View from the Wing

Back in July, I wrote up a primer on securing Star Alliance awards. In it, I alluded to Starnet, the system that United uses for booking these awards for Mileage Plus members.

Its search capabilities are primitive (you often can find better availability searching segment-by-segment that you can telling the agent your origina and destination, simply because it doesn’t search many possible connections).

But most vexxing for frequent flyers is that the system filters availability. That is, a partner airline may be offering a seat for award redemption — but United’s system will still tell you it’s unavailable. The agent will usually blame the partner (”they aren’t offering any seats”) when that isn’t true at all. Instead, United doesn’t want to pay for the seat.

United is known to ‘filter out’ availability especially of Luftansa flights within Europe and Thai Airways premium class flights between Europe and Bangkok. But I never grasped just how extensive the filtering was on these routes until I started playing with an award from North American to Asia via the Atlantic (strange as it may seem, the distance is seven miles less for my destination and preferred routings than crossing the Atlantic.. availability supposedly better.. and offering a potentially better premium class experience).

Alas.

This morning I searched 53 dates in May and June using ANA’s award booking tool and found 51 flights on which Thai Airways was offering not just one but two award seats in First Class from London-Heathrow to Bangkok.

When I called United, I was told that there were no flights available with two first class awards during this period of time.

Then I asked United to check Franfurt-Bangkok. This is a tougher route, with only 9 flights showing two first class award seats available during this time. So unsurprisingly, United won’t book a single one.

Let’s be perfectly clear about what is going on here. United’s partners are offering award seats. United just won’t book them.

When pressed, United might say ‘different award inventory is made available to different partners’ but even that is a slight of hand — they’re really saying ‘different partners (ie, us - United) make different award inventory available to our members than other airlines make available to theirs.’

Lufthansa or Thai may well have inventory open in the “O” bucket (award first class). StarNet pretends it’s not there.

Shame on United — for refusing the offer seats your partners make available, and for claiming it’s your partners’ faults.

Cranky Flier reports that United is reducing the size of its Biscoff cookies. I admit, I really love those cookies. Always have, since I first got them on a United Express Westair flight many years ago. Some cutbacks just hurt, ya know?

Via Free Frequent Flyer Miles, United’s Mileage Plus Dining (the co-branded Rewards Network dining rewards program) is offering 250 United miles for creating an online profile by December 31st if you haven’t already done so.

As United rolls out the new international premium class product, some aircraft will have the new configuration and some will not — and the planes have very different configurations, very different number of premium class seats.

United is famous for aircraft swaps, unfortunately this has happened most recently with mainline A320s to TED (no first class) and before that it was downgrading regular 737s to old Shuttle aircraft that used to service the West Coast only. These aircraft swaps are disruptive, with different seating configurations. And ticketed first class passengers, in the TED example, go to an all-coach configuration. Not as big a deal on domestic routes as long-haul international.

But dropping 21 business class seats from the 747 has the potentially to be hugely disruptive. Either United will hold back most upgrades until the gate when it’s certain it’s running one of the old-style aircraft (bye bye advance upgrades) or it will be faced with significant at the gate downgrades (very unpleasant) when swapping out an old style aircraft with a newly confiugured one.

While I don’t ever bet on United’s savvy, I do think they’ll hold back upgrade availability… and then coach passengers looking to upgrade will be hoping for older aircraft once the renovations are underway because there will be much better upgrade chances.

Still, on some routes upgrades won’t be the issue. United will either be turning away paid business class, or potentially downgrading paid business passengers (though if first class seats haven’t been sold out, they’ll be managing the problem through operational upgrades).

A minor point, but a problem that United does at least have some time to work through.

United is refitting its international widebody fleet with new first and business class seats beginning in the fall (with the 767s) and ending two and a half years from now.

United’s promo site is here.

Business class will feature:

• true lie-flat seats (not the angled-flat wedgie seats)

• some rear-facing seats in business class
  
• 15″ lcd video screens and video on demand

• iPod adapter and standard outlets for seat power

This will give United the best seats among US-based carriers. But they’re hardly world-leading. Virgin, Air New Zealand, Singapore, British Airways, and Cathay Pacific already offer similar business class seats. Those last three all offer first class as well, with products that will still surpass United’s (and we’re not even getting into the ’soft product’ of food, service, and amenities - more about that below).

Along with the business class upgrades come far fewer seats — the 747 goes from 73 seats to 52, the 777 from 49 seats to 40, and the 767 from 32 to 26. That’s make international premium class awards and upgrades much harder to come by.

Not surprising, of course, if United is going to invest the money in the product they want a revenue premium for doing so.

There will be fewer first class seats, and on the 747 a whole bunch fewer economy-plus seats. They’ll be packing more sardines in the back.

