I wrote before about the UA F service from Shanghai to San Francisco so I won’t bore you with too much.

Background

Originally the flight should have been a 787 (which would have been my first flight on that aircarft). However, when the whole battery saga started UA subbed a typical 777. A waitlisted an upgrade to F, and on the day it turned out that only I and the Captain’s wife were in F. The coach cabin was pretty full by C had empty seats.

Check-In / Lounge

United uses an agent at Shanghai and as the LA flight is some hours after their other departures, when I got to check-in they were not open. At exactly three hours before flight time they opened. The self checkin machine were also not opened until the staff came.

I have written about the lounge before, and it was fairly quiet for my time there.

On board

The Captain’s wife was just in front of me on the jet bridge and the crew made a huge fuss of her when she boarded. In fact I was pretty much ignored for the first 20-30 minutes at which point they produced a drink, newspaper and menu.

Menu
Crab Cake and Beef Skewer with lime hollandaise sauce:

Minestrone Soup

Salad

Tenderloin of Beef (other options were Chinese-style Barbeque Chicken, Bouillabaisse, Stir Fried Noodles)

International Cheese Selection

Ice Cream Sundae

The food was generally good and the service prompt.

I fell off to sleep and had a decent amount of rest before we came in to land at LAX.

Breakfast was offered, but I declined (it was about 4pm LA time!), Frittata, Congee and Cereal with Banana were on offer.

Arrival
United has its own arrival facility at LAX which is under Terminal 7. We were the only United flight at that time, but I had not realised that Alaska now use the same arrivals facility for their Mexico to LA flights. Several arrive at the same time as the United flight. Despite being first off, I was in a line behind about 20 people from the Alaska flight. With four agents processing non-US, and one of these taken off to handle people in wheelchairs it was a good 30 minutes before I got to exit.

My inspection, I might add, consisted of the inspector holding up my passport to check the photo, asking my middle name and how long I was staying. He then stamped and let me through – 2 minutes tops.

I wanted to go to the First Class Lounge as I had several hours to kill before my connection to Newark. I popped upstairs at Terminal 6 and went through security there. This worked OK as they opened a new line just as I got past the checker. A brisk walk to the lounge in Terminal 7 and a very warm welcome from the staff there made up for the delay through immigration.

LA First Class Lounge

Located on the mezzanine, when I arrived there was one other passenger. As the evening drew on people arrived for the late flights to JFK and the Sydney/Melbourne service.

Although a bit dated the staff were great – offering hot food freshly prepared like this soup and toasted sandwich.

I went off to get my flight to Newark which left on time.

BA are currently doing the summer Business and First Class seat sale from London. Hidden amongst the prices are some gems, in my view. By ‘gems’ I mean reasonably priced flights that earn a decent number of BA Tier Points and Avios for their price. These include:

• £1504 to JFK and Newark in Club World
• £1599 to Orlando and Tampa
• £1699 to Vancouver

Book by 4 June. (Saturday night stay required.)

BA Shareholders receive their 10% discount on the base fare.

You can obtain the BA London City Service – I have reviewed it here and here and flights seem to be available until January 2013 for booking.

However, if you want some additional Tier Points but don’t or cannot take the LCY flight, you can book on AA.com and as it offers the ability to book connections you can generate some fun routings:

Just to confirm that United are matching these prices:

With some creativity you can score a reasonable EQM/GBP ratio – although the LH Business Class is not much to write home about – 14,023 for this routing.

Also available is a decent fare with United from Belfast to San Francisco: 18,876 EQM’S for £1,595:

So act fast, but if you need some EQM’s over the summer from the UK, there are decent ways to earn them for the moment.

Just for today 25% off all fares – including Business Class tickets.

If you are thinking of crediting a flight to United, note there are changes to earning levels from 11 July 2013 and as credit is now based on date of travel (and not purchase), care needs to be taken.

I am booked from Shanghai to LA in early May and after spending a long time thinking I was going on a 787 Dreamliner, UA finally switched the aircraft to a 777-200. Disappointed, I then had to agonise about whether an upgrade to First was worthwhile. Having done some more waiting to see if upgrade space became available, I decided to go for it about a week ago and waitlist. Primarily because I want to sleep on the flight and to use the First Class lounge at LAX for my long connection to Newark. I hate waitlisting as United charge you for the upgrade when you join the waitlist. If you don’t clear they refund the fee (charged in US$) and miles, but of course your credit card company has already charged you and invaribly using a worst rate for the refund. Hence, even just waitlisting costs money!

