Here’s a United mileage run with oodles of availability I found this morning that I haven’t seen posted elsewhere.

This $99 one-way base airfare between San Francisco and Charlotte was filed back on April 26, and given it hasn’t been pulled yet, this post might stay useful longer than my last mileage run tip. It works in both directions, but I focused on zero- and one-nighters available originating in San Francisco.

Here’s the nitty-gritty and an example itinerary.

Routing: San Francisco to Los Angeles to Washington Dulles to Charlotte r/t

Routing rules: SFO-LAX/DEN-WAS/HOU/DEN/CLE/CHI-CLT

Travel period: Now through January 5, 2014

Dates I found available: Dozens, particularly in Sept/Oct/Nov

Number of nights stay: Many 0-night or 1-nighters available

Day of week restrictions: None

Fare basis: NA14KN, 14-day advance purchase

Fare: $249.40 roundtrip all-in

Premier Qualifying Miles earned: 6,576 (assumes 500-mile minimums)

Cents-per-mile (CPM): 3.79

Example itinerary: (click the image for a larger view)

The above itinerary was found using ITA Matrix, but can be booked on United directly with ease using Hipmunk.

Related posts:

Save Time Using Hipmunk for Multi-Segment Mileage Run Bookings

How to Find Mileage Runs – 2013 Edition

It’s never too soon to begin mileage running in the New Year, especially when fares like this one pop up bringing the cents-per-mile down to 3.24. Shown below is an itinerary netting 7,486 United Airlines Premier Qualifying Miles with a “zero” night stay (includes red-eye flying). There are many more dates available if you consider a 1-night stay in Columbus.

American has the same base fare available, though its routing rules only allow for one connection (through Dallas, Chicago or St. Louis).

Routing: Seattle to San Francisco to Newark to Columbus roundtrip

Travel period: January 7 – February 13, 2013

Dates I found available: 1/14, 1/28, 2/4, 2/5, 2/6 and 2/11

Number of nights stay: 0

Day of week restrictions: Mon/Tue/Wed/Thu/Sat

Fare basis: GAG21CS

Fare: $242.80 all-in

Premier Qualifying Miles earned: 7,486 (assumes 500-mile minimums)

Cents-per-mile (CPM): 3.24

Example itinerary: Click for full view

To book this itinerary, use the “multiple destinations” flight search option on United.com.

Happy flying!

It’s been months since I’ve searched for mileage runs and I came across this gem today. Coming in at 3.66 cpm, it’s pretty darn good in this age of struggling to find anything closer to 3.0.

Here are the details:

Routing: Seattle to San Francisco to Cleveland to Kansas City roundtrip

Travel period: Now through end-of-schedule

Dates I found available: 9/24, 10/2, 10/23, 10/29, 10/31, 11/6, 11/13, 11/27, 12/3, 12/4, 12/5, 12/10, 12/11

Number of nights stay: 0

Day of week restrictions: Travel only on M/T/W/Th/Sa

Fare basis: GAG7CN, 7-day advance purchase

Fare: $258.80

Premier Qualifying Miles earned: 7,068

Cents-per-mile (CPM): 3.66

Example itinerary: Click for full view

One issue I see with this itinerary is the 31-minute connection on the last leg back to Seattle. With United’s current usage of T1 and T3 at SFO, making a successful connection would be virtually impossible if a change of terminal is required. While United originally announced only intra-California (and a few other) flights would use T1, that’s not the case according to Flyertalk reports.

I was successfully able to piece this booking together for the $258.80 fare using the “Multiple Destinations” feature on United.com

Related posts:

Airfare Pricing Buckets & Airline Fare Basis Codes REVEALED!

My United Airlines Mileage Tracking Spreadsheet

Finding Mileage Runs Without the FareCompare Flyertalk Tool

Kansas City has been a very popular fare war market recently and there are some pretty nice mileage run fares out there today from SFO & SEA on American, Delta and United from either $89 or $99 one-way base roundtrip.

