Which is better, $250, 20% off, or 10,000 miles?

September 7, 2008 11:18 AM

My girlfriend and I had a really bad flight and United's customer appreciation website gives us three choices: $250 dollars off a domestic flight (50 states, PR, Virgin Islands), 20% off an international flight (I'm assuming at full published rate) or 10,000 miles. What should we do?
posted by gilgamix to travel & transportation (16 comments total)

I think the most valuable is the $250 off a domestic flight.
posted by agentwills at 11:25 AM on September 7, 2008

I'd go with $250 dollars off a domestic flight

I don't know all the details of United's program, but 10000 miles doesn't get you very far on most airlines. The only way the international travel discount would be a better deal is if you're planning on taking an international flight soon where you'll pay more than 1250 dollars for your ticket.
posted by chrisamiller at 11:35 AM on September 7, 2008

Just a word of warning about United's flight coupons. I was given 2 within 2 months because United ruined two trips in a row. Of course what United failed to tell me is that they expire in 1 year and that the only way for me to redeem them was to physically go into the airport and hand them in when I wanted to book a flight. Driving an hour each way and then paying for parking and gas made the coupon far less valuable and I opted to simply never, ever fly United or any of their partners ever again. So you might want to go for the miles as chances are they will be much easier to actually use.
posted by whoaali at 11:40 AM on September 7, 2008

I think it depends on how many United miles you already have -- if you have enough that 10,000 would bump you into a category where you would get free international travel, that might be a better deal for you. If you don't have any, then 10,000 miles is probably worth nothing to you.
posted by dpx.mfx at 11:42 AM on September 7, 2008 [1 favorite]

Yeah -- a friend of mine had to go to the airport to book and redeem his flight with a United coupon. What a pain in the ass. I'm suprised they didn't make him swim across the bay to SFO to redeem them. "I'm sorry sir -- in order for this coupon to be valid, you have to be completely wet."

Maybe you can escalate it? Take it to a VP at United to se if they will drop that ridiculous restriction?
posted by potsmokinghippieoverlord at 11:45 AM on September 7, 2008 [1 favorite]

Just a word of warning about United's flight coupons. I was given 2 within 2 months because United ruined two trips in a row. Of course what United failed to tell me is that they expire in 1 year and that the only way for me to redeem them was to physically go into the airport and hand them in when I wanted to book a flight.

The customer relations certs have an expiry date printed on the front and the ticketing conditions printed on the back.
posted by nathan_teske at 11:52 AM on September 7, 2008

Some folks have mentioned that you have to go to the airport to use the coupons, but I was able to redeem a flight coupon using their ticketing by mail option. I used their website to save an itinerary and then called the 1800 number to book it over the phone. I was sure to explain that I had a flight coupon up front before the agent started to process my tickets. I then had to mail the coupon in, and got paper documentation for my flights about ten days later. I thought it would be a paper ticket, but it claims to be an e-ticket. We'll see - the flight isn't until December, so I haven't proved the concept yet!
posted by handful of rain at 12:10 PM on September 7, 2008

Oh, and one more thing: to book a flight over the phone and get a ticket by mail costs $100 in fees, according to United's website. I was *not* charged any of these fees for using the phone/mail to redeem my flight coupon, but I was kind of worried about it. That's why I made sure to explain to the agent right away that I had the coupon.
posted by handful of rain at 12:16 PM on September 7, 2008

I was definitely able to ticket by mail. I was able to make a reservation on the internet, call and have them apply my coupon to flight, mail it in, and not get charged the ridiculous phone-reservation-fee.

My coupon also expired, and when I wrote them and complained, they sent me another with another year's validity.

I was helped by searching the forums of FlyerTalk. You can ask there, those guys know everything about this kind of stuff.
posted by mhz at 12:18 PM on September 7, 2008 [1 favorite]

Oh, and seeing another of handful of rain's concerns, it was an e-ticket. I made sure to ask, they did mail me a confirmation, but it was an e-ticket through and through. I flew in July.
posted by mhz at 12:19 PM on September 7, 2008

I would suggest that before you do anything you ask this question in the forums over at airliners.net and flyertalk. there are loads of people on those two sites who have very specific knowledge about this.

a.net is frequented by lower-level airline employees en masse, flyertalk more by passengers. there also is pprune but that site is more geared towards pilots.
posted by krautland at 1:17 PM on September 7, 2008

I fly regularly with United and their partners. I'd say go with the $250 domestic if you don't fly very often.

If you do fly often, and have points in your bank already, however, definitely consider the points as an option. You WILL be amazed with the different tiers of customer service you reach as you amass more miles. While, like most airlines, they treat their customers in general pretty crappy, they do recognize their best customers and make more effort to treat them better.

That said, if you do take the points, make sure they're elite-qualifying points before you do take them. Otherwise they're crap.
posted by allkindsoftime at 3:10 PM on September 7, 2008

You WILL be amazed with the different tiers of customer service you reach as you amass more miles

Number of miles doesn't matter, until you hit 1M or 2M total earned. What matters is immediate status. Most people, however, don't fly the 30 segements or 25K miles a year needed for status.

But status *does* count -- esp. the top two tiers.
posted by eriko at 4:32 PM on September 7, 2008

$250 is your best mathematical value. 10k miles is roughly equal to $100, and 20% off of an international fare (assuming an average cost of $1k) would only be about $200.
posted by charlesv at 6:08 PM on September 7, 2008

Of course what United failed to tell me is that they expire in 1 year and that the only way for me to redeem them was to physically go into the airport and hand them in when I wanted to book a flight. Driving an hour each way and then paying for parking and gas made the coupon far less valuable and I opted to simply never, ever fly United or any of their partners ever again


The voucher I had and used last month had the expiration date on the front and I'm pretty sure I was told about the 1 year expiration at the time the voucher was issued. I had to call United directly to book my flight because there is no where on united.com to enter the voucher number and $ amount. At that time they gave me an address where I could mail the voucher to be applied to my airfare. I was only charged for the balance of the airfare after the voucher had been applied, so my flight to San Diego was ~$55.
posted by SoftSummerBreeze at 10:14 AM on September 8, 2008

My issue with there being an expiration date is more that two trips were ruined and all I got were the vouchers which a) i had to redeem within a year b) i couldn't combine together for one flight and c) it was a huge inconvenience for me to redeem even when when I tried to redeem it within the year time frame. I had no control over the terms and conditions of the vouchers and honestly I think they are crap, purely designed to make them hard to actually use. I was never told I could mail them in and was told the only way I could redeem them was by going to an airport. Worst customer service I have had to deal with in a long time and I will never fly them again because of it.
posted by whoaali at 11:56 AM on September 8, 2008