Anybody use expertflyer.com?
 

Anybody use https://www.expertflyer.com/ and is there any advantage to that software over what united.com offers in expert mode (or what other websites provide without charge)? The listing of all published/available fares and rules looks particularly useful.

These are the rates:

RATE PLAN INFORMATION - PLEASE READ

All prices are in US Dollars.

Subscription Plans:

* Basic Service. $4.99 per month per subscriber. Includes 250 queries of Basic
services. Additional queries are $.05. Minimum one month service agreement required.
Term is month to month and is automatically renewed at the then current rate unless
cancelled. Additional queries in excess of the 250 queries included in this plan will be
automatically purchased and billed at the end of the billing period within which they were
purchased. You will be considered to have purchased these additional queries each
time you execute a query within the service in excess of the included 250 queries for that
billing period. You may terminate service and receive a full refund of the monthly
subscription fee within the first 5 days after plan commencement, subject to the
conditions in section 17 of the ExpertFlyer.com Terms and Conditions. After this initial 5
day period after service commencement, subscribers who terminate before the end of
their billing cycle will be charged for the entire monthly service fee. Any subsequent new
subscription that is for the same customer or billed to the same credit card as previously
used for a cancelled subscription of any plan will be deemed to be a reconnection of
service and not subject to a full refund in the event of cancellation within 5 days of
service. Applicable taxes, assessments, and other fees and charges, including charges
for additional queries in excess of the included 250 queries, are additional and not
refundable.

* Premium Service - Monthly. $9.99 per month per subscriber. Includes unlimited
queries of Basic and Premium services. Term is month to month and is automatically
renewed at the then current rate unless cancelled. You may terminate service and
receive a full refund of the monthly subscription fee within the first 5 days after plan
commencement subject to the conditions in section 17 of the ExpertFlyer.com Terms
and Conditions. After this initial 5 day period after service commencement, subscribers
who terminate before the end of their billing cycle will be charged for the entire monthly
service fee. Any subsequent new subscription that is for the same customer or billed to
the same credit card as previously used for a cancelled subscription of any plan will be
deemed to be a reconnection of service and not subject to a full refund in the event of
cancellation within 5 days of service. Applicable taxes, assessments, and other fees
and charges are additional.

* Premium Service - Annual. $99.99 per year per subscriber. Includes unlimited queries
of Basic and Premium services. Term is one (1) year and is automatically renewed at the
then current rate unless cancelled. You may terminate service and receive a full refund
of the annual subscription fee within the first 5 days after plan commencement subject to
the conditions in section 17 of the ExpertFlyer.com Terms and Conditions. After this
initial 5 day period after service commencement, subscribers who terminate before the
end of their billing cycle will be charged the Premium Service Monthly fee for each and
all months, and any partial months, of subscription. Any subsequent new subscription
that is for the same customer or billed to the same credit card as previously used for a
cancelled subscription of any plan will be deemed to be a reconnection of service and
not subject to a full refund in the event of cancellation within 5 days of service.
Applicable taxes, assessments, and other fees and charges are additional.

* Corporate Service - Annual. $89.99 per year per subscriber. A minimum number of
ten (10) subscribers are required. Includes unlimited queries of Basic and Premium
services. Term is one (1) year and is automatically renewed at the then current rate
unless cancelled. You may terminate service and receive a full refund of the annual
subscription fee within the first 5 days after plan commencement subject to the
conditions in section 17 of the ExpertFlyer.com Terms and Conditions. After this initial 5
day period after service commencement, any subscriptions which terminate before the
end of their billing cycle will be charged the Premium Service Monthly fee for each and
all months, and any partial months, of subscription. In no event may the number of
subscriptions go below the minimum of ten (10) subscriptions. Any subsequent new
subscription that is for the same customer or billed to the same credit card as previously
used for a cancelled subscription of any plan will be deemed to be a reconnection of
service and not subject to a full refund in the event of cancellation within 5 days of
service. Applicable taxes, assessments, and other fees and charges are additional.

As far as I can tell it's no more accurate than what is on united.com.... it's just faster. Also, being able to look at seatmaps without having to go through a dummy booking is useful. The only problem is that it can only show what is in Sabre, so exit rows and E+ are blocked out.

During my brief subscription before I canceled it (after they restricted all the AA itin functions), I had found it didn't list any UA award booking buckets (R/X/O/I/N/E)... and for revenue buckets, as said you can find them on united.com.

Since aa.com doesn't list fare buckets, it was a little more useful for them, and listed AA award inventory too. For a UA only flyer, I would never recommend it unless you wanted the buckets and rules a little faster and were willing to pay for that.

There was MUCH discussion about it in the AA forum, and then moved to TravelBuzz here. That thread should tell you everything you ever wanted to know about it and a whole lot more!

It's interesting how something that generated over 200 posts in a matter of two weeks has been completely forgotten. OTOH I feel sorry for the entrepeneurs that started that business - once AA cut them access to the PNRs, their business was never the same.

Great availability information
 

I use Expertflyer extensively to find availability across airlines. For example, if I need to go from "here" to "there", I first do a search on expertflyer. Then, when I have identified my options, I contact the airlines directly to do a booking which matches my schedule, etc.