robb

I am so torn on this. On the one hand, I can totally see the argument that since the benefit is not reciprocal on airlines without such a product, it shouldn't be offered on UA.

On the other hand, I think it's a violation of the spirit of the idea of an airline alliance to deny elite treatment on any given airline to the elites of the partner carriers. All *A carriers who do offer such a perk should offer it to all *S and *G elites.

My gut tells me that those arguing that it dilutes the *Alliance are right. All that can follow is infighting and reduced benefits for us all.

FT Guest xyzpdq

To me E+ was a nice feature on NA flights - that added a little extra comfort to an otherwise less than nice product. This was an incentive to fly US - now I might as well connect with other carriers - the price is more or less the same whether I connect with UA, US, AA or CO.

On intercontinetal flights UAs Economy product stinks - 31 pitch, horrible service (food, drinks and overall ambience). The only incentive for going UA longhaul was the E+ feature - which by no means is a seperate cabin just the same seat in the same cabin with same service but with a few more inches of leg room (not at all comparable to the NZ, SK, VS products).

Bottom line: I will definately not take a UA intercontinental flight after this - and for NA flights I might as well take any other carrier - whereas I before had a strong preference for UA.

Does the move make good business sense for UA? - I hope they have a solid business case for messing with a large group of frequent flyers. Personally my tickets will have a lot less UA flight codes on them from now on.

flysurfer

Exactly. What's next? Should LH stop accepting UA*Gs at their F check-in? After all, isn't the C check-in is good enough? Or no more SEN lounges for UA*Gs, the FTL lounges will certainly do, correct? Middle seat blocking in Y? Not for UA*G, just pack all of them into the back.

Then again, we have those notorious complainers who keep repeating that this is exactly how LH is DELIBERATELY treating UA elites, anyway. Remember the infamous "LH hates UA elites" thread? It's funny that these people don't realize that most of these horrible, terrible, unspeakable LH experiences have their source in incompatible booking systems and making the mistake to book LH flights on ual.com, often as a codeshare.

Personally, I had only 6 segments on UA metal this year, all of them in F. Two additional F segments LAX-SYD and return are to follow in December. I'm 1K and SEN. So I'm pretty much unbiased about this E+ thingie. However, the lack of graciousness displayed in certain posts (especially those accusing other posters who have a real understanding of maximizing FFP value of being irrational! ), makes for a pretty revealing discussion that displays a lot of character and attitude. Those two inches of additional legroom apparently generate a lot of "human interest".

ftweb

It seems to me that we have a bunch of people who are members of another *A frequent flyer program but fly a fair number of UA segments. This change is bad news for them. So we can expect two things to happen:

Some of these people will fly fewer UA segments, to avoid UA's E- product which is even more cramped than most airlines' economy product.

Other people will switch frequent flyer programs to Mileage Plus. After all, I've seen very rational posts from people essentially doing the cost/benefit analysis and showing why it better for them to be, say, a US elite than a UA elite. Well, UA has just changed the equation.

It's not a priori clear which of these things will happen more often. There's certainly a lot of anecdotal evidence on this board that people are very annoyed with UA and want to take their business elsewhere, but non-FTers might react differently.

That said, I don't know how to quantify the value of having more MP members, compared to the lost revenue. Certainly it gives United the ability to spam people with offers and publicity. Also, again anecdotally, MP members do seem to develop a kind of love-hate relationship with UA where despite resenting UA's sucky web site, broken seats, bad service, etc., they nonetheless are willing to pay more for UA tickets. In large part this is probably because of E+.

So maybe United is thinking that E+ is a drug people won't be able to live without. Give everyone a taste. Then take away people's E+ access and they'll join your frequent flyer program, despite hating you.

That said, I can't think of any plausible reason for denying E+ access to Y and B fares. Assuming the people making this policy aren't stupid (which I think is safe to say given United's recent profitability), there just has to be some "cost" element to E+ that no one in this thread has identified yet.

Maybe if United offered 3P status after 5,000 Y or B class miles this would make sense--start rewarding the high spenders as much as possible. But even with the CoS bonus, currently it would take 3-4 transcons to get 2P status. For a non-MP member, I can't see any possible reason to book a Y or B class fare instead of M/E/whatever (I forget what the cheaper refundable classes are). Maybe the explanation is that in fact no one ever does book those high fare classes (there was a point recently when the web site wouldn't even sell them), so they are just simplifying things by getting rid of irrelevant rules.

Jetstreamer

Noticed that from today all UA seat maps show the Y+ section as full/not available for assignment even for dates months into the future. This was using expert flyer. I then tried expedia and the same deal and then united.com trying to buy a full fare ticket and the Y+ seat map didn't open up either as it did yesterday.

Looks like my knees will have to be reintroduced to my chest

rangerss75

This assumes that everyone only belongs to one FF scheme and/or only one alliance. For a lot of us this is simply not true. Our travel patterns are more complex. This is certainly the case for many European residents, as one single airline rarely answers our travel needs. I suspect it's also true in the USA for those who live in cities which are hubs for more than one airline. I have FF schemes in two alliances, which gives me the choice of five US airlines for my domestic US flights. E+ has been a big factor in my choice of United if I'm flying in Coach. On my next trip (in about five weeks) I have one itinerary of five sectors for which I only chose United because of E+. I was allocated E+ seats ten days ago before the recent change, so I shan't be too pleased if they're taken away from me at check-in and I'm put in a middle seat at the back. The other intinerary is mostly in First, so I chose Continental, though it would have involved some very out-of-the-way connections if I'd gone for United. Continental was also on offer (though less convenient) for the United itinerary. If there is no E+ for me on United, then I'd prefer to go with them.