While first class is improved as well, the difference in hardware between two cabins is reduced. Other airlines that upgrade their business class product while retaining 3 classes of service differentiate the front cabin not just with fewer seats and better hardware, but with meaningfully better service and meals. It’s just hard to imagine United doing this … with designer amenity kits and pajamas, with truly gourmet meals (including good Iranian caviar, lobster, etc) and fine wines (even Dom fails the test for first class champagne), and with attentive, anticipatory flight attendants. I’m actually surprised that United didn’t go two-cabin with this investment and cabin re-fit..

The promo video courtesy of YouTube:

A couple of weeks ago I noted that effective June 1 United would no longer allow expiring 500 mile upgrades to convert to miles — and was also blocking the early conversion of 500 mile upgades in order to get in under the wire. This was a big blow to international customers who rarely use 500 milers, as well as United frequent flyers in TED cities with no cabin to upgrade into.

Responding to complaints and pressure, United has relented and reversed course… sort of. Current Global Services, 1K, and Premier Executive members of Mileage Plus can register by August 15th so that their expiring 500 mile upgrades will continue to convert to miles — as long as the member retains at least Premier Executive status or resides outside of the 50 U.S. states.

General members and premiers are still out of luck, but at least United isn’t sticking it to their very best customers anymore (at least those who notice the offer).

United awards elite flyers (4) 500-mile upgrade certificates for every 10,000 miles flown on United (and United Express and Ted.. rar!.. planes). They also sell ‘em. And they can be used to upgrade domestic flights a few days in advance of travel subject to availability, the specific length of time governed by your particular status with United.

Currently, if those upgrade certificates expire unused, they each convert to 500 frequent flyer miles.

June 1 this practice is no more.

I knew about the change back in January when it was posted on Flyertalk and didn’t see it as an especially big deal. It used to be that the old paper 500s converted just to 250 miles, and you had to mail them in to boot. Then when they went electronic it actually improved to the current 500 miles.

Now, with this new policy I really don’t get the logic of taking a paltry number of miles away from your best customers who really can’t use them. Makes no sense.

This is especially strange because the flyers with the most expriing 500 mile upgrades are those 100,000 mile flyers who do mostly international travel, many of whom are based out of the United States. Since the 500-milers can’t upgrade those transatlantic and transpacific flights, they just expire. It’s nice to have them turn into miles, an extra 20% mileage bonus in effect. Makes good sense, since this is in lieu of a benefit they can’t use. And long-haul travelers based outside the United States in particular would seem customers that are hard enough for United to attract and keep. Why take this away?

American used to offer conversion at 2500 miles apiece! Then it was reduced to 500. But conversion is still an option there as far as I know. And American’s 500-milers don’t expire at all, period.

United would allow ‘early conversion’ for years, if you had a stash of 500-milers they’d cancel ‘em out and deposit miles in your account in exchange. This was never a ‘formal’ option. So United is certainly within its rights to end it without notice. And that’s just what they’ve done — since Flyertalkers were apparently converting their 500-milers like crazy, United sent out a message to its agents saying ‘no mas!’.

Doing so just seems incredibly… petty.

Upgrade: Travel Better has more.

United’s Grocerymiles is offering 1500 bonus miles on $1500 in spending by June 15 at Safeway, Vons, Dominick’s, Genuardi’s or Pavilions.

Good for folks who shop at these places anyway, it amounts to triple the usual miles on $1500 in grocery purchases over a month and a half.

Of course you need to be averaging $1000 a month in groceries — easy to do at stores like Whole Foods and the like, much tougher at Safeway!

And as usual, the following spending doesn’t count…

Liquor, Tobacco, Fuel, US Postage Stamps, Fluid Milk, Bus/Commuter Passes, Fishing/Game Licenses, Ski Tickets, Lottery Tickets, Gift Certificate sales, Pharmacy prescriptions, Safeway Club Savings, Safeway Store Coupons, and Sales Tax.

As of this past Sunday, United is waiving paper ticket fees, Australian Electronic Travel Authority Fees (which up until recently were free), and the $25 same-day confirmed change fees for 1K, Global Services, and passengers flying on paid premium class ickets.

I still miss the days when same-day confirmed changes (not on the day of departure, but well in advance) were no cost to Premier Executive and 1K members. I could book an 8am flight and call up a week later, still long in advance of travel, and change it to a 2pm as long as the same fare class I had ticketed was available on the 2pm (and technically as long as the fare I had purchased wasn’t time or flight specific, but those rules were often ignored).

Still, fee waivers are good, and certainly appropriate for top tier elites.

Normal pricing is 35,000 miles for coach and 75,000 miles for first. But this Flyertalk thread is discussing how these awards are pricing out like regular domestic flights. Get ‘em while you can!

Continuing my kick of linking to just about anything Upgrade: Travel Better has to say, Mark points to the Star Alliance offer to match status held with Varig.

Varig went bankrupt and lost its membership the Star Alliance, so other Star Alliance members are jockeying to pick up the elite frequent flyers in the now-defunct Varig “Smiles” program. The Star Alliance webpage lists the different status match programs that are available to Smiles members until April 30, 2007. Air Canada, Lufthansa, South African, Swiss, and TAP are all granting status matches to Varig’s elites.



