee of up to $75 for award flights booked within 21 days of departure.When will these updates take effect?
The award pricing changes apply immediately to flights on or after November 15, 2019. Until then, award prices will be the same as or lower than what’s currently published in our award chart.How many miles will I need for award travel after November 15?
Award prices will now fluctuate based on a variety of factors. Some air awards will be available for less than what’s listed in our chart, which you may have already noticed. After November 15, award prices may also be higher, especially if you’re traveling at popular times. Use our flexible award calendar to get a monthly view of the award prices for a specific destination.Why are you making these changes?
Increasing award prices for the most in-demand flights allows us to offer better returns for our shareholders. If your award travel is flexible, these updates will help you make the most of your miles.How will these updates affect award travel availability?
United MileagePlus members with Premier® status and qualifying United Chase Cardmembers can continue to book award travel without blackout dates. For other members, most award flights that are available today will continue to be available after these updates take effect.Do the lowest-priced awards have any extra flight restrictions?
No. Our lowest priced awards do not have any added restrictions; the fare rules for all award travel apply.How can I find the lowest priced award for my travel?
The award calendar on united.com or in our app will continue to show the lowest available price for your destination.Will I earn miles on my flight if I book an award?
No. As with current award bookings, award travel in the future will not be eligible to earn miles with MileagePlus or any other loyalty program.What if I need to change my existing award?
If you need to change your award ticket, you will be issued a new ticket for which new pricing and additional fees may apply.What if I purchase a close-in award before November 15
The close-in booking fee will still apply to all tickets booked within 21 days of departure prior to November 15, 2019. We will not refund fees paid prior to November 15, even if travel occurs on or after November 15.
"Dynamic Award Pricing" by UA; questions, experiences, .... {Archive}
Apr 6, 2019, 5:06 pm
#676
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 23,066
Maybe this was covered previously, but if you book a flight at a higher amount, and later on it's available for a lower amount will you be able to get the lower priced award easily?
Currently if you book as standard and closer to your travel date a saver becomes available, a competent agent can get you the saver price.
Also is still best practice to book one way awards?
Currently if you book as standard and closer to your travel date a saver becomes available, a competent agent can get you the saver price.
Also is still best practice to book one way awards?
DL has roundtrip awards on a number of routes which are cheaper than two one-way's. I wouldn't assume that two one-way's will always result in the same price as a roundtrip.
Apr 6, 2019, 5:13 pm
#677
Join Date: Oct 2009
Programs: UA 1K, Hilton ♦ , Hyatt Carbonado, Wyndham ♦, Marriott PE, "Stinking Bum" elsewhere.
Posts: 5,000
The Smisek strategy for UA assumed a core cohort of customers would be forced, by reduced competition or corporate contracts, to fly United no matter their attitude toward the airline, licensing UA to ease up on pesky / difficult factors like 80%+ OTP, customer sat, and loyalty rewards. Kirby is not so different. Their idea of a utopian market is no consumer choice.
I am truly a free agent and will buy a cheaper J-class fare on a *A carrier, but UA usually has the best routings and shortest transit times to my international destinations. Short total transit times and comfort are really the only things that matter to me as an international business flyer. The soft product means nothing to me. The FF program, while having been very good to me, is really not as important as being able to UG to J with GPUs and/or the outstanding IRROPS service that comes with high status.
Apr 6, 2019, 5:15 pm
#678
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Austin, TX
Posts: 21,415
Apr 6, 2019, 5:46 pm
#679
Suspended
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Bay Area
Programs: DL SM, UA MP.
Posts: 12,729
The Smisek strategy for UA assumed a core cohort of customers would be forced, by reduced competition or corporate contracts, to fly United no matter their attitude toward the airline, licensing UA to ease up on pesky / difficult factors like 80%+ OTP, customer sat, and loyalty rewards. Kirby is not so different. Their idea of a utopian market is no consumer choice.
I bailed on DL SkyMiles. AA redemptions are garbage especially paying over a thousand to fly BA in J.
People love AS but their TATL premium cabin award options don’t seem great either.
So there isn’t an obvious choice for where to turn to if I were to bail on UA MP.
I have some Chase UR and some MR points but on those *A awards seem like the best options.
Apr 6, 2019, 6:03 pm
#680
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: ORD
Programs: UA 1K
Posts: 16,901
May not be wrong.
