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The New United Stopover & Routing Rules

Drew MacomberbyDrew Macomber
February 4, 2019
54

United Stopovers aren’t dead! Far from it!

On Oct 6 United switched stopover rules, and on paper, it seemed that all the tricks I’ve written about were dead. But every ending is a new beginning.

It is true that many of the United stopover and routing tricks I discovered over the years area dead. For example The Most Powerful Zone concept is completely dead. The United Stopover Routing Rules and United Stopover Secrets... all totally irrelevant.

However, I’ve been playing around with stopover tricks with the new system and while it’s disappointing to lose some gems, I’m totally excited to share my finds.

I’ll break up the findings into two posts. Today will be an overview, and tomorrow will be a specific trick to make stopovers with United even better.

Booking

Know that all the things I’m about to discuss are bookable on United.com when checking “search for award travel” and clicking “Multi-city“. And while a number of tricks are gone, the booking engine online is way better! Anything can be booked online now, unless United isn’t showing the award space (like Singapore flights).

 

Overview

You can view the United Stopover changes in my post here.

Summary of changes (in United’s words):

  • Stopover can not be in your originating region.
  • Travel must start and end in the same region.
  • Stopovers must be in the same region as the destination.
  • You can add more oneways on the same ticket, and they just charge you for the oneway.

 

What’s really happening are two things. 1) United is now really giving you a free segment. And 2) That segment has to be within one region.

That’s my interpretation of the rules and rewording. If you understand my rewording, you’ll understand what you can and can’t do.

In addition you’ll need to understand that 3) you have to return to your region of origin to get your free segment.

Once you understand those three things, you can know that 4) you get one stopover per multi-city booking and open-jaw(s) are allowed.

So let me try a summary in my words.

 

Summary of New United Rules (all in my words):

  1. One free segment per booking.
  2. Free segment has to be in the same region (but different than the region of origin).
  3. Booking must return to region of origin.
  4. 1 stopover per booking, open-jaws are allowed.
  5. As many segments are allowed as you want, you just pay for them all like you would a bunch of separately booked oneways.

 

My interpretation of the rules, as you’ll see now and in the next post, is much more appropriate.

 

Unlimited segments

One important concept mentioned in #5, is that it will price segments one at a time, and it will give you one free segment in a single region.

What would happen if you tried to book a stopover in Europe on the way to Asia? Well, it wouldn’t be a “stopover” in that it would be free… you would just pay for each segment.

It would price out like this:

  • USA – Europe = 30k
  • Europe – SE Asia = 55k
  • SE Asia – USA = 40k

Total = 125k

That’s hardly a deal, and it’s exactly what the price would be if you just booked a bunch of separate oneways. In fact you could do US to Europe, to Africa, to Asia, to Australia, to Oceania, and then back to the US… It will “let” you book that, and again it would just price it out like a bunch of oneways.

The big reason to book as a multi-city is that you will get a free segment if you have a segment in a single region.

And I move to the language of “free segment” instead of “free stopover”, because that’s how they actually price it… as you’re about to see.

 

Example Of A Basic Stopover

Let’s take a basic example. USA to Europe, free segment (or stopover) in Europe, then back to the US.

WAS – FRA – IST – WAS

What happens? Well, WAS – FRA and IST – WAS are 30k each, and as I mentioned it just makes the FRA – IST segment 0 miles.

WAS FRA IST WAS

Notice that the economy segment is free but the business isn’t? That’s because my previous segment was in economy… But we’ll come back to that in a bit.

 

Stopover with an open-jaw

If you didn’t gather from my saying “open-jaws are allowed”, you can have multiple open-jaws.

This is one of the biggest wins of the new system.

ORD – FRA / VIE – IST / FCO – WAS

That’s three open-jaws and a free segment (or stopover) for 60k! That’s one open-jaw better than the old rules, and you couldn’t have had two of those stopovers in Europe under the old rules.

How does it price out?

  • ORD – FRA = 30k
  • VIE – IST = 0k
  • FCO – WAS = 60k

 

Here’s the key… and pay attention to my wording here:

The free segment is always going to be the first segment in a single region different from the region of origin.

In other words, if you kept adding a bunch of segments after, the free segment is going to be the first one within a single region.

Let me first give an example of a bunch of segments, and then explain how the pricing works.

