I do believe the poster is referring to the fact that sometimes the computer messes up and ignores the "quiet" period.

You may be right... I certainly did not draw that inference from what she said.

I also just realized that it does not adjust for timezones. I was on a quick turn in BWI last weekend. I didn't get my easy update until I could check my voicemail at LAX and it was sent at 6:30am PDT, but my flight left at 8:30am EDT meaning I got the update 1 hour after I left BWI.

OK, no problem. Glad we are on the same page after all. ^

To reiterate what I've said here and on the other relevant threads: Sometimes the website works fine with e-certs and sometimes it screws up horribly.

And as for WindFlyer's question about "multi-city" itineraries (that are in reality roundtrips), I gave up trying to use that option because the website seemed to be programmed to automatically reject it as ineligible. I don't know if this has been fixed; it's been a while since I tried it.

BTW, a workaround I use to get the website to show more of the possible itineraries is to edit the URL: I change the "air_avail" parameter to make it larger than the normal 20 (or 10 or 5). This is a suggestion made by another FTer (whose name I can't recall now). Unfortunately, even if air_avail is set to a very high number, like 200 or even more, it doesn't magically show ALL possible itineraries. But at least it will usually show MORE of them.

And I should add by way of explanation as to how I was able to have so much success with my ten e-certs, given the website malfunctioning: First of all, many of my trips were mileage runs, and they were all discretionary. So if one itinerary and/or destination and/or date didn't work, I would try different ones. And/or I would come back to the website later and try again. It really took a lot of persistence, a truly unreasonable amount of persistence in fact. I don't think the average consumer should be expected to go through that to redeem e-certs!!!

I just tried one and it got rejected with a message about the cert only being good for roundtrips.

-Edit: My mistake, I tried with a %off cert, not a $ off cert as WindFlyer was asking about. I don't have any $ off certs available to test.

It worked just fine on mine--I used multi-city to price it, but it was actually an open-jaw. I was sure it wouldn't take, but there was no problem at all.

An update to all who care, I just got an updated E-Ticket receipt from UA reflecting the $100 e-cert.

It seems as if a new ticket number was issued. Will I still earn the 1,000 mile online booking bonus and the double miles per the United M+ Visa promotion?

Ok, I will change it to conspiricay to hire incompetent people.

In my case UA overcharged me a total of about $500.

It is principle and the fact that I suspect thousands of people have been overcharged hundreds of dollars.

I do have some encourging news. I will edit this post to the link when I have posted it. Give me 15 minutes, I type slow.

See http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showp...8&postcount=57 for the good news.

Thanks for the response, Kathy. I am encouraged by the success reported by MKE-MR ^

My problem has been that ual.com often chokes on something like an SFO-GRU/GIG/EZE R/T (it gives me RG codeshares, or can't find anything and asks me to look for 'bigger cities' or something like that), even if I change the url to ge 50 flight choices. The workaround, of course, has been to specify the route via 'multi-city.'

I had despaired of using two $100 CR certs until I was booking online a PDX-MIA flight for mid-January. It easily let me apply one for my flight but since my wife actually uses her own name I had to set up a separate PNR for her and then it refused to honor the second e-cert and I gave up and paid the full fare rather than risk losing the same flights for us both.

Call ual.crap web support and tell them you want them applied. Incist on it. But don't hold you breath.

I recently tried using an entertainment book e-cert ($ off), and united.com gave me the same error message whenever I tried to create a multicity booking. When I called United phone support, they said my routing (BOS-SFO-PDX-SEA-PDX-SFO-BOS) was "not a roundtrip" because the stops weren't in hub cities and therefore did not qualify for a discount.

That sounds kind of like a crock to me. That is a RT from BOS to SEA with some connections. In recent promotions, there has been very specific language about roundtrips, such as this from the DC bonus offer:

"roundtrip travel is defined as travel from an origin city to a destination city with return travel beginning in the outbound destination city back to the first origin city"

I would say your flights qualify under ths definition (which I know is not binding because it is part of a promo). I will tout the FT motto, keep calling until you get someone who will give you the answer you are looking for.

You are due the 1K miles but will have to call MP to get them posted after the trip. I think the double miles will be OK since the but you will have to follow thru and make sure. The $100 will show as a credit and those EQM should be deducted. I have to keep a complex spreadsheet to make sure all mine are correct. BTW, MY spreadsheet is kindof messy so I don't want to send it out in case someone is interested.