Exploit The “Excursionist” United Airlines Loophole for Free Segments: Part 1 – Introduction

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United Airlines recently changed their MileagePlus program, including some of their award flight booking rules.  For some folks, booking award flights has become trickier

and

even more expensive.

But for others, via Travel is Free, United Airlines’ new policies will provide great value.

This is due to a new rule under the United Airlines award program called Excursionist Perk.  The Excursionist Perk is a free one-way flight you can book in addition to a round-trip or multi-city itinerary.  

In this 4-part series, I’ll show you how to use the Excursionist Perk to get Big Travel with Small Money!

Exploit the “Excursionist” United Airlines Loophole for Free Segments: Series Index

• Part 1:   Introduction
• Part 2:   How to Use United.com to Book Award Flights
• Part 3:   Using the Excursionist Perk to Extend Your Vacation
• Part 4:   5 Crazy Ways to Use the Excursionist Perk for Maximum Value

What Is the Excursionist Perk?

United Airlines describes the Excursionist Perk as “a free one-way award flight within select multi-city itineraries.”  So the Excursionist Perk is a way to get a 3rd one-way flight segment for free, when booking at least 2 other one-way award flights or a round-trip award flight.

Additionally, the free one-way flight can be used in conjunction with up to 3 open jaws!  Keep reading to learn more about “open jaws”

and

figure out how this might be helpful on your next award flight.

You can use miles for 2 one-way flights (or a round-trip)

and

get the 3rd one-way flight free!  This can save you thous

and

s of miles while allowing you to fly to more places!  But there are limitations you need to know.

For most folks, this perk will be useful when booking a round-trip award flight.  The Excursionist Perk will allow you to add a free one-way flight, without time restrictions, in addition to your round-trip award flight!

Note:   The Excursionist Perk is only available on flights booked with United Airlines miles, not flights paid with cash!

Rules for Using the Excursionist Perk

There are several rules associated with using the Excursionist Perk.  And if you don’t follow these rules, you won’t be able to book your free one-way flight.

1.   You Must Book at Least 2 One-Way Flights, or 1 Round-Trip

You can NOT use the free Excursionist Perk if you are only booking a one-way flight.

But you can use it if booking a round-trip flight or a multi-city itinerary with at least 2 segments!  In a future post, I’ll show you how to use the Excursionist Perk when booking 2 one-way flights.

2.   You Can NOT Use the Excursionist Perk on Round-Trip Flights Within the Continental US

If your round-trip flight is wholly within the Mainl

and

US, Alaska, & Canada, you do not qualify for the free one-way flight.  This means the United Airlines Excursionist Perk will be most useful for folks traveling internationally or to Hawaii.

3.   Your Free Additional One-Way Flight Must Be Within a Single “Region”

A “region” is how airlines categorize countries to determine the price of award flights.  For example, United Airlines has 17 “regions,” including:

• Mainl

  and

  US, Alaska,

  and

  Canada
• Hawaii
• Mexico
• Caribbean
• Central America
• Northern South America
• Southern South America
• Europe
• Middle East
• Northern Africa
• Central

  and

  Southern Africa
• North Asia
• Central Asia
• South Asia
• Japan
• Oceania
• Australia

  and

  New Zeal

  and

For the complete listing of countries in each region, visit United Airlines’ list of countries

and

regions.

For example, your free one-way flight could be wholly within the “Europe” region (Dublin to Rome) or wholly within the “Central

and

Southern Africa” region (Nairobi to Johannesburg).

Note:   Each airline has different “region” definitions, so be careful when booking award flights with other airline miles (such as Delta miles or American Airlines miles).

4.   Your Free Additional One-Way Flight Can NOT Be a More Expensive Award Type or in a Better Cabin

If your round-trip award flights are in coach, your free one-way flight must also be in coach.  But if your award flights are in Business Class, your free one-way can be in Business Class too!

If your round-trip flight is in Business Class, you can also book your free one-way flight in coach.  This might be useful if no Business Class award flights are available.

Similarly, your free one-way flight can not be a “st

and

ard” flight award if your round-trip award flights were at the “saver” level.  United Airlines uses “st

and

ard”

and

“saver” to identify their different award types.

“St

and

ard” awards will always be more expensive than “saver” awards.  But “st

and

ard” awards usually have more available award seats.  So “st

and

ard” awards are considered to be the more expensive award type.

Similar to the coach

and

Business Class restriction, your free one-way flight can only be a “st

and

ard” level flight if your round-trip flight was booked at the “st

and

ard” level as well.

5.   Travel Must End in the Same “Region” Where It Originates

Your flights must also begin

and

end in the same United MileagePlus defined region. For example, the above bookings work because the itineraries both originate

and

conclude in the continental US.  Or, the travel must both originate

and

conclude in Europe.

The following itinerary would NOT qualify for the free one-way flight:

• Los Angeles – London
• London – Amsterdam (free one-way flight)
• Amsterdam – Cancun

This itinerary violates the Excursionist Perk rules since Los Angeles

and

Cancun are in different award “regions” according to United Airlines (Mainl

and

US

and

Mexico).  Thus, this booking would NOT be eligible for the free one-way flight.

If you don’t follow these rules, the option to book your free one-way won’t appear during the online booking process.

