United Airlines is making 3 big changes to MileagePlus that no one is likely to be happy about. They’re making changes to award rules, upgrades, and upgrade pricing.
Here are the 3 changes:
- August 21, 2025, United will eliminate the “Excursionist Perk” for all new bookings. That’s United’s limited free stopover program. Existing bookings will be honored but not if any changes are made after August 21. This is a big loss for award maximizers who would build in a second side trip onto their awards. The excursionist perk was the concession United gave members when eliminating free stopovers eight years ago.
- Also August 21, 2025 will drop instant upgrades at the time of booking for elite members buying the most expensive (Y, B, and M) fares. Customers could immediately confirm an upgrade if seats were available at booking on these fares.
These higher fares will still receive higher priority in the Complimentary Premier Upgrade waitlist but will no longer benefit from immediate confirmation. All upgrades not using PlusPoints or MileagePlus miles will be processed exclusively through Complimentary Premier Upgrade, which means uncertainty for those who would have done instant confirmation on the highest fares in the past.
- November 24, 2025 United will stop displaying their MileagePlus Upgrade Award chart. The only reason to hide the price is because it’s likely to change regularly (dynamic pricing) and on net to go up. That’s certainly what we saw when United eliminated its award charts for free tickets in 2019.
I’m not sure whether dropping stopovers and instantly confirmable upgrades is worse than eliminating upgrade award charts. I suspect there will be partisans debating which of these three changes is worst, but I don’t really see any upside for members in what the airline is doing to its loyalty program.
(HT: The Points Guy)
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