 

Dear Bloggers, just a reminder – if you are writing about a trick or rule that you read about on this blog, you *should* give a backlink and credit. Thanks.

 

Multi-Segment & A Stopover

USA – Europe – (free) segment within Europe – SE Asia – segment within SE Asia – USA

Again, you can do whatever you want… you just end up paying for it. I’m not saying this route is a good idea, but I want to explain how the pricing works.

ORD – VIE – IST – SIN – BKK – ORD

How would it price?

  • ORD – VIE = 30k
  • VIE – IST = 0
  • IST – SIN = 55k
  • SIN – BKK = 17.5k
  • BKK – ORD = 40k

Total = 142.5k

 

Which is the free segment?

Again, what’s important here is that VIE – IST is the free segment.

See, technically the free segment is the one that is 1) within a single region and 2) not the region of origin. In this case there are two regions that would qualify for the free segment, VIE-IST and SIN-BKK.

But the key is that the first segment is the free one.

 

But what would happen if we reversed the route? Let’s use the same picture as above but price it backwards:

  • ORD – BKK = 40k
  • BKK – SIN = 0
  • SIN – IST = 55k
  • IST – VIE = 15k
  • VIE – ORD = 30k

Total = 140k

 

Obviously neither are a great deal, but I want to show how it works, because we’re about to talk about the great deals.

 

Multi-Segment /w Open-Jaws & A Stopover

One super interesting aspect is that open-jaws have no limits. There are no real routing rules since now we price per segment.

You can go around the world hitting every region, and it would be allowed! … But you’d pay a fortune in miles.

Similarly, you can just kind of stop and start again anywhere.

 

By the way, an open-jaw is basically when your ticket lands in one airport and leaves from another. It’s a segment of travel where United isn’t responsible.

An open-jaw could be flying into Rome and out of Vienna.

Or what’s crazy it could be flying US to Rome, and then continuing from Bangkok to do Bangkok to USA. How you get from Rome to Bangkok doesn’t really matter, as long as you leave enough time.

You could book an AA miles ticket or swim. Doesn’t change the United booking process.

 

So you understand what’s possible, and why, let’s give an example.

 

EWR – NRT – GUM / IST – FRA – ORD

How does it price?

  • EWR – NRT = 35k
  • NRT – GUM = 12.5k
  • IST – FRA = 0
  • FRA – ORD = 30k

Total = 77.5k

 

I suppose it’s not a terrible price, but you’re still needing a giant ticket to get from GUM to IST. Which is fine, because it’s just an example.

Remember IST – FRA is the free segment because it’s first segment in a single region. NRT – GUM is cheap, but it’s the region of “Japan” to the region of “Oceania”.

 

Technically we could have just thrown off the NRT – GUM part and we still would have the free segment, but I want to use the example in a minute to exemplify a trick.

Also, this exemplifies a few things:

  1. How United is pricing a bunch of segments one at time.
  2. How United is allowing huge open-jaws (one from GUM / IST, and another is returning to ORD instead of EWR).
  3. How United prices the first segment in a single region as zero.

 

 

Pricing Different Classes

If not obvious, all of the rules apply exactly the same regardless of which class you fly. The only difference between these routes when flying economy or first class, is the price you pay!

Since United now prices per segment, you can pick and choose what class you want to fly for each segment.

 

If you booked an entire route as economy the free segment can only be in economy. But if you booked an entire segment in business class, the free segment can be in business class as well.

However, what happens when you mix and match economy and business (or first)? When is the free segment in business and when is it economy?

 

Very simple.

The class of the free segment can be (up to) the class of the previous segment.

Let me give an example:

 

Mixing Class Example

Let’s do the same example as above (EWR-NRT-GUM / IST-FRA-ORD), but where only the blue segments below (NRT-GUM & IST-FRA) are in business class and the rest are in economy.

How would it price?

  • EWR – NRT (economy) =  35k
  • NRT – GUM (business) = 25k
  • IST – FRA (business) = 0
  • FRA – ORD (economy) = 30k

Total = 90k

 

Proof:

mixing united class

 

IST – FRA in business would have been 30k but it’s free, 1) it’s the first single region segment, and 2) the segment before it was in business.

The kicker is that NRT – GUM in business is cheaper than the free segment.

