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In addition to United’s recent devaluation, United recently made its award searching worse.
If you search on the home page for an award–like say New York to Paris next June–
you’ll get one week of award prices in one cabin.
You used to get shown two months of award space in economy and premium cabins. You can still get shown that. All you have to do is tick the box that says “My dates are flexible” when you search.
You get the familiar two-month award calendar that shows economy award space with a line and premium cabin award space with dots.
I’ll be searching like this from now on on united.com because it saves a lot of clicks when you need to see the award picture over more than just a few days.
The only problem is the award engine consistently shows phantom space – so it’s next to useless. Total piece of garbage.
It would be nearly impossible to read every blog, every day, and still get my work done. I greatly appreciate how Scott and Sarah, will post a story, and give credit to someone that posted it first. I subscribe to milevalue for this reason, along with the well written articles. We generally get excellent in-depth trip reports.
Thanks for what you guys do.
Scott- I find the the search engine often shows on the calendar no premium cabin award space (lack of “dots”), but clicking on a date often reveals premium award space availability that is “Exclusively available to you as a MileagePlus Chase Cardmember”. Word to the wise, don’t rely on the calendar “dots” to indicate award availability for Chase cardmembers. I found United Polaris Business availability from Brussels to EWR when there were no “dots” on the calendar. Yeah it makes you check each day, but worth finding the space effectively hidden from the less diligent. Of course you need to be a Chase card holder to “see” the space. And yes the Polaris Business experience was great…
..Forgot to point out it was Business Saver Award space.
NEW? I have searched like this since forever, flexible dates. If you happen to end up on the one week page, click ‘Advanced Search’ and start all over.
[…] Tip When Searching United Award Space: When planning award travel, we know we have to be flexible. However it doesn’t mean that your searches have to be so limited. When searching award space on United, clicking on the right box will allow you to view 2 months at once. […]