The routing rules are again generous on United (and even Delta from Seattle allows SEA-ATL-MCI!), so there are some opportunities out there for sub-4.0cpm mileage runs.

Here’s an example (below) on United from San Francisco. Be sure to check out your options on American and Delta, too. I’m on the road today, so can’t commit the time to check further.

Routing: San Francisco to Los Angeles to Cleveland to Kansas City roundtrip

Travel period: Now through May 23, 2012 (no restrictions out of SEA!)

Dates I found available: 5/1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, 15, 22

Number of nights stay: 1

Day of week restrictions: None

Fare basis: GA7CN, 7-day advance purchase

Fare: $228.80 all-in

Premier Qualifying Miles earned: 6,470 (assumes 500-mile minimums)

Cost-per-mile (CPM): 3.54

Example itinerary:

Kansas City has been “on sale” for some time now out of LAX, but a $69 one-way base fare is also now available from SFO and SEA on both American and United. Delta has only filed a matching fare in the LAX-MCI market as of this posting. Travel must be completed by May 9, 2012.

Routing rules vary based on carrier with United offering the most generous mileage-maximizing opportunities. Still, though, there are many options with American and Delta at under 4.0cpm

Selfishly, as I’m primarily a United guy and LAX-based, here’s an example of a zero-nighter available on May 2 and May 7.

Routing: Los Angeles to San Francisco to Cleveland to Kansas City roundtrip

Travel period: Now through May 9, 2012

Dates I found available: 5/2 & 5/7

Number of nights stay: 0

Day of week restrictions: Mon/Tue/Wed/Thur/Sat

Fare basis: GAG7CS

Fare: $188.60 all-in

Elite Qualifying Miles earned: 6,712 (assumes 500-mile minimums)

Cost-per-mile (CPM): 2.81

Example itinerary:

Well here’s a surprise. I’m used to seeing fare wars in major markets with a lot of competition, so did not anticipate finding this fare today on United offering a $63 one-way ticket from the Washington, D.C. group of airports to Spokane, WA.

I haven’t spent too much time finding ideal connection opportunities for this deal, instead wanting to get this posted ASAP for my East coast friends. There are oodles of same-day trips available if you fly IAD-DEN-GEG roundtrip, but for the best CPM, consider a 1-nighter as shown below.

Routing: Washington Dulles to Denver to Spokane to San Francisco to Washington Dulles

Travel period: Now through 6/6/2012

Dates I found available: 4/17 (there are many dates available for same-day turns IAD-DEN-GEG r/t)

Number of nights stay: 1

Day of week restrictions: None

Fare basis: GA10CS, 10-day advance purchase

Fare: $169.20

Elite Qualifying Miles earned: 5,439 (assumes 500-mile minimums)

Cost-per-mile (CPM): 3.11

Example itinerary:

United Airlines ended up matching the fare posted by American and Delta in the Los Angeles to Kansas City market, so here’s another mileage run opportunity post for today. This one is what I consider a “book it without thinking about it” fare since the CPM comes in at 2.81cpm.

[Edited 2/8/12 7:00pm PST: United pulled this fare tonight, but AA & DL haven't yet... we'll see what tomorrow brings.]

I searched availability now through the end of May and found only two dates where you can do a zero-night turn, but there are other dates available for a 1-night stay, as shown below. United didn’t put an expiration on this fare, so there are likely more runs available beyond May.

Note the tight connection on that last segment SFO-LAX, but personally I wouldn’t worry about it. There’s at least two more flights if you were to misconnect.

Routing: Los Angeles to San Francisco to Cleveland to Kansas City roundtrip

Travel period: Now through end-of-schedule

Dates I found available: 5/1 & 5/2 (1-nighters are open 4/24, 5/1, 5/7, 5/8 and 5/15)

Number of nights stay: 0

Day of week restrictions: None

Fare basis: GA7KN, 7-day advance purchase

Fare: $188.80 all-in

Elite Qualifying Miles earned: 6,712 (assumes 500-mile minimums)

Cents-per-mile (CPM): 2.81

Example itinerary:

Happy running!

