coinboy66

I booked a flight for my Brazilian partner to come to the US, on an Azul flight to GRU, then UA to IAH and DCA. Paid 30K miles + tax. Strangely enough, the Azul flight is booked into Z class instead of X or R. At the airport, the Azul agent told him she could not see any of his itinerary beyond his Azul flight that was *paid* for by UA. Thus, he was able to earn Azul points on a UA award ticket! Has anyone else experienced this/know what's going on?

airzim

dvs7310

NH domestic awards also book into revenue classes. Sometimes they credit as Y, sometimes they don't. They system itself strips your frequent flyer number out, but depending on how the agent adds it back (for *G recognition), you might get credit.

CaptainMiles

Years ago I redeemed an intra-Europe award that involved a double connection: TK to OS to SK. The TK segment booked into revenue (full Y) and earned miles on UA. The OS and SK segments on that same ticket booked into award class.

coinboy66

It just seems so strange because this would be a painfully easy thing for UA to prevent. They just need to maintain a list of miles/points redemption fare buckets for that carrier and make sure their booking engine has access to them. Especially easy for the star carriers (or should be), but even Azul would surely work with UA on this if requested.

diburning

That won't work now (that is, if you redeemed UA miles for that ticket). UA's system has a record of that ticket being an award ticket, and any changes down the line affecting the fare bucket won't result in any credit on UA. This happened to me. I was flying on a UA award ticket with the final segment being a TATL on Lufthansa. I was able to buy an upgrade to Premium Economy at the gate, and my ticket was "resissued" to E (but retained the original UA ticket number). If I had thought of it at the time, I probably could have switched my FF# to M&M and gotten some sort of credit for that segment.

jhangilp

I have a question on United Award Flight Schedule Change on Partner Flight.So I booked an award flight from NA to South America for the summer and just got an email from United saying that my flight schedule changed and looking at it, it changed my middle portion of the flight from Sao Paulo (GRU) to Buenos Aires (EZE) by more than 10 hours and not I am arriving at 2 AM. Since this won't work I want to call and try to get the flight changed, but the problem is that this award is on Azul airlines and I am not sure what United will do about a schedule change on a partner airline. Another problem is that there doesn't seem to be many options for me since there are no other flights from GRU to EZE that day (only previous day). I am willing to fly from Sao Paulo to Montevideo instead, but I am not sure if they will even let me do that as that is change in destination. I can go onto their website and click modify reservation to change that flight from Sao Paulo to Montevideo instead, but it will charge me $75 for the change fee, is there anyway to get United to waive that fee because of the schedule change?

On a related note my flight from NA to South America also changed, but only by 15 minutes or so. I was wondering if I can some have them move me to a united Polaris flight since I am currently placed in an uncomfortable COPA airlines business, but the Polaris flight doesn't have any saver awards available only standard.

Any suggestions are appreciated before I make a call to United this afternoon. Thanks

jsloan

They will open space on a UA flight, if that helps. So, if you can fly UA metal to EZE, that's an option.

If that's a better outcome for you, ask for it. That should be no problem.

You can ask, but a 15-minute change is below their schedule change threshold (30 minutes), so they may say no.

WineCountryUA

UA has limited options for award partner schedule changes. If there is another partner award flight available, you will be able to change for free and that should include a change of airports / destinations.

If there is no partner award options, UA is generally unable to get partners to create space.

If there is a UA operated solution, UA will open award space in the booked cabin on their operated flights (assuming there is space), Again for no fee or mileage change.

If neither works, UA will refund the ticket for no fee.

jhangilp

This is very helpful, thank! I will try to get them to change me to a different partner flight from Sao Paulo to Montevideo instead.

ali7204

I am trying to add the following to my already ticketed award (EWR-BOG), a one way flight and I am doing it within 24 hour cancellation window.

Excursionist perk( IGU-EZE) same region and it is coming out at 0 miles and taxes

last leg: taking a return flight from IST/LIS- NYC later this year for another trip.

Eveyrthing is calculating fine except when I go to last page for payment, the website bombed.

should I call and see if there is an availability issue OR would I be making life difficult for an agent?

ETA: I was able to get it ticketed online.

jsloan

I would call. While that itinerary is unusual, it doesn't seem abusive, so I don't suspect the agent will be intentionally unhelpful.

Kacee

Right. UA's systems are absolutely able to do it. Some agents are better than others and/or have access to better tools.

ali7204

That's absolutely true. In my case, I just had wonderful agent who went above and beyond to grab the seats which are not visible on UA.com and she didn't even charge the $25 telephone booking fees. It was for 5 J pax from South American to USA so I was fully expecting to hear the united phantom award space issue and indeed she mentioned it first but then after holding and continually working for more than 30 minutes, she was able to grab 5 J seats.

ali7204

After a 3rd or 4th try, I still got an error but it was a different error. Something like "please call united to confirm the changes" so I called and agent looked at it and everything is fine on united end.
I can look up the reservations details on Azul website for my EP leg.