 

And again, obviously the shortest segments possible aren’t the ones I want in business class, but I’m trying to show that you can pick and chose, and which segments are qualified to be free.

 

Stopover Tricks Coming Tomorrow! & Conclusion

All I’ve shown so far is how the computer thinks and how the computer prices things. The rules they’ve published only tell us so much, and the rules I’ve figured out by testing tell us a lot more.

What tomorrow’s (Tue, Oct 25) post will teach us is just a couple more mechanisms at play, and then some tricks to really make the most of United.

 

Again, everything above is most of the rules… but if you’re really good at reading between the lines, you’ll discover a number of cool routes and options.

 

But you don’t have to… because tomorrow’s post will reveal a ton of United stopover tricks!

Hope to see ya tomorrow!

Thanks,
Drew

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Comments 54

  1. Lively says:
    4 years ago

    Great post. Can’t wail until tomorrow.

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks Lively!
      I’ll have two tricks tomorrow, and then another big post next Monday.
      I hope its useful!
      Drew

  2. techoin says:
    4 years ago

    after this united should accept the defeat and just hire you 🙂

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Haha 😀

      I will say that understanding the last rules helped me understand the new rules. Like the rules are different, but I thought to try tacking on a oneway at the end because of the last post.
      It took me two years to figure that out with the old rules, and 2 days this time.
      So… it’s still the same platform.

  3. Sherman says:
    4 years ago

    You rock!

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks Sherman!

  4. Bryan says:
    4 years ago

    I’ve been hoping for a reboot of your United posts since the changes. Thanks so much for doing them! Excited for tomorrow’s post

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks for reading Bryan! I’m lucky that there were actually cool things to be found. United just keeps giving me content. 😀

  5. Ken says:
    4 years ago

    awesome work!

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks Ken, glad to share!

  6. Allison says:
    4 years ago

    Thanks for this! I booked using a lot of my United miles but still have some left to burn. As a result of your awesome last post, I booked a ticket from NYC to Seoul to Queenstown, NZ then an open jaw from Auckland to Bangkok for 57.5K miles 🙂 Very happy about that one! Thanks for all you do!

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      See, that’s a great ticket. Although not the most direct routing to Bangkok. 😀
      But I’m glad to hear bookings like this. It’s good to know that post helped people, and that despite my poor attempt at explaining those crazy rules, people still got it and used it.
      So thanks for sharing!

  7. newbie says:
    4 years ago

    Drew,
    I am looking forward to see your genius work again for Routing rules and all loopholes. Because of your blog, I was able to booked various itinerary in the past and will do the same again. I knew that you would counter the new rules and here we are..

    Looking forward to see your tomorrow and all upcoming post..

    Best..

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks! 😀 I appreciate your support!
      I hope it will be close to as useful as the old posts… but either way, I think it’s the best we can do with the rules. Hope you enjoy it.

  8. uk says:
    4 years ago

    Great post! So if I am reading this correctly then, one could theoretically do say NYC-LIS, then from LIS to KHV as the (free) segment // open-jaw from PEK back to NYC?

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      If there were flights from LIS-KHV, but I don’t think there are.
      Otherwise the concept is totally right. You can open-jaw to anywhere.

  9. chum says:
    4 years ago

    You are a genius! Thanks for all the hard work.

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      😀 Thanks for the encouragement! I appreciate it. 🙂

  10. Brendan says:
    4 years ago

    I haven’t had much of a chance to screw around with the new rules but am intrigued. I’m guessing/hoping that the add-on segment opens up big opportunities for Caribbean/Mexico to Northern South America with the excursion i.e. making a RT from SJU to GPS/SCY with a spell in a non-hub city in northern South America. I fear that the new pricing engine won’t be smart enough to accomplish most theoretically allowed routings if one is no longer able to use the mult-city search tool, though.

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Yeah, that’s a great route. I actually talked about it with the old rules and predicted it would still be possible… and I can verify it is. There are all kinds of routes you can do for 20k… but I’ll talk about that next Monday.

      Really, the computer is better than ever. It can handle anything as long as the search results are there. It’s the one real improvement.

  11. caveman says:
    4 years ago

    Great work. If I got that right, you can only do that online only? not with an agent. Correct?

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      It’s not that you can only do online, it’s that you can do everything online now, so why call? Really, the computer – “multi-city” can handle it now.