I haven’t been diligently checking mileage run opportunities lately given the FareCompare FlyerTalk tool is still down, but did take a look this morning at options using their map feature. Many of my readers emailed me with requests to search from their hometowns and now that I have a bit more time on my hands, I’ll be sure to start looking.

Both American and Delta have a fare out there in the Los Angeles to Kansas City market right now – actually since February 3 – that offers an easy day-trip run. Delta’s example is below and if you’re an American flyer and have residency in California or Illinois, you can do even better through March 31 flying a LAX-ORD-MCI round-trip with American’s DEQM promotion.

Routing: Los Angeles to Atlanta to Kansas City round-trip

Travel period: Now through September 28, 2012

Dates I found available: 2/19, 21, 22, 27, 28; 3/5, 6

Number of nights stay: 0

Day of week restrictions: None

Fare basis: TA07A0PA, 7-day advance purchase

Fare: $181.20 all-in

Medallion Qualifying Miles earned: 5,278

Cost-per-mile (CPM): 3.43

Example itinerary:

Flyertalk also has a thread with additional information, including the exact routing rules published by American and Delta. For me, it’s never too early in the year to pad my balance, especially when CPMs are in the low 3.0 range. Happy running!

United Airlines is attacking Delta’s Atlanta hub tonight, particularly from Los Angeles (the same fare is valid from San Francisco). Very special thanks to reader @kziel who notified me tonight via Twitter.

Updated 1/19/12 at 9:30am PST: As suspected, this fare was pulled this morning and is no longer available.

Routing: LAX-IAD-ATL-IAD-SFO-LAX

Travel period: Now through end-of-schedule

Dates I found available: Too many to type out, even this month!

Number of nights stay: 1

Day of week restrictions: None

Fare basis: GA7KN, 7-day advance purchase

Fare: $169.00 all-in

Elite Qualifying Miles earned: 6,273 (assumes 500-mile minimums)

Cost-per-mile (CPM): 2.69

Example itinerary: Click for full view

Visit my Mileage Running 101 Part 1 and Part 2 posts to get step-by-step instructions on how I found this fare and created the routing. [The FareCompare tool mentioned in my Mileage Running 101 posts is currently offline, but will be back soon.]

A reader emailed me asking about mileage run opportunities on United Airlines from his hometown, Pittsburgh. I do tend to be coast-centric as that’s where you get the biggest bang for your buck on mileage runs, but welcome other origins as well. If you’d like me to research options from your hometown, shoot me an email and I’ll see what I can do.

This one travels from Pittsburgh through Washington Dulles and San Francisco to Tucson. There is technically a 0-nighter when starting from Pittsburgh, but the flight arrives at 12:15am with the next departure at 5:51am. I haven’t hung around an airport overnight in years, but know some hard-core runners who do. I’d tack on a mattress run to such a trip.

One thing to note about the itinerary below is the 31-minute connection in SFO. It’s “legal” per United’s rules, but obviously very tight. What I would try to do is standby on the earlier PIT-IAD and IAD-SFO legs that are available that day. Otherwise, if I got stuck in San Francisco, they’d overnight me for misconnecting and I’d pick up the return and plead my case with Mileage Plus to get original routing credit. They’ve said “no” to me once before, but I ended up getting a $200 cert out of it, so was happy enough.

Routing: Pittsburgh to Dulles to San Francisco to Tucson roundtrip

Travel period: Now through end-of-schedule

Dates I found available: 1/19, 30, 31; 2/1, 2, 3, 8, 9, 20, 22, 28, 29

Number of nights stay: 1

Day of week restrictions: None

Fare basis: GA7CN, 7-day advance purchase

Fare: $248.80 all-in

Elite Qualifying Miles earned: 7,340 (assumes 500-mile minimums)

Cost-per-mile (CPM): 3.39

Example itinerary: Click for full view

Visit my Mileage Running 101 Part 1 and Part 2 posts to get step-by-step instructions on how I found this fare and created the routing. I will soon update these posts as the FareCompare page is temporarily down and the classic version of Matrix has been taken off line.