Advanced Warning: Severe United Mileage Plus Program Inflation Effective October 16th!!!

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For all of you who have been netting 20,000 bonus miles for opening the free united credit card every 90 days your miles are about to become less valuable.
In March I made a comparison chart ranking the various mileage programs in which United did very well compared to its’ competitors due to 3 main factors, namely:
-No mileage award expedite fee for booking a mileage ticket close to the day of departure.
-Very low mileage required for tickets to the land Down under.
-Low mileage premium class awards.

Now United is doing away with all that and more…

1st the only good news: Every flight is now guaranteed to have “Saver Award” availability…however what exactly that’s going to mean (1 seat per flight???) is anybody’s guess.


Important Notes:
1.Saver awards refer to the typical capacity controlled mileage award ticket. Standard awards refer to the unrestricted, always available mileage award.
2.The following, unless otherwise noted, assumes the US48 as the point of origin.
3.Changes effective 10/16/2006 mean that in order to lock in the current rates, ticketing must occur by 10/15/2006, travel is permitted up to 330 days after the day of ticketing.
4.The following will outline the mileage cost, whether changed or left the same, to all major destinations served by United only, not by partner airlines

——————————————————————-
1-Starting 10/16 there will be a $75 charge (in addition to the mileage required) for travel ticketed six days or less prior to departure and $50 for travel ticketed 7-13 days prior to departure.

2-Australia takes a big hit…
Currently-Saver Awards:
Coach-60k
Business-90k
First-120k

Eff. 10/16
Coach-80k
Business-110k
First-140k

3-Intra-Hawaii saver flights double from 5,000 miles to 10,000 miles

4-The domestic short-haul award of 15,000 miles for all flights 750 miles or less is reduced to 700 miles or less, eliminating popular routes such as Chicago to New York LaGuardia(733 miles)

5-Nearly all Standard awards get much pricier:

Domestic:
Currently:
Coach-40k
Business-80k
First-120k

Eff: 10/16
Coach-50k
Business-90k
First-120k

-Hawaii:
Currently:
Coach-60k
Business-120k
First-160k

Eff: 10/16
Coach-70k
Business-150k
First-190k

South America:
Currently:
Coach-60k
Business-120k
First-160k

Eff: 10/16
Coach-100k
Business-180k
First-220k

Europe:
Currently:
Coach-80k
Business-150k
First-200k

Eff: 10/16
Coach-100k
Business-180k
First-220k

Asia:
Currently:
Coach-100k
Business-150k
First-220k

Eff: 10/16
Coach-120k
Business-200k
First-240k

Australia:
Currently:
Coach-100k
Business-150k
First-200k

Eff: 10/16
Coach-150k (50% increase!!!)
Business-220k
First-270k

6-Saver Awards(excluding the aforementioned Australia) don’t change too much for the most part:

Domestic:
Currently:
Coach-25k
Business-40k
First-60k

Eff. 10/16
Coach-25k
Business-45k
First-60k

Hawaii:
Currently:
Coach-35k
Business-60k
First-80k

Eff. 10/16
Coach-35k
Business-75k
First-90k

South America:
Currently:
Coach-50k
Business-80k
First-100k

Eff. 10/16
Coach-50k
Business-80k
First-110k

Europe:
Currently:
Coach-50k
Business-80k
First-100k

Eff. 10/16
Coach-50k
Business-80k
First-125k

Asia:
Currently:
Coach-60k
Business-90k
First-120k

Eff. 10/16
Coach-60k
Business-90k
First-120k (Cheaper than Europe-Go figure???)

Conclusions:
-Coming out from bankruptcy United has brought its’ once superior Mileage Plus program for the most part in line with its’ peers. However the AAmerican AAdvantage program now becomes the clear leader as the best program in which to accumulate miles, for reasons which are too many to enumerate in this posting.

-People hoarding United miles should act fast in redeeming miles for saver tickets, as many members will soon be rushing to cash in their miles at the current rates, which may dry up United’s typically so-so saver inventory for the near-term future.

©2006 Ctownbochur.com, please refer back to this site when quoting any portion of this article.

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4 Comments On "Advanced Warning: Severe United Mileage Plus Program Inflation Effective October 16th!!!"

All opinions expressed below are user generated and the opinions aren’t provided, reviewed or endorsed by any advertiser or DansDeals.

jtb

Dan, you had this thing about getting rid of your cell for $20 a while ago, what was the website?

Dan

Just use the search at the top of this site for “cell”

Anonymous

You’re right about AA, also – tickets to south america they ask for only 40k (vs. United’s 50k and rising…)

Debu Dasgupta

I fly frequently on business btween India and US. When I lived in the US, I used to be a Mileage Plus member. Since moving back to India I became a member of Lufthansa Miles and More program. I normally use that number for ALL Star Alliance flights, including the last one in Sep 2010. However, for my latest trip (in March 2011) I decided to use my Mileage Plus number. I was in for a surprise when the miles got credited. I got HALF the Base miles on UA as I got on LH when I flew the SAME flight number between the SAME cities in the same Class Z (Business Class), paying almost the SAME Money. When I wrote to UA they said they do not consider “Z class” as Business and Lufthansa’s policies were “different” than UA’s, and basically, that was tough. As an example, on flight LH 750 between Frankfurt and Calcutta, I received 9185 base miles in LH in Sep 2010, but 4599 miles on UA. Even on an atlas, it is closer to 9000 miles than 4500 . There is a ticket open (REF:12151345A) with UA to explain this where I have sent them a reply after they said inane things like “You cannot claim miles from 2 different airlines for the same flight”. Will keep you posted. But, it seems, switching to Miles and More will give members more miles for the SAME flights than UA.

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