Yeah, it wants to charge me that at checkout. The total fees are the 147 plus what I already paid.

 

What's the charge if you build a new itinerary from scratch? I suspect something's getting double-counted somewhere due to the fact that you're trying to make a change. If that's the case, you might get the lower price by calling.

 

Same as if I'm adding it to my existing itinerary. Looking at the cost breakdown, the Germany Air Transportation Tax is $17.10 on the standalone booking, versus $78.20 on the excursionist. The German passenger service charge is a few dollars different too.

 

OK, so here's what I think is happening:

On your existing itinerary, you're not paying a German departure tax. As a separate ticket, you're paying a short-haul German departure tax. Combined into the single itinerary, you're now paying the long-haul German departure tax. Whether that's correct or not under the law, I can't say, but the $78.20 doesn't make sense any other way.

 

I had an IAD-FRA-DUS award, and I wanted to get to OSL. On UA's website, it would not show IAD-XXX-OSL. However FRA-OSL awards were plentiful on their own. So I asked the agent to remove FRA-DUS and replace it with FRA-OSL for 4 people!! and she did so without any issues and we flew a lovely IAD-FRA-OSL award for 4 in J. No issues, she had to use the old tool to do it but it did not stop her. Now I know these days if you try to do anything using the old tool, it forced agents to the new tool which is really frustrating and annoying given how excessively restrictive (and flat out bad) the new tool is.

 

As long as the segments you're "messing with" (IAD-FRA in this case, which should be revalidated against current inventory but the agent probably overrode that) are on UA metal, an agent can break a lot of rules for you. It's a question of whether they're empowered to do so, and whether they're willing.

 

Firstly congrats on becoming mod!! Well deserved.

Secondly, in this particular case it was actually LH metal. Which is why I was confused as to is this purely a matter of finding an agent that's willing to step over the line to make these things happen vs not? This was a year ago so presumably they were still able to use the old tool to actually issue booking changes. My understanding is that today they can use the old tool to look at stuff, but actual bookings/changes need to be made from the new tool. The only exception being the new tool can't yet handle bookings for minors, which are the only things allowed to be done from the old tool until they completely phase it out. My entire takeaway from this is that what agents may or may not have been able to do all this time, they soon will not even have the opportunity to try since they will have their hands tied to only what this sorry new tool let's them do, which is pure A to B awards, and not point to point routing construction.

 

LH is one of the few partner carriers that may re-validate booked award space. Sometimes will work online also. Suspect that is what happen here and why the old tool was used. Suspect the agent's backup plan if re-validation failed, was to put you on UA metal to FRA as an award and add the new available segment. You got a saavy agent but one that was willing to take a risk.

Agent can not and have not for years build awards from partner segments. Here you had an existing award on LH that LH agreed to re-validate with a new available partner segment.

 

Oh wow, I didn't actually realize they could revalidate an LH segment even if keeping it in-place. Partner award space has always been the third rail for me; once it's confirmed I don't dare ask for it to be played with.

 

Hi everyone,

I’m based out of Los Angeles and need to get to Bangkok soon. I found a Saver Award next week on United from SFO to BKK via NRT in business class for 100k miles. I also see Saver Awards from LAX to SFO that arrive a few hours before the SFO-NRT flight.



However, when I try to add the LAX to SFO segment online, the total award jumps to 170k miles. When I called an agent, they could only ticket it for 250k miles, which is an insane increase over the 100k miles for just SFO to BKK.



I’m wondering if anyone can offer tips on how to include the LAX to SFO segment and still keep the total award at 100k miles? Is there a way to get United to include the domestic leg at the Saver Award level so the mileage doesn’t skyrocket?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

 

I (and many others here) run into this issue with married segment availability all the time. I can only solve this by buying the inexpensive domestic flight separately. You aren't protected against IRROPS (so leave a comfortable connection time) and it's a bit of a pain to get them to check baggage through (though it can be done). But that's pretty much your best option. Agents aren't really going to be able to help you with this.

 

What's the price if you book it as multi-city? It won't be 100 even, but should be a lot less than 170.

 

Thank you this is helpful. What if instead of paying cash I use award miles to buy the flight from lax to sfo... can I think marry the reservation after and protect myself from IRROPS?

 

No, two separate reservations cannot be merged into a single reservation.

 

Date change on excursionist roadblock.



The first segment was already flown earlier this year.
PTY - LAX on Copa in P class (I think P class on Copa cost more than regular I class on United)

LAX-EWR booked into JN class

GUA-SAL a throwaway booked in X class.

I want to push the last flight to be somewhere in January so I can change the date for LAX-EWR around Christmas time. I have called 3 different times now to do the changes and they want to change me more miles. The agents insists the this is the current price now. Shouldn�t this be an easy even exchange?
PS. I tried to recreate a new reservation and some how booking P class on Copa no longer allow me to book the excursionist flight in JN class. Was my original reservation a glitch?