MUTiger86

Seriously, if anyone can share getting any benefit whatsoever other than boarding in front of the 30% of the passengers who aren't GS, 1K, etc., I'd like to know it. Star Alliance Gold is supposed to give me something called "Priority Airport Standby" on partner airlines. To the best of my knowledge, on United that means I get the opportunity to pay $75 to fly in an unused seat before the next guy.

No matter when I book, I'm in a middle seat in the back of the plane, #18 on the upgrade list, and certainly no premium coach seat ever. So I am wondering: is it just me or is United this crappy to all USAir Platinums?

Bill

Captain Flush

If you're #18 on United's upgrade list based on your status with US, you're actually doing pretty well. Just being *G shouldn't get you on the UDU list at all.

phlwookie

I used to go out of my way to fly UA when the alliance between US and UA was younger, even before US joined Star. However, when they stopped giving E+ to Star elites and otherwise treated me less well, I reduced my usage of UA to the extent that I haven't flown them in about a year now and am in no hurry to. With the US-HP merger I needed UA less out West as well.

That said, it is airport dependent to some extent. I have had good luck with UA gate agents in LAX and PHL, and truly poor experiences in particularly IAD. ORD is hit or miss.

By default I tend to get some of the worst E- seats by default on UA but have been generally able to talk my into at least marginally better ones or E+. Then again, LH does the same thing to me as a Star Gold in Y - it's not that I mind traveling in E- if that's what I paid for, but those two seem to go out of their way to give me the restroom view seats with the associated enhanced olfactory experience by default, and thus get less of my business.

bevoinva

The "standby" designation is for a flight that is sold out. The $75 fee you mention is for open flights having seats available. Similar to US Move Up program. United has a similar program. If you were to try and get on a sold out flight and truly fly "standby" your *G status would get you priority for that flight.

UA doesn't give other FF members access to preferred seats (e.g. E+). For that matter, US doesn't give United elites any kind of preferred seat either. Preferred seating isn't a benefit of *G so you shouldn't expect it.

As for being on the upgrade list. I'd love to know how you got on it in the first place since once again, this isn't a benefit of *G.

Bottom line - US is following *A rules and giving you the benefits they are required to give and what US would give to a UA *G flyer.

dtremit

I've found that the UA website sometimes has issues with seat assignment -- seats that are shown as available when doing a flight search (and which are in no way premium) become unavailable after booking. When this happens I have always been able to get them reassigned over the phone.

MUTiger86

I guess I just expect US/UA to be more like some of the other partnerships. Alaska/Delta is a thing of beauty. Oh well, I guess I won't have to worry about UA much longer...

bevoinva

Years ago I think it was more like the partnership you mention. UA used to give US elites E+ access - US used to give UA elites preferred seats (e.g. exit rows). Then UA took away the E+ access for US flyers; US took away exit row access for US flyers and it just went down hill from there.

Mykle

US doesn't really have a comparable product to E+, so it was the UA people who were not getting anything special from US. I completely understand why UA stopped giving E+ to US *G, although I did enjoy it when UA gave it.

Luckily, AA has Main Cabin Extra, the equivalent of E+, and it sounds like that's coming our way at US. It's about time.

treznor

For boarding you end up boarding at the same time as pretty much all of United's elites, other than the GS and 1Ks. So yeah, for United hubs there will be a number of GS and 1Ks, but you're boarding alongside the rest of UA elites, not after them like your first post made it sound like.

On a separate note, as others have said, upgrades aren't part of the Star program. However, a couple weeks ago I did end up getting upgraded on a UA flight, at check-in nonetheless. I know there were other UA elites on the upgrade list (I've taken this flight a couple of times and its always had 30+ people on the upgrade list. This flight was no different). I can only surmise that somehow I lost my seat assignment (I'm not sure I actually ever had one) and when I went to checkin the night before the only seat left was one in first class and for some reason I ended up with it instead of a UA elite. I'm fairly certain I was on a US codeshare and checked in via the US website, which adds another level of complexity in the 'how the heck did that happen' category.