It’s stunning to me that this is even something that’s been an issue, but as I wrote about on March 23rd, in the post United Refusing Refunds on Cancelled Award Flights, United was, indeed, refusing to redeposit miles for award flights that had been cancelled due to the ongoing COVID-19 situation.
Instead they were offering mileage vouchers, good for one year and not even valid to book partner awards! That part is even more crazy since, with new dynamic award pricing, the best value for miles now are often (almost always) on partner awards.
In this article
United Now Allows Free Award Redeposits for Cancelled Flights
According to View From The Wing, United has finally backtracked on this policy and you can now do a mileage redeposit online just by going into the reservation and clicking a button to Cancel and Redeposit Miles.
This is great news, although it merely matches what Alaska, AA, and Delta have been doing all along – i.e. the right thing.
My understanding is that you can also use the above if your flight is not technically cancelled, but you are not permitted to fly the route due to travel restrictions (I assume that will require a phone call).
Sadly, on cancelled flights that you paid for with actual money, United will still hold onto your money for a full year, giving you only a voucher and then refunding you the cash in 12 months if you haven’t used the voucher. This is despite the fact that the really do, legally, have to refund you cash in this situation. But who are you going to complain to about that when United simply refuses? (I would, myself, do a chargeback for services not rendered).
If you already paid a fee, I’m guessing it will be an uphill battle to get United to go and refund those fees – but I’d still try.
Did you get your United miles back for your cancelled flight?
Let me know here, on Twitter, or in the private MilesTalk Facebook group.
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New to all of this? The MilesTalk “introduction to miles and points” book, MilesTalk: Live Your Wildest Travel Dreams Using Miles and Points is available on Amazon and at major booksellers.