Using the Excursionist Perk on a Round-Trip Award Flight

The simplest examples of how to use the Excursionist Perk are when booking a round-trip award flight using United Airlines miles.  Remember, you can use the same strategy between any 2 cities in the US

and

Europe, or between the US

and

other award regions!

1.   Fly to Another City in Europe for NO Additional Miles!

If you wanted to book a round-trip award flight from Chicago to London using United Airlines miles, the Excursionist Perk would allow you to visit one more European or US city, free of charge!  So instead of simply flying straight to London,

and

straight home to Chicago, you could stop in Vienna as well.

In this example, you can book a free one-way flight from London to Vienna.  And, you can stop over in Vienna (extend your stay) for as long as you want, up to 1 year!  This functionality is very similar to United Airlines’ previous award rules.

So the following itineraries would cost the same amount of United Airlines miles:

• Chicago to London (one-way flight)
• London to Chicago (one-way flight home)

and

• Chicago to London (one-way flight)
• London to Vienna (FREE one-way flight, with free stopover in Vienna)
• Vienna to Chicago (one-way flight home)

Using the free one-way flight in the “Europe” region is just one example.  You could also use the Excursionist Perk when traveling to “South Asia,” such as adding a free one-way from Hong Kong to Vietnam.

Or, you can use the free one-way flight award between 2 completely different destinations!

2.  Your Bonus One-Way Flight Does NOT Have to Connect to Your Original Destination

This can be great for travelers who want to visit many different cities.

Let’s say you want to travel by train from London to Brussels

and

from Venice to Rome.  You could use your free Excursionist Perk to fly from Brussels to Venice before flying home from Rome to Chicago.

So your flights would be:

• Chicago – London (destination, 30,000 United Airlines miles one-way in coach)
• Brussels – Venice (free Excursionist Perk, zero additional miles!)

• and

   Rome to Chicago (return home, 30,000 United Airlines miles one-way in coach)

Your overall trip would be:

• Fly out of Chicago to l

  and

  in London (30,000 United Airlines miles one-way in coach)
• Take the train from London to Brussels
• Use your free bonus flight to fly out of Brussels to l

  and

  in Venice (No additional miles, just pay taxes!)
• Take the train from Venice to Rome
• Conclude your award flight by flying from Rome home to Chicago (30,000 United Airlines miles one-way in coach)

3.   You Can Return to (or From) a Different City

Finally, it is also possible to use the Excursionist Perk in conjunction with an open jaw back in the US.

This means that you could see 6 different cities in 1 award like the one below!

An open jaw is flying into one destination (such as London)

and

returning from another (such as Vienna).  Or, an open jaw can also be departing from one destination (such as Chicago)

and

returning to another (such as Los Angeles).

So you can fly from the US (your departure region) to any city in another destination region (such as Europe).  Then use your free bonus one-way flight to fly within that destination region.  This could be a flight within Europe, for example.  Then, use your one-way flight back to the US to fly to a different city than the one from which you departed!

So if you want to return to Los Angeles instead of flying home to Chicago, you could do that for the same amount of miles!

An award flight from Chicago – London (destination), Brussels – Venice (free Excursionist Perk),

and

 Rome to Los Angeles is also permissible under the new rules.  This award flight has a total of 3 open jaws, which can be very valuable.   For example, a traveler who wanted to combine a European vacation with visiting family in California could get half their West Coast vacation for free!  So 2 trips (European vacation

and

California to visit family) could be booked for just a single round-trip

and

a one-way flight back to Chicago from California.

Your overall trip would be:

• Fly out of Chicago to l

  and

  in London (30,000 United Airlines miles one-way in coach)
• Take the train from London to Brussels
• Use your free bonus flight to fly out of Brussels to l

  and

  in Venice (No additional miles, just pay taxes!)
• Take the train from Venice to Rome
• Conclude your award flight by flying from Rome to Los Angeles (30,000 United Airlines miles one-way in coach)

Once you factor in the various booking classes (coach, Business Class,

and

First Class), there are even more possibilities to use this new perk.  In Parts 3

and

4 of this series, I’ll give you more specific examples of how to use the Excursionist Perk to get Big Travel with Small Money!

Underst

and

ing United Airlines’ Booking Rules

In Part 2 of this series, I’ll show you exactly how to use United.com to book award flights, including the Excursionist Perk.  But United Airlines has made it very easy to use the free one-way award flight!

You just need to know a little bit about award regions, so you can follow the rules of the Excursionist Perk.  The United Airlines award chart is region based, so make sure your free one-way flight’s origin

and

destination are within the same region!

Some readers might ask if the new Excursionist Perk is actually any different than the old option of booking a free stopover.  And the answer is YES – the Excursionist Perk is much more valuable.  United Airlines’ previous stopover allowance was more difficult to book,

and

far more restrictive.

Bottom Line

United Airlines’ recent changes to their MileagePlus program were primarily negative because awards became harder to book.  And many folks are unhappy that some multi-city itineraries now require more United Airlines miles to book.

But the introduction of the Excursionist Perk has the potential to be incredibly valuable.  Under the new rules, you can get a free one-way flight if you book a round-trip flight or 2 qualifying one-ways.

In my next post, I’ll show you how to use the United Airlines website to book a free one-way flight using the Excursionist Perk.