Getting the Phantom United 50,000 Mile Business Offer

Last week, the United MileagePlus Explorer card lifted its bonus to 50,000 miles after meeting the minimum spending. At the same time, the Business card was also lifted to the same amount. The business version had actually been around the 50,000 mark for some time as a sorta-targeted offer. However, the last few months, it has gone down.

The problem is that many people are saying that they are unable to get the 50,000 mile offer anymore. Even going directly to the landing page for the 50K amount that has that amount in the address will only bring up the 30,000 mile offer. So, how do you get the business offer for 50,000 miles? That is an awesome offer – especially if you couple it with the United personal card for the same amount. That equals a 100,000 mile payday!

Getting the Phantom United 50,000 Miles

If you try going directly to this link, it will show the 30,000 offer unless you are signed into an account that has the offer tied to it. It does seem to be a targeted offer. I received the offer when logged in to my account, but my wife did not receive it when going through her account. Her account did not have any miles in it, so I put 1,000 miles in to test it (this is what happened before with the personal offer). Still, no offer for 50,000 miles – just 30,000 miles.

This is the offer when logged in to my United account for the business card

Then I tried logging in through my daughter’s account (also a zero balance). It did not show up in her account either. These tests were done from both the affiliate link available through most bloggers and the link for the $50 statement credit – same results on the business card for both.

What is the deciding factor?

There are a couple of differences between the three of our accounts. Here is the breakdown:

• My account – A lot of miles and Premier 1K status – 50K offer
• My wife’s account – 1,000 miles and no status – 30K offer
• My daughter’s account – no miles and no status – 30K offer
• My son’s account – 2,000 miles and no status – 30K offer

The link from my wife’s account

The link from my account

The qualification could be related to a certain of award miles that you already have in the account, but I do not think that makes sense. More than likely, it is related to if you have elite status with United.

Now, I am wondering if it is available to members of all status or just the upper tier statuses. If it is for any elite, then this could be a good time to sync your Marriott Platinum status to United to receive Premier Silver (why would you wait anyway?:) ). If you are not a Marriott Platinum, then you could request a status challenge to United from another program with which you have status. Since it is after July 1, any status you earn through the challenge will give you status through February of 2016, so that could work nicely! See here for more information.

Need your help

To help others who may want to get the 50,000 mile offer, leave a comment below if you received the offer and if you hold status with United. That way, others will be better equipped to go with the options before them if you do want to receive the extra 20,000 miles. I would value them to be worth at least $350, so that may make sense to get the status to help you with that.

One other data point that would be helpful – leave a comment if you have the United Club card. That might be a deciding factor as well (if you do not have status).