I fully understand that it was a rather generous benefit to *G members and I'm not really surprised that it is disappearing. I'm just saying that several factors are often involved in the choice of carrier and United certainly doesn't automatically get my business. But the E+ benefit put it pretty well at the top of the list for travel in Coach.

jef7

To those claiming that E+ seat is the main determining factor for choosing UA, well, $299 really isn't that much for a year access with few more leg room and more comfort.

Let's face it, these E+ seats are really intended for people who fly and put their money on UA metal regularly, if not exclusively and use MP as their frequent flyer program. Sure, there will always be an exception of non-UA *A Gold/Silver members who already spend significantly on UA, but then again, I suspect these, as noted, make up a small fraction.

So who really deserves an E+ seat? Is it the last minute UA elite flyer or a non-UA *G/S flyer? Clearly, UA is setting aside these seats as a loyalty benefit, and definitely for the former.

simong

I guess you are right and you wont mind paying it yourself in the near future?

jef7

If I currently don't have UA elite status and will be flying UA for several segments or itineraries simong, I'll absolutely pay for it.

LHR Tim

What flights were you looking at? Just tried a dummy booking for Ted (rar!) LAX-LAS. Seems that if you say ecomony (no restrictions) it books into U - which is not eligible.

So right, we'll try a mainline flight - LAX-BOS. Hmmm. That gives an EBIZX fare. So pay a shed load of mone,y but since it is an E fare, that means no E+ for you!

So finally, try booking but set 'Upgrade Eligibilty' to 'Miles YB' to force to a Y/B fare. Well that it does, but then even though it gave a BUA fare, no E+ is opened up.

So has it been cut off from *G/*S and those on full fares now??

simong

you miss the point, maybe soon UA status won't be good enough.. The same as it isnt for RCC

jef7

Well, everything is possible . Yet all we can do is speculate. The good thing is that UA isn't the only airline out there and we could freely choose according to benefits and costs. Until then, my UA elite status gives me E+ for free.

flysurfer

Exactly. This might simply be a stopover on a route that ends with E+ as a seperate charge for everybody.

There's no real logic behind giving E+ to a 3P travelling on the cheapest fare, while a LH HON or SQ PPS on a very expensive full-fare Y ticket has to pay for it. So it's possible that in the end, everybody will have to pay up. Makes much more sense. I guess, UA is simply doing this step by step.

UA promised service enhancements after getting out of bancrupcy. Here are a few examples illustrating those "enhancements":

• higher award redemption levels for MP members
• new booking fees for awards
• no free food in P.S. Y
• no complementary E+ for *A elites and Y,B etc. fares
• continued replacement of U.S. based call centers with, um, less competent overseas CCs
• additional TED routes

UA is definitely on the right track. Carry on! ^

NickB

The argument holds true with respect to Germany. It is far less convincing in the other two major European markets, viz. the UK and France, where it is just as convenient to fly US. Ex-LON, up until now, US Air did not figure much on my radar, Why fly US when I can get E+ on UA? My choices for tatl were either UA or non-*A. Now, it does.
Where UA stands to lose most is in its international services. Now, I don't know about UA specifically, but I thought that it is in international services rather than domestic ones that money is made. And while non-UA *A elites might represent a small proportion of US domestic traffic, they represent a far more substantial fraction of UA international services. I would not mind so much the loss of E+ on UA domestic services. I rarely fly very long distances intra-US on UA (or any other airline, for that matter). I do mind the loss of E+ on international services, especially tatl services.
Another disadvantage of being relegated to E- is that all the E+ pax will be before me at immigration since they will leave the plane before me. To me, and many other non-US nationals, that is a real issue as it will increase my queuing time.
If I were UA, I would have treated international services and domestic services differently and maintained *A access to E+ on inter-continental services. But then, they did not ask for my opinion .
I will not boycott UA out of spite, but one thing for sure: they are likely to see less of me on tatl. I'll either spend a little more and go for BA WT+ or, when I need real cheap, whichever of US, CO, VS or UA is the most appropriate.

DJC

In my case, I will certainly be directing my business elsewhere. My situation is that I am *Gold with AC Aeroplan and will have flown 105 - 100,000 miles with the * Alliance this year. I am based in the UK and a lot of my flying is transatlantic.

By my reckoning, about 65 - 70,000 of those miles were or will be with UA this year - almost exclusively because of: (a) Economy Plus and (b) the ability to buy up from E+ to business on the day on UA. I'm 6'4 and so E+ transatlantic was very important to me - not to mention the fact that the further forward I am on the plane, the quicker I get through customs and make my connection. My travel includes a lot of my travel to the west coast of Canada - AC's direct flights to Vancouver don't work for me time-wise and so the options open are flying AC and changing in Toronto or Montreal or flying UA and changing somewhere in the US. For the reasons stated above and given that AC's product has deteriorated very badly, I've opted to go UA.

Now, some people will be saying, just switch to MP but I am sitting on a huge balance of miles with AC and don't really want to go down the path of having miles in a number of different pots. Plus, I don't know whether UA would even offer a status match from another *A carrier.

Infuriatingly, I e-mailed UA customer service yesterday and asked them: (a) whether E+ Access would be extended to *A members (you currently need to be a MP member) and (b) whether on check-in, I would now only be offered the option of buying up to E+ or whether the option to buy up to C would also be allowed (I generally ALWAYS do this for flights over two hours). I got a response that did not answer either of those queries. I am also not in a position to pitch up at the airport 5 hours before departure to try to "get a good seat".

My other option is to change to OneWorld and buy tickets in BA's WT+.

So it looks like it's goodbye UA and, for that matter, goodbye *A unless someone has any useful suggestions otherwise.