UPDATE 11/19 12:00PM – Aeroplan agents are now able to book United awards again. If you had trouble before, go ahead and give them a call to try again.
What Is Going On With Aeroplan for United Awards?
This is a strange one. I have been trying for over 24 hours to book an itinerary that included a short United segment (on a transatlantic award). I have spoken to many reps and there seems to be no idea why they cannot book these tickets.
The Problem
According the various agents, they can see the United award space but the system will not allow them to book any United awards. This started yesterday and I was told it should only take another couple of hours. Yet, here we are over 24 hours later and the problem is still here.
This is very annoying if you are trying to modify any booking that needs a United segment. Fortunately, I was able to have the agent last night change my award (no more Swiss business – going for the good old Turkish business!) to get me to the US and then I would try later to add the last segment on. At least this way, I was able to grab the elusive Turkish business class ticket from Istanbul to San Francisco for now.
Bookable Online?
I actually wish I could test this but I do not have any more miles in my Aeroplan account right now and don’t want to transfer any in just to test this out! If anyone else wants to see if it will let you get to the booking page before reserving, let us know in the comments if this is working!
What To Do?
In the meantime, it is just a waiting game if you need to call in (1-800-361-5373). While it has been refreshing to get Aeroplan agents within 3 minutes over the last few months, today the wait was over 15 minutes. Kind of a pain to wait that long (or longer) and then find out that there is nothing they can do!
If you are trying to do something similar to my situation, ask the agents to get the segments that can be booked and then try later to add the United segments. If the United connections disappear (which tends to happen since United likes to lock up award space for cardholders and elite members), I suggest asking the rep about waiving the change fee if you need to do something different as this is a problem on their end and not anything under your control.
I didn’t want to write a post about this yesterday as I was hopeful it would be up in a matter of hours. But now that this is going on for over 24 hours, I thought I would put it out there to see if anyone else is able to book online and to have people chime in here when it is finally working again.
Featured image courtesy of Shutterstock
Let us know in the comments of your experiences and if it is bookable online.
There a lot of awards currently unavailable on the UA site.
You are saying that trying to book partner flights on United are not working or regular United awards on UA are not working?
What is going on? Probably United warning Air Canada that their aggressive credit card focused future loyalty program should not include any US launches..