  12. Jeffrey says:
    4 years ago

    Just fantastic. Another great post. Off the charts good. Thank you Drew

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks Jeffrey!

  13. Mark B says:
    4 years ago

    I’ve been looking forward to your postmortem United post, and you haven’t disappointed! It was great to finally meet you and Caroline at the Chicago seminars.

    Off-topic question — what’s the best way to follow up with you regarding certain things from your presentations? Some of the IHG related things, for instance, appear to be outdated (unless I’m missing something), but I want to be careful about not mentioning anything that shouldn’t be public.

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Glad there’s still enough cool stopover stuff to not disappoint. 🙂

      Twitter me and I’ll dm.

  14. Boris Minevich says:
    4 years ago

    @UK. KHV is not served be European based *Alliance airlines, only by Asiana and you are not supposed to touch the region different from free segment region in order to keep your free segment.
    OVB is served by Turkish, so in theory it should work but for some reason it does not as it adds 15K for economy segment.It prices as it is supposed to according to UAL region definition ( Europe), but for some reason it fails to provide free segment.

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      If you find one, let me know. 😀 I think a lot of pricing will be like the old rules, and don’t think you can boomerang around stuff.

  15. Cliff says:
    4 years ago

    Drew, you are the man! So excited for tomorrow’s post, that’s why i (and my friends) keep using your affiliate links, original contents

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Well, I owe you a big thanks for reading and supporting the writing.
      Thanks much!
      Drew

  16. Jon says:
    4 years ago

    Thanks for the updates. Courtesy of your original posts I was able to book IAD-MUC,FCO-IAD, stopover for 4 months then IAD-HNL all direct flights in econ for 65k points. Sad the no stopover from originating region is a new rule but all good things come to an end. Keep up the solid research, by far the best out there!

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks Jon, hopefully the new post will show some similar ideas!

    • Erika says:
      4 years ago

      I don’t understand how this works. Isn’t your “free segment” (IAD to HNL) in the region or origin? I thought that wasn’t allowed?

  17. Mikey G says:
    4 years ago

    Thanks so much for digging into these rules and posting what you’re learning. The old rules were absolutely fantastic. With the old routing, I was able to book a trip to Sub-Saharan Africa with a layover in Cairo (to see the pyramids) and a stopover in the UK, along with two open jaws. I was also able to book a trip to the Galapagos Islands and Peru with an open jaw when I returned to the US. So much amazingness.

    The timing of the changes is unfortunate, as I was hoping to use stopovers next year on a big trip from Europe to Africa and then to the US, but since my origin and destination were in different regions, I can’t take advantage of a stopover.

    I’m looking forward to your upcoming posts so that I can learn more about the rules going forward!

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Check out my newest post! I figured out a rough way to get a stopover in Europe and then a segment in Africa without paying more.

      http://travelisfree.com/2016/10/25/new-united-stopover-tricks-the-roundtrip-hack/

  18. Ten Bucks a Week says:
    4 years ago

    Always insightful. You showed me how to save on United before and here we are again.
    One idea I had was if you combine two roundtrip tickets you could have a ton of options. That many legs isn’t my style, but for those travelers out there.

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks!
      Yeah, I thought about that. The returning to the same region part makes it a throw away… but it’s totally possible. A oneway to Africa with stopovers. Then a oneway back to the US, but then we a throwaway.
      Is that what you meant?

    • Khym says:
      4 years ago

      The above is exactly what I’m trying to do and I’m not coming up with the o miles segment. Looking one way from Zanzibar back to ORD. Possible stop overs of Cairo, Rome, Istanbul. Any advice? Thanks!

  19. Jun says:
    4 years ago

    Really looking forward to! You always rock!

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      Thanks! I hope you enjoy it!

  20. DebbieT11 says:
    4 years ago

    Excellent interpretation and examples. I’m eager to give this a try for an upcoming trip….. thanks! Though seemingly complicated, your suggestions are clear and specific enough that even this newbie can follow along.

    Reply
    • Drew Macomber says:
      4 years ago

      I hope you find it useful.
      I’ll do a post next week on REALLY clear examples. Just a few tickets I’d recommend booking that aren’t too crazy.
      If you read it next week, please give some feedback!
      Drew

  21. Saket says:
    4 years ago

    Hello

    What about layovers? Earlier we had 4 connections either way on a round trip flight. What happens now?