I bailed on DL SkyMiles. AA redemptions are garbage especially paying over a thousand to fly BA in J.
People love AS but their TATL premium cabin award options don’t seem great either.
So there isn’t an obvious choice for where to turn to if I were to bail on UA MP.
I have some Chase UR and some MR points but on those *A awards seem like the best options.
Apr 6, 2019, 6:58 pm
#681
Join Date: Jan 2013
Location: Hawai'i Nei
Programs: Au: UA, Marriott, Hilton; GE
Posts: 7,145
After decades of wonderful GF seats booked 330 days in advance at a saver rate, the last UA saver O international trip (HNL-LHR) we were able to book was three years ago. Since then, we have been unable to find confirmed saver O or I space at time of booking. So, decided to we pay for our trip to South America and back, and found AA J for much less than UA. Very impressed with the AA product. We then decided to pay for our trip from TYO to HNL, and once again, DL J was much less expensive than UA. Very impressed with the DL product.
Back to the AA experience in paid J: We earned so many miles on our South America Trip, we just redeemed a one-way J award HNL-NRT-XXX for 52.5K AA miles (we had to buy several thousand miles --on sale--to top off our holdings). By comparison, if I used UA miles, it would have been 110K.
With a million UA miles hanging around and the writing on the wall, for our next trip to Europe, for the first time we redeemed for a standard J award. Ouch.
I guess I have to thank UA for introducing us to DL and AA and encouraging us to become free agents in the travel marketplace.
Back to the AA experience in paid J: We earned so many miles on our South America Trip, we just redeemed a one-way J award HNL-NRT-XXX for 52.5K AA miles (we had to buy several thousand miles --on sale--to top off our holdings). By comparison, if I used UA miles, it would have been 110K.
With a million UA miles hanging around and the writing on the wall, for our next trip to Europe, for the first time we redeemed for a standard J award. Ouch.
I guess I have to thank UA for introducing us to DL and AA and encouraging us to become free agents in the travel marketplace.
Apr 6, 2019, 7:50 pm
#682
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: CA, USA
Programs: UA MM
Posts: 1
I think Australia will be a problem. I had a biz class flight (partners), all miles, lined up for Feb-March of this year, and it turned out I couldn't go so I didn't book. Two one-ways. SMF-SYD and return of MEL-SMF. Total charge was 170K miles and trivial $$ fee. Those same flights are showing in Feb-March 2020 as 400K miles plus trivial $$. A lot of the award flights seem to now be routed through Beijing, with biz to Beijing but an economy seat on PKG-SYD. I'm hoping partner airlines haven't released next spring's seats yet, and the price will become more favorable. But this doesn't bode well.
Apr 6, 2019, 7:52 pm
#683
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: BOS
Programs: UA MM
Posts: 1,581
I've been a M+ member since shortly after the program started in the early 80s. How many times have I heard the exact same story? "We're revamping our award structure. Some awards will cost more. Some will cost less." Yup, it's always a devaluation but they do throw in a few useless (to me) low mile options. Like when they introduced Saver awards. Saver are for people who don't mind catching a 5 AM flight or who are willing to start their vacation with the last flight of the day and arrive near midnight. I use my miles for "Standard" domestic Y travel, and it seems it was only about a year ago when those went up from 50K to 62.5K (oh, of course, all standard awards are not 62.5, only the ones that work remotely well for me - in other words, flat out devaluation). I thought maybe things would be OK at that for another few years. I was wrong.
But I stopped counting the miles a few years ago. They are not worth much any longer. I still usually fly UA, if the fare is remotely competitive, but that's because my MM benefits let me choose exit seats and a good baggage allowance, including overweight bags. But the steady devaluation of the miles, it is grating. And of course losing the option of miles for very short term emergency travel, losing that one will hurt.
As others have said, definitely time to get rid of the UA branded credit cards.
But I stopped counting the miles a few years ago. They are not worth much any longer. I still usually fly UA, if the fare is remotely competitive, but that's because my MM benefits let me choose exit seats and a good baggage allowance, including overweight bags. But the steady devaluation of the miles, it is grating. And of course losing the option of miles for very short term emergency travel, losing that one will hurt.
As others have said, definitely time to get rid of the UA branded credit cards.
