OUCH! United Is Blocking Most Award Space From Partner Airlines

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Before United merged with Continental, they used Starnet Blocking to limit the program’s liabilities by blocking members from booking some Star Alliance partner award space with United miles. Even if other Star Alliance airlines would show availability, United wouldn’t show the award space. This saved the airline from having to spend too much money buying awards on other airlines. The practice went away together with the Continental merger.

Now, United is taking a different tack. They are blocking other Star Alliance airlines from booking most saver economy award space on United flights. If you want to book the ticket, you’ll have to use United miles, which often costs much more than what partner airlines charge. Back in the day, United enjoyed the revenue from partners buying award tickets and sending cash to United. But times have changed, and United would rather members interact directly with United and spend United miles, which were paid for by banks and other partners.

This change was first flagged by DDF member bmw last Thursday.

I verified it and reached out to United multiple times, asking if this was a bug or policy change.

The airline responded to DansDeals today saying that, “Inventory for all fares – including awards and revenue – is dynamic and always changing. We have nothing further to share at this time.”

My read of that response is that they are confirming it’s not a bug, but a feature. They want you to primarily earn and use United miles, not partner miles, for United flights. They claim that all tickets are dynamic, which is technically true since they copied Delta and deleted award charts, but saver X award inventory has always been released to other airlines, so blocking some of that space is a new development.

For example, on 4/15, United Expert Mode shows XN9 X7 for this flight from Newark to Cleveland. That translates to 7 saver awards bookable by all United members and all partner airlines and at least 9 saver award seats bookable by United elites and cardholders when using United miles.

At least that’s what it meant until last week.

Now, only a subset of the X award space is released to partner airlines. United claims this isn’t a policy change, but it certainly is.

United Club cardholders can book it for 13.5K miles:

Other United members can book it for 15K miles:

X award space is no longer automatically bookable by partner airlines. I checked with Air Canada, Lifemiles, and Turkish, and none have the flight available. Until this week it would be bookable for just 6K Air Canada miles, based on X class being available.

Now, Air Canada can’t book any United nonstop flights that day, instead they offer some poor connecting options for 10K miles instead of the 6K miles that a nonstop would cost. The connecting option is the only saver award flight for that date that United isn’t blocking.

Same goes for the next day, with multiple saver awards bookable with United miles:

But no nonstop options with miles from partner airlines:

Trying some other random samples, Newark to Honolulu on 10/31, showing XN9 and XN3:

Bookable for 25K United miles as a saver award:

But partner airlines have no nonstop options available:

LA to Newark on 4/14 shows XN9 and X7:

That’s bookable for 13.5K miles by United Club cardholders with United miles:

Or 15K United miles for other members:

But once again, no partner award space:

On other dates, you might find multiple saver awards on United.com, but fewer options with partner airlines.

United cardholders have 4 saver award options from Newark to Cleveland on 7/15:

Previously, non-cardholders and partner airlines would have the same number of saver award flights, but now United non-cardholders have 2 saver award options:

While partner airlines can only book 1 option on that date:

For now, it appears that I class business saver awards are all still bookable by partner airlines, but of course that can change at any time.

Newark to London in business saver for 80K United miles:

Or for 60K Air Canada miles:

United isn’t alone in doing this, airlines like BA, Lufthansa, Qantas, and more have some saver awards that can’t be booked with partner miles. And of course United’s higher priced everyday awards have never been bookable with partner miles.

But United certainly may start a trend within the Star Alliance to block partners from accessing more saver award space.

Or maybe partner airlines will complain to United about this and they will change back to the old policy? We can dream, right?

This is certainly a negative change, but I suppose it does make United miles and Chase points more valuable as partner airlines won’t have the same access to United awards as they used to. At least United awards are fully refundable until the time of departure, a small perk considering how much more they charge over partner airlines.

United cards, which give access to expanded XN class award space, include the United Gateway℠ Card, United℠ Explorer Card, United Quest℠ Card, United Club℠ Infinite Card, United℠ Business Card and United Business Club Card.

The Club card also gives 10% off on domestic saver awards.

Typically, you’ll do better transferring points from Chase cards to United. That way you can use hybrid points to book paid tickets, transfer to other airlines, or have the choice to transfer to United on demand. Plus, you can earn more points per dollar with other cards.

• Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card has a 60K signup bonus for spending $4K in 3 months, earns 2.1 points per dollar on travel after the card's 10% anniversary bonus, 3.1 points per dollar on dining, streaming, and online groceries after the card's 10% anniversary bonus, has a $50 hotel credit, can transfer all Chase points into miles, and points are worth at least 1.25 cents each for paid travel ($95 annual fee). Read more here.
• Chase Sapphire Reserve® has a 60K signup bonus for spending $4K in 3 months, earns 3 points per dollar on dining/travel, has a $300 travel credit, can transfer all Chase points into miles, and points are worth at least 1.5 cents each for paid travel ($550 annual fee with $300 travel credit). Read more here.
• Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card has a 90K signup bonus for spending $8K in 3 months, and earns 3 points per dollar on up to $150K of annual spending on shipping, advertising, and travel, can transfer all Chase points into miles, and points are worth at least 1.25 cents each for paid travel ($95 annual fee). Read more here.

• Ink Business Cash® Credit Card has a 35K signup bonus for spending $3K in 3 months and another 40K signup bonus points for spending another $3K in 6 months for a total of 75,000 Chase Ultimate points, plus if you have a Chase business checking account open on the card's first anniversary you will get a 10% points bonus on all earnings from card spending, this card earns 5 points per dollar on the first $25,000 in combined purchases on cable, TV, telecom, cellular, and office supply stores, plus 2 points per dollar on dining and gas on up to $25,000 in purchases ($0 annual fee). Read more here.
• Chase Freedom Flex has a 20K signup bonus, plus 5 points on rotating categories, 5 points per dollar on travel purchased through Chase Travel, and 3 points per dollar on dining and drugstores ($0 annual fee). Read more here.
• Chase Freedom Unlimited® has a signup bonus that earns an extra 1.5% cash back in the form of 1.5 points per dollar everywhere on up to $20K of spending during your first year, on top of at least 1.5 points per dollar everywhere, 5 points per dollar (marketed as 5% cash back) on travel purchased through  Chase Travel℠, and 3 points per dollar on dining and drugstores ($0 annual fee). Read more here.

What do you think of these changes?