United.com Ecert frustration
 

I received an United 10% off Ecert with the following rules:

Valid Routing: This discount is valid for travel system wide on United, United Express or Ted during the above travel period.

Qualifying Fares: This discount may be used on qualifying roundtrips with a minimum fare of $100 or greater (F, A, P, C, D, Z, Y, B, M, E, U, H, Q, V, W, S, T, L fare classes) exclusive of taxes and fees.

I tried searching for an H fare (international upgradable fare) on united.com using one of the drop-down boxes and also entered the ecert number. But apparently, you can only pick one. Anyone has the same experience before? How can I find an H fare and apply the ecert discount? I tried just entering the ecert and never got to the "Review Itinerary" page......kept seeing the animation. No one at united.com support or mileage plus was able to help (at least the ones I talked to). Any suggestions/insights?

Yes, I've had the same experience, and it wasn't any fun......But here's the only workaround I've been able to accomplish:

1)Find a very very good CSD on the phone,
2)Explain what you're trying to accomplish,
3)Let them call web support themselves (who will likely tell them that e-certs and H fares can't be combined),
4)Hope that the CSD knows this to be "nonsense",
5)Ask them if they will allow you to purchase the ticket on united.com USING the e-cert while they wait on the phone,
6)Have them 're-fare' the tix up to H by charging the difference to your CC, and,
7)Thank them profusely.

Its not an easy thing to get them to do, and they may tell you to take a flying leap, but I've gotten it to work in the past. YMMV.
Best wishes, Dave

the problem is that once the ecert is used on the lower fare, upfaring will negate the discount, as it will upfare to the published rate.

The whole thing is really, really, annoying!

I wholeheartedly agree that its very very annoying,,,,,,but it's not correct to say that an upfare will negate the cert. You need to find (and its like looking for a needle in a haystack!) a CSD who will simply charge you the "difference" between the fare basis in question (i.e.- Q v. H), and leave the underlying purchased ticket price alone. In any event, this will leave you with a higher fare basis and is inclusive of the discount. I was probably not very articulate in my earlier post. Sorry, Dave

1. Purchase the fare you want online.
2. call websupport and have them apply the ecert and/or refund the difference.
3. If they won't, cancel the ticket (withing 24 hours).

You guys probably aren't going to believe this and I was reluctant to believe united.com support, but this afternoon, I was able to book a ticket using the multi-city function and a friends plus e-cert. However it did take web support 45 minutes to figure it out.

Initially I entered SFO-SIN-HKG-SIN into the fields. I added the e-cert code and selected flights then got the message that the e-cert couldn't be applied. The green star that showed qualifying flights wasn't showing up on all the flights, but given that there's another sale going on that adds the stars, I wasn't surprised. Well after being put on hold a few times, the agent tells me to try this as she was able to get it to work :eek:

This time I entered SFO-HKG-SIN-HKG-SFO into the fields. I added the e-cert and voila all the flights showed as being eligble. Now the moment of truth after pressing continue and getting the fare. It worked! Why the first method didn't I don't know even though the same flights were selected. Anyhow I guess there is some hope for united.com!

The reason why I just didn't use the roundtrip search SFO-SIN is because I'm stopping in HKG for a layover to do shopping :)

By the way should mention that the fare basis that was returned was a W so for us with SWU's that's good ^

Anyone care to try and see if they can get the following to work: multi-city, e-cert, and SWU friendly fare ;)

Go buy a LOTTO ticket, pronto!!!

I'm not even going to bother trying to get this to work for myself. You just witnessed a miracle....

When I tried to use my 10% e-cert, united.com just hung up (30+ minutes) waiting for the fare (green starred flights). After several attempts, I ticketed w/o the e-cert; now I need to try to get them to credit me.....

Last e-cert failure I managed to get a $200 paper discount cert.

Yup, basically what I had to do last month - except I was just looking for a SWU fare. I ended up getting tossed around a lot (I think I actually wrote a post about it at the time, I was rather annoyed). I ended up in HNLRR and found myself a service director (a sup's sup) that got United.com web support on the line along with me, and they had at it for a while. Rather entertaining. In the end she simply refared my ticket (HNLRR) since United.com support was totally useless. The HNLRR women was incredible, although clearly annoyed at United.com person for their lack of assistance in the issue (it was clearly a United.com issue - and I wasn't even trying to do multicity thank you very much).

Call late, and just escalate. That's my motto.

So I am trying to book an F fare using e-cert. Part of the trip is on Great Lakes Airlines (codeshare). The only way you can book Great Lakes through united.com is to have a valid connecting UA or UX flight. All segments price out at United FUA fare, but it will not apply the e-cert. Do you think I can get web support to do it?

OT here, but....

when I saw the title of this thread, my evil mind gasped...
I thought United has an erect frustration... :eek: :eek: :eek:

:D :p :D