Apr 6, 2019, 9:15 pm
#684
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Oct 2014
Posts: 10,904
I agree with this. The restaurant credit on PP makes the airline "club" lounges a lot less attractive, unless they are in a terminal without any other options. I just flew out of SFO but I didn't see any point in going to the UC -- much better food at Yankee Pier. My UC passes are probably going to expire unused in a couple of months -- even for free, I just don't see any value in using them.
Apr 6, 2019, 9:47 pm
#685
Join Date: May 2000
Location: IAH
Programs: UA 1K 2.7MM, Marriott Titanium/LT Plat, IHG Spire
Posts: 3,317
I've already gotten bit by this change. I've been saving miles for four tickets for a standard economy one way from EZE-IAH after a South America cruise in early January. Was going to be 70K miles for the one way standard award or 280K total. We can still book on partners for that but the non-stop that was 70K last week is now 85K. So 60K more for the four of us. :-(. I'll probably fly the partner to save the miles. This just stinks because now I cannot plan ahead and know that if I just accumulate X miles I can get a standard award.
Apr 6, 2019, 9:57 pm
#686
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2017
Programs: AS 75K, DL Silver, UA Platinum, Hilton Gold, Hyatt Discoverist, Marriott Platinum + LT Gold
Posts: 10,515
After decades of wonderful GF seats booked 330 days in advance at a saver rate, the last UA saver O international trip (HNL-LHR) we were able to book was three years ago. Since then, we have been unable to find confirmed saver O or I space at time of booking. So, decided to we pay for our trip to South America and back, and found AA J for much less than UA. Very impressed with the AA product. We then decided to pay for our trip from TYO to HNL, and once again, DL J was much less expensive than UA. Very impressed with the DL product.
Back to the AA experience in paid J: We earned so many miles on our South America Trip, we just redeemed a one-way J award HNL-NRT-XXX for 52.5K AA miles (we had to buy several thousand miles --on sale--to top off our holdings). By comparison, if I used UA miles, it would have been 110K.
With a million UA miles hanging around and the writing on the wall, for our next trip to Europe, for the first time we redeemed for a standard J award. Ouch.
I guess I have to thank UA for introducing us to DL and AA and encouraging us to become free agents in the travel marketplace.
Back to the AA experience in paid J: We earned so many miles on our South America Trip, we just redeemed a one-way J award HNL-NRT-XXX for 52.5K AA miles (we had to buy several thousand miles --on sale--to top off our holdings). By comparison, if I used UA miles, it would have been 110K.
With a million UA miles hanging around and the writing on the wall, for our next trip to Europe, for the first time we redeemed for a standard J award. Ouch.
I guess I have to thank UA for introducing us to DL and AA and encouraging us to become free agents in the travel marketplace.
Apr 6, 2019, 10:09 pm
#687
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: San Francisco
Programs: All-Around Kettle
Posts: 3,291
Apr 6, 2019, 10:22 pm
#688
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: May 2001
Posts: 10,971
Good they did not announced on Monday (April Fools) 
I have a decent number of miles accumulated. I guess since most of my miles came from travels I would have to do / pay for anyway (work, family, maintain status) and we know this kind of thing happens, what can I do, right?
This makes "doing the math" a lot harder. When the reward is not clear, why should people try so hard to get it? "Apply for the MileagePlus Explorer Card and you get points that might be enough to take a trip somewhere."
With the economy doing well and less competition, you wonder what is next...
I have a decent number of miles accumulated. I guess since most of my miles came from travels I would have to do / pay for anyway (work, family, maintain status) and we know this kind of thing happens, what can I do, right?
This makes "doing the math" a lot harder. When the reward is not clear, why should people try so hard to get it? "Apply for the MileagePlus Explorer Card and you get points that might be enough to take a trip somewhere."
With the economy doing well and less competition, you wonder what is next...
Apr 6, 2019, 10:24 pm
#689
Join Date: Mar 2014
Programs: 1K
Posts: 220
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery so I vote for MileagePesos.
Apr 7, 2019, 12:26 am
#690
Join Date: May 2008
Location: Bay Area
Programs: UA 1k now; AA (no status); HY Diamond; SPG Platinum
Posts: 707
I guess I got lucky and booked to SQ special deal in D from JFK to SIN- will now switch to NH for miles accrual. Done with any us based carrier FF program.