Lo and behold, this morning they cleared me off the list and sent me an email.

Perhaps United IT systems are working at last!

Stepping off my recent United Global First flight from Shanghai, I had about 3 hours to connect to Newark as US Immigration was so efficient and swift that Sunday morning. United offers it’s revenue Business Class, all First Class and its Global Services Members, access to its Arrival Lounges where these exists. In the old days they used to have them in several countries around the world, but now the choice is much more limited – San Francisco, Chicago (Although it appears the showers in the C United Club are now available to anyone with lounge access) and London.

These small lounges offer a light breakfast and a shower.

Located on the lower level in Terminal 3 at SFO, once you exit the International Terminal it is a short walk to the lounge.

On entry I was the first customer of the day and received a warm welcome. Knowing that Security at SFO can be a madhouse, I did not want to spend too long there.

After a short wait I was given the access to a shower – which had it’s own amenity kit – I suspect in case you had already re-checked your bags:

A nice shower later, I felt ready to face 5 hours to Newark and 2 more hours to Miami. A short trip in the lift and I was deposited by the Premium Security line at SFO. Showing my Global First boarding pass got me in the First/Global Services security line for the TSA. Unfortunately this brings you to the end of the regular Premium line and you are left to your own devices to push in front of other passengers. One gracious gentleman let me know, but it felt un-British to say the least.

Shanghai to San Francisco

Check-in at PVG was relatively easy, although the First Class desk appeared to be occupied by a couple checking in 10-15 pieces of luggage, and whilst totally ignored by the staff at the bag drop desk, I was eventually served by an agent when she had finished with the Business Class line. United appear to use China Southern staff at Shanghai and there was no visible United presence. After obtaining my boarding passes I left to my own devices to get to the Lounge – Lounge 77.

At Shanghai there are lots of steps to get to the lounge:

• Check to see you are a passenger
• Boarding pass check
• X-ray before Immigration
• Immigration
• Security /X-ray check

It is usually fairly fast and friendly, but allow 15-20 minutes as the line for immigration can be long.

There is a priority Security/X-ray check. Laptops/iPads out – liquids in – shoes on, is the norm at Shanghai.

The lounge is nothing to write home about – a reasonable selection of seating options – including some small ‘day rooms’ that never seemed occupied on my two visits last month.

Food Options:

Alcohol:

View from the Lounge:

United flight being pulled on to stand:

Day Room:

I went to the gate at normal boarding time and it was the scrum that United have created since their boarding group changes. Announcements and signs were held up to illustrate that Uniformed Military and Global Services board first, followed by what appears to be the rest of the plane, but is in fact Group 1. This seems to consist of passengers in Business and First, and elite members in Coach, as well as people who have purchased early boarding. It makes the whole boarding process feel very uncomfortable.

The menu was:

Appertizer
Sauteed shrimp skewer with walnut and blue cheese souffle and red pepper-jalapeno sauce
Soup
Tomato-Basil
Salad
Creamy wasabi or balsamic vinaigrette
Entree
Grilled Filet Mignon
Preserved Lemon and Herb Poached Fillet of Salmon
East Coast-style Crab Cakes
Stir-Fried Chicken and Cashews in Gong Bao Sauce
Cheese and Crackers
Dessert
Ice Cream with choice of toppings.

Mid-flight they offered Asian-style noodle soup or dessert

Prior to Arrival
Spinach and Cheese Frittata
Congee
Cereal and Banana

On arrival at San Francisco we were the only international arrival and parked at the closest gate – 92. This meant a five minute walk to Immigration, immediate processing and being out of Customs 15 minutes after landing. I went to the Arrival Lounge at SFO, but will write about that in another report later in the week.

My return flight a few days later was slightly late leaving owing to the unusual take-off/landing pattern being used at SFO on the day. We took off towards the South on the longer runways, whilst inbound aircraft landed on the cross runways, usually reserved for take-offs.

