As widely blogged and reported, United Airlines has a new promotion out there today offering up to 25,000 bonus MileagePlus miles after completion of a defined number of roundtrip flights from now through 7/15/12. Based on what I’ve read from others, it definitely appears targeted and the required number of trips varies.
I saw a slew of tweets and blog posts from those who had already received an email from United about it before mine arrived in my inbox at 3:15pm PST. I must be on the delayed distribution list, though I guess I shouldn’t care given how a twitter friend got “shafted†(more on that in a bit).
Here was my offer received via email:
I clicked through and successfully registered getting the confirmation as follows:
(Side note: Does everyone take a screen capture or save a PDF of each successful promotion registration? I do. It might pay off if something goes awry with mileage crediting after the promo ends.)
The fine print reads, “To qualify, register for the offer before travel, then purchase and complete paid qualifying roundtrips to any destination worldwide on United– or United Express®–operated flights.†The bolding emphasis was mine. I don’t like the way they worded it, as it might be open to interpretation. Meaning… do you have to register before you purchase or just before travel? I would have written that sentence a bit differently.
Further fine print reveals the ticketing period is 4/15/12 – 7/15/12 and the travel period matches, excluding trips taken between 7/3/12 – 7/5/12.
Now… one twitter follower mentioned his offer was for 5,000 miles after 7 roundtrips, 10,000 miles after 8 and 25,000 miles after 9 roundtrips. He’s a Premier Gold and flew about half the amount of miles I did last year. To me, it would make more sense for United to offer lower-tier members the offer I received and force me to fly even more to qualify.
If you have not received an email and want to give registration a go, click here.
Did you receive a different offer?
I’m a Premier Gold and I didn’t get an email. I tried your link, entered my Onepass, I mean Premier, number and United said I didn’t qualify. I already felt my status deminish with the merger. Now I’m just mad. Time to look at a status match on another airline since I’ll be flying a lot more this year.
@Chris: Sorry to hear. I did read reports of others receiving the same “not eligible” message, for what it’s worth.
I was able to register for the same offer. but my wife received a message that she was not eligible for the offer when we tried to register her acct.
definitely targeted. worked for me, but the same web address did not work for my wife.
I am lowly Premier Executive, and was able to register on the link you provided – heck SHARES was even able to spell my first name correctly…pretty amazed right now.
I didn’t receive the email, but Your link worked for me. Thanks Darren! For what its worth, I’m a premier platinum.
It takes a while for the emails to get out, I registered via the link around 2:30, I didn’t get the email until 6. And I am the aforementioned shaftee.
sux for me… i’m flying 2 paid roundtrips in that promo period but all ticketed previously … so according to the fine print i’m probably dq’ed
I got the 25k after 4 round trips offer. I am a Premier Gold but barely flown 5k miles this year.
@Darren, I took interpreted as “just before travel”, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense having to register before purchase… but it’s the new UA, who knows
1K 3MM with a non-US Address didn’t get the email and the link doesn’t work.
With all of your comments now, I’d love to know United’s algorithm for who received what. I’m still shocked I got the “easy” offer.
My registration was unsuccessful. I sent United an email to send me an offer. You never know……
I was looking on some other BA blogs and it looks like most of the people getting the 1/2/4 offer rarely fly United/don’t have status, but apparently high tier people get it too. I still can’t fathom how I got 7/8/9.
@Kris: I really want to pick a MileagePlus person’s mind about this promo… the targeting, offer is soooo odd.
Called United, only tickets purchased after promotion registration count towards the trips.
I’m 1K, got the 2, 3, 5 offer.
I’m a Premier Plainum, and was offered 5K for 4 RTs.
@David: Only 5,000 total miles after four roundtrips??
I’m not eligible. I hardly fly with UA. Was given Gold Premier Status for the year so I’m not too surprised.
I’m a Million Miler/Premier Gold who flew 60,000 miles last year on United, and have flown around 20,000 so far this year, and I tend to usually have fairly expensive (>$1000) tickets. I am not eligible. Nice United. I need to take a number of trips during the period. I’m tempted to fly Frontier just out of principle. I really don’t have anything to loose by taking my business elsewhere. (Like I’m ever going to see another upgrade…)
I lost my Premier Gold status this year due to low mileage last year, and got the email for the “easy” offer Darren showed.
As a Premier Silver got this:
According to our records, you are not eligible to participate in this promotion.
If you feel you’ve received this message in error, please contact a MileagePlus® customer service representative.
Just wondering does a reservation booked on 3rd party website like orbitz count for a qualifying roundtrip?
@Andy: As long as it’s not one of those “hidden” fares where you don’t know the airline until you purchase the ticket, it should qualify.
1k, US-based, was not eligible
I got the 6, 7, 8 offer… Meh…
Hey, I have a question, if I book a roundtrip through Travelocity, does this count for qualifying trip? Thank you.
@HF: So long as it’s a published fare (not an opaque one where you don’t know the carrier until you buy), you should be good to go.
I got the “not eligible” message as a Premier Silver. Too bad, I have two cross country trips in June.
I got the 4/5/7 offer as a Premier Gold. I have 4 roundtrips in that period but all were booked before this silly offer. Also, 3 of the 4 roundtrips are gov’t fares which do not qualify for this anyway. Overall, I am not pleased with the “new” MileagePlus.
I am non-elite with UA, and got this message when I tried to register:
According to our records, you are not eligible to participate in this promotion.
If you feel you’ve received this message in error, please contact a MileagePlus® customer service representative.
1K 2MM flyer with 40K I. mileage this year and 3 roundtrip EWR/SFO flts booked before end of May. I’m not eligible either. Yet another reason for my disappointment with United.
The bottom line with these is that they are being used to differentiate between different types of flyer and maximise value for the airline. For the flyer who is already flying a lot this isn’t that useful but for those who are close to a new tier level or have just reached one, different levels of incentive will encourage you to keep going.
To be honest, blanket promotions are pretty hard to support from a marketing point of view as a targeted promotion can often get better results from the company’s point of view.
GS 1MM, 87k PQM so far this year with another 33k booked between now and end of May. “According to our records, you are not eligible to participate in this promotion.”
I was EXP on AA for a few years and was happier then than as GS now. I just did the AA status matching promo couple of days ago to get EXP again.
Tough decisions to make when it’s time to book my next longhaul trip.
I’m 1K and got e-mail for up to 25,000 bonus miles for 4 roundtrips and on united’s web under special offers a special note in upper left corner that this offer was for a select few? Boy do I feel SPECIAL!!! My wife is not elete and received NO OFFER.
1k with ~65k miles this year so far – not eligible. I never seem to get any of the promotions that others get 🙁 (and never have, even when I flew less)
@JK: That’s sad to hear… I’m sitting at 65k, too, right now. Strange.
I am Premier Executive with 33K miles this year so far and did not get the offer. I think COdbdUA just found a new way to alienate their customers. They are getting very good at that. With all the bad press and negative feelings they generated with the merger debacle, you would think they would have better sense then to exclude elites from their promos. The miles dont mean that much to me, but being excluded does.
@Mike: I hear you. I’m still baffled why I got this offer and other, less frequent flyers (and even 1Ks who’ve flown as much as me this year) haven’t.
I’m Premier silver. Did not get the email and I’m not eligible, according to the lightning reply from United at the link. I did get a 2,500 bonus back in January in some sort of similar thing – I think it was 500 per segment or something.