Talk about being flyer unfriendly. United has announced some major award chart devaluations for all award flights booked starting 2/1/14. It’s not pretty, so prepare yourself to be disappointed.
There will now be two award charts – one for travel on United Airlines and one for travel on Star Alliance partners. The one we got totally screwed on is the Star Alliance Partner chart.
New United Economy Award Chart
Note that the changes are the same for both flying on United or Star Alliance partnerss.
New United Premium Cabin Award Chart for Flights on United Only
Note that United doesn’t even have flights to some of these regions…
New United Premium Cabin Award Chart for Flights on Star Alliance Partners
Brace yourselves…
You can view the actual award charts here.
I don’t have to tell you how much this sucks. Many of the numbers on the new award chart look like they should be round trip prices, but they’re all one-way. So First Class to Central Asia just went from 160K round trip to 280K round trip – a 75% increase. Pretty brutal.
If you were planning on signing up for credit cards for international travel using United miles, I recommend thinking hard to figure out whether that’s actually a wise choice now. On the other hand, if you happen to have a ton of United miles, make sure to use them for international travel before 2/1/14.
On the bright side, economy travelers won’t be impacted tremendously. But for the luxury travelers among us, this is as bad as it gets. I’ve warned against devaluations before. You can bet American/US Airways is going to be next. This is yet another reason to burn your miles sooner rather than later, and why the value of having points in a program like Ultimate Rewards is better than in an account like United’s.
Voice your displeasure on Facebook and twitter towards @United. Please use the hashtag #UnitedUnfriendly – it would be great to get it trending!
Good luck to everyone!
WTF IS THIS?! F**K United.
When Delta’s points start to look good, that’s when you know you’ve gone too far. What’s a good word for this new currency? MileagePlusPesos? MileagePlusPennies?
I’m fond of rupees but not sure how to make it work. I’m sure more creative people will come up with something.
Let’s just call the new program MileageMINUS.
This is pathetic
Thanks for the comparison chart. Yours is by far the best.
Thanks. It took a while, but somebody had to do it.
Great charts and very easy to read. However, very bad news. Luckily I’m mostly with American. May need to change to ANA miles instead.
A good name for the new program might my KilometersPlus – mathematically it works to some degree…
Great chart outlining the changes
Thank you thank you thank you (TS) I was planning on transfering 90k UR points to UA. Thanks I will take my chances with Chase than UA.
This makes Avianca the #1 *A awards plan for now !
I love Avianca. I’m a fan of US Airways also…for now.
The worst changes (maybe getting rid of some loopholes, in fairness?) for me are the ex-Europe awards in Y.
Intra-Europe: Old 12,500, New 15,000
Europe-Caribbean: Old 27,500; New 35,000 (!)
United is starting to suck big time. Specially for loyal customers, they should really change their marketing gimmick from fly the Friendly Skies to Fly the United Un-Friendly skies
I just wanted to add that flights from the lower 48 states to Alaska are supposed to go up 5000 miles each way as well. At least thats how I understood it.