BUT: United goes one further. Their rules doesn’t specify that the status match is only open to Varig flyers, either on the Star Alliance site or on their own page. So this is where it gets interesting.

This is a good offer for Varig elite members. It’s quite rare for most international airlines to offer to match status. Outside of North America the only one that I can think of making the offer on a standing basis is British Midland. Other carriers will do it occasionally, or through their sales office in specific countries for very high potential revenue flyers, or as part of a corporate contract. But blanket offers to the public on most airlines are rare — such offers are generally just the province of US airlines, almost all of which will do a one-time granting of status to flyers with equivalent status on another airline.

But here’s the rub — Ashley says this is a special opportunity for anyone with status to get matched on United. But United has offered status matches for years — just fax (current number 605-341-6140, email to PremierMatch@united.com might work as well) in your frequent flyer statement showing your status and flight activity on another carrier along with a note including your Mileage Plus number and requesting status on United, and bingo it’s generally yours without too much hassle. Same is true for most US airlines across the board. Full details can be found in a Flyertalk thread I started in 2003 that continues to attract new posts to this day.

United is offering 1000 miles for a roundtrip costing $350 or more domestically ($700 or more internationally) through May 15.

Earn 1,000 bonus miles when you register, then purchase and fly qualifying roundtrip travel in the amount of at least $350 domestic, or at least $700 international,** anywhere United, United Express®, or Ted(SM) flies between February 16 and May 15, 2007.

Registration is required.

There’s something calm.. and peaceful… and home about this clip. If you’re a United frequent flyer you’ll certainly agree.

United announced today that its miles will now expire after 18 months of inactivity rather than the current 36 months.

The worst part of the change, though, is that instead of giving useful advance notice of the change, it’s retroactive to July, 2006. Accounts without activity from July ‘06 through December ‘07 will be terminated at the end of the year.

The press release contains some whoppers:

By shortening the amount of time a
Mileage Plus account can remain inactive, United’s most loyal customers
will compete with fewer people for award seats, making it easier for them
to redeem their miles.

Sure, I compete every day for international first class awards with the median member with 17,000 miles in their account striving for 25,000. Heh. As though it’s the fault of members (rather than the airline which controls inventory) when award inventory is unavailable. True, zapping miles off the planet means fewer miles chasing a constant pool of seats, but it’s a fairly disingenous argument to make.

This change…brings our program in line with major competitors

First, one doesn’t usually describe a change as positive when it removes an advantage relative to the competition.

Second, it isn’t even true — Ameican’s miles (the largest airline, United’s largest competitor) still expire after an account’s inactivity for 36 months. It’s true United isn’t the first one out of the gate on this — Delta and USAirways recently made similar changes and Continental has had this (unenforced) rule for years. But it’s hardly a benefit as the press release suggests that United is now the same (in a negative way) as some other carriers.

Shame, shame, for the lack of notice on this one United.

United’s online booking bonus has been reduced from 1000 miles to 500 - though on the upside, one-way itineraries now earn 250 miles rather than being ineligible. A sad day, truly, though certainly in line with the direction of the rest of the industry.

Register by February 15 and dine 10 times (minimum $25 spend) by March 31 at qualifying restaurants to earn 5000 bonus Mileage Plus miles.

United is offering:

• 5,000 bonus miles for completing one qualifying roundtrip
  
• 10,000 bonus miles for completing two qualifying roundtrips

• 25,000 bonus miles for completing three qualifying roundtrips

Ticketing and travel must be between November 10 and January 31, and the first roundtrip must be completed by December 31. Only roundtrips qualify, but it looks like all regular paid fare classes count.

Registration is required.

I hadn’t seen this before, and have been wanting such a tool ever since Dave Friedman’s excellent site stopped working maybe three years ago — a website that finds United Mileage Plus promotions and automaticallly signs you up for them.

The only caveat is that the tool doesn’t discriminate between better or worse promotions, so if there are two out there which are mutually exclusive (don’t permit double dipping) you’ll wind up getting the first one the tool finds.

But for busy people without the time or inclination to specifically track what’s available at any given time, this is outstanding.

Maybe I’ve been under a rock for awhile, but this is the first time I’ve seen the United Business Visa with fee waived first year — hence in the past I’ve never churned these. They’re offering 21,000 bonus miles after $250 in purchases, and since there’s finally no fee to get those miles I’ll give an application a whirl.

(Hat tip to Don.)

Update: a helpful reader points out the business visa also comes with 25,000 points after $250 in purchases, fee waived the first year. I knew about this offer on the personal card, didn’t realize it applied to the business card…

It was only a matter of time before the signup bonus arms race made it up to the next level. The United Visa is offering 21,000 bonus miles and even 25,000 bonus miles with annual fee waived the first year.

They took a page from a recent Citibank American Mastercard offer, though, and are requiring $250 in spending on the card before awarding the bonus instead of crediting it after first purchase. Still, an extra 5000 miles award for spending $250 seems quite worthwhile.