The United Global seat has plenty of leg room and is pretty comfortable, and felt a lot less hard that the business seat I had experience on my previous flight over:

The menu on this leg was:
Appertiser
Vegetable-filled pastry and shrimp tempura with Asian barbecue sauce

Soup
Mushroom Brie Bisque

Salad with buttermilk ranch or classic Caesar dressing
Main Course
Grilled Pork Chop

Mongolian-style Beef
San Francisco-style Cioppino
Stir-Friend noodles
Cheese with Crackers
and the inevitable United Ice Cream Sundae.

Mid Flight it was Noodle soup with Braised Beef or Cherry custard cake

Prior to Arrival
Herbed Scrabled Eggs
Congee
Cereal and Banana

Overall
Perfectly pleasant flights with reasonable food – I still miss the old days of flying when the food was special, but we won’t see those again. The United First seat is comfortable and I was able to sleep for a good 6-7 hours on each segment. The cabin temperature was excellent, and the crew friendly and attentive. The major complaint is really the rubbish boarding process that United has adopted.

BA are having another premium cabin fare sale until 17 March.

Fares apply for the Easter period and for the Summer 2013.

(Fares apply on AA flights operated as BA codeshares.)

Example:

United has matched:

Interestingly you can pick up First Class for a few hundred pounds more, via Frankfurt:

Good Fares (for Avios collectors at least) appear to be:

San Francisco £2082

JFK £1592, Newark £1582

Las Vegas £1999, Los Angeles £1900

The London City service appears to be in the sale, but on some days over the summer only the late flight is operating, meaning no pre-clearance at Shannon and the normal huge queue at JFK instead.

I recently flew SFO to Shanghai with United, travelling on a discounted Business Class – ‘P’ fare.

When the flights (three segments, Miami to Chicago, Chicago to San Francisco, and then on to Shanghai), the last segment has posted with a negative Class of Service bonus.

Never seen this before!

Last weekend I posted about a change to an award ticket in order to try and obtain a seat in LH First Class from Shanghai to Frankfurt in early March.

After sorting it all out, but making a booking via Seoul and Munich to London, I had a look over the weekend at United.Com. Well that pesky LH flight was still showing availability.

So, I tried a booking – and guess what – it worked!

I managed to grab the Upper Deck Window seat, and will be spending a little time at the First Class Terminal!

On my mammoth 40,000 mile trip which starts next week, I am coming home from Shaghai to London on a United Award ticket. I’ve held this since November, but the routing was not the best. I was flying Shanghai to Seoul, then Asiana to Frankfurt and Lufthansa to London.

As many readers know Lufthansa only opens its First Class seats for redemption about 2 weeks before the flight, so I have been assiduously checking each day since the two week window opened.

So when I found First Class space on Lufthansa from Shanghai to Frankfurt and then London, I was delighted. I rebooked myself via the United web site – it worked out all the refund of taxes properly! Whoopee!

But no, as soon as the booking refreshed in my browser I knew something was awry. The Lufthansa segments I had just booked had vanished, and so had my original flights via Seoul. I quickly called United in the UK – who picked up on the first ring on the Premier Line – and asked them to look at it.

“Well it can take 24 hours  for Lufthansa to confirm” I was told. Ouch!

“Can I get back my original routing?” I asked.

“No, there is no space left now, we’ll have to wait and see what LH say. You call them to see how it looks”, the agent explained.

So here I was stuck with no way home.

Quickly I did two things, found space, again via Seoul but with Lufthansa to Munich and then London with United miles and booked that. (Free cancellations for 1K’s suddenly felt like a great perk). Then I check my booking with the Lufthansa web site – sure enough – waitlisted!

Waitlisted for an award!

24 hours later the position was the same. I checked the seat map (no real indication I know), and found only two seats on LH729 reserved. So there was space just none at reward inventory!

I called back United (and again answering on the first ring), I had the miles for the PVG-LHR (and taxes) refunded and we decided just to go with the backup plan, via Seoul and Munich.

Even this morning, United claims that there are award seats on the route that I wanted, but of course the booking fails when you come to pay!

So the lesson I suppose is – Don’t change a United award ticket online – make a new booking and then convert the old one to a one-way. That way you might avoid the danger I nearly faced – being stuck in Shanghai!

I am flying from San Francisco to Shanghai next week and noticed this interesting flight route for United’s flight yesterday.

It appears that flight is diverting to avoid travelling over North Korea, although it seems odd it doesn’t go West rather than East.