    Reply
  22. WayLo says:
    4 years ago

    This is how a blog post should be. Kudos. The trick then is to tag on the costliest intra zone segment to your reservation

    Reply
  23. DCS says:
    4 years ago

    Laudably proactive way for a travel blogger to react to a “devaluation”! Learn about it and let the readers know what it means to them and suggest remedies!

    What’s been presented here jibe’s with what I have learned. I had the chance to speak with a UA 1K Desk supervisor about their “new” multi-city award booking rules and what I was told was that it was essentially a “bug fix”, and I tend to agree because that would now explain some weird multi-city award prices that I got before, which seemed too generous and I could not explain why I got them (like allowing me a stopover on a one-way award when that was verboten). According to the supervisor, the way things are working now is the way they were supposed work all along, but did not due to an IT problem. The system was way too generous with stopovers. So, this is a “selective devaluation” because people booking award trips that include no stopovers or have a single connection outside of one’s departure region to which they would return would get a free segment, i.e., a stopover. Open jaws are allowed galore on multi-city awards.

    The notion that the sky had fallen and that UA awards got as bad as DL’s as a result of the new rules were unwarranted exaggerations. I was, in fact, puzzled and wondered why UA would institute something that was as unfriendly as was initially claimed, when Oscar Munoz was trying to turn the company around? The answer is that they had not done anything that was overly unfriendly, like a wholesale award chart devaluation would have been. They just fixed a bug to avoid bleeding revenue at a time when they wanted to turn things around. The major change involved a redefinition or enforcement of “stopovers”, that are now working as initially intended: Good only on round trip award travel, with one allowed in a region other than the one where one originated and would return to.

    There are other nuances I learned about, like UA agents now see fewer *A awards than travelers booking a multi-city award online. Apparently, that’s because *A carriers now release and control their own awards, which are accessible only through general or public booking engines, but not through individual *A members’ systems — something which I was able to confirm.

    All in all, call it a “stopover” or a “free segment”, that’s still better than what either AA or DL allows: neither program offers a stopover so that even after this so-called “bug fix”, UA still offers more flexibility. Importantly, however, they have stopped bleeding revenue by doing away with the prior overly generous and “buggy” stopover rule and implementing a more competitive stopover rule at a time when they are trying to turn the company around.

    Reply
  24. Evan says:
    4 years ago

    Excellent post. Thank you for digging so deep into this!

    Reply
  25. Jesse says:
    4 years ago

    Great work as always, Drew. I actually wrote a very similar post a couple days after the rule change. I laid out an Alaska to Miami flight that I found using the Excursionist Perk. https://loopholetravel.com/2016/10/06/new-united-routing-rules-understanding-the-excursionist-perk/

    Reply
  26. r hirsch says:
    4 years ago

    incredibly thorough. all stones were turned! nice. gracias.

    Reply
  27. GENE says:
    4 years ago

    @Drew Macomber
    so there is no way at all to use UA miles to book singapore air?

    Reply
  28. Janet says:
    4 years ago

    Goodness I have so much to learn when it comes to this! Thanks for breaking it down so much and making it easier to understand.

    Reply
  29. Chai says:
    4 years ago

    Great post, Drew! Thanks a ton for the step-by-step breakdown!

    Reply
  30. Christine says:
    4 years ago

    Ha! Just for fun, I found LAX to Vancouver (long layover), Vancouver to London, London to Berlin (free segment), Frankfurt to Vienna or Stockholmm (long layover 24+ hr), Vienna or Stockholm to LAX for 60K miles + 181 in fees. How fun. Thanks for the article and its examples. And I have yet to travel outside the US.

    Reply
  31. PO says:
    4 years ago

    Question – once you book the “perk” segment in between a round trip – can you then move it to a different date? Can that date be after your return trip? The example is booking at trip from US to Europe but saving a leg in Asia for a later date. How would you keep pushing the date if you didn’t know exactly when you would use it?

    Reply
  32. Nathan says:
    1 year ago

    I would like to know how I can book a United Award ticket between WAS -> CMB that has a stop in BKK. Is there a way to allow a few days in BKK before traveling the next segment, without paying for 2 separate segments (42K + 25K)? Thanks in advance! _Nathan

    Reply

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