[Tech Glitch Resolved] United To Add Mileage Pooling

Update 3/26/24: Tech glitch has now been resolved and this is working again.

Update 3/22/24: A few hours after launch this was pulled from the United website. United is saying this is due to a technical glitch and they hope to have it back soon.

Update 3/21/24: This has now been confirmed by United. Details are as follows:

  • Pool leader must be 18+ but can invited up to 4 other people to join of any age (total of 5 people in the pool)
  • You can only participate in one miles pool at a time
  • You need to wait 90 days between leaving a pool and joining a new one. If your pool was full (5 people) and one person leaves, you need to wait 90 days before adding a new person
  • Pooled miles can only be used to book United and United Express flights. Pooled miles cannot be used to purchase upgrades, seat assignments, onboard food and beverages, inflight Wi-Fi access or anything else
  • Contributing miles to a MileagePlus miles pool will not affect an individual member’s Premier® status.
  • Only members who travel on a ticket using pooled miles will earn any eligible Premier qualifying points (PQP), not the member who contributed them. Members cannot pool PQP, Premier qualifying flights (PQF), PlusPoints, or TravelBank cash.

Restriction of this only being able to book United an United Express flights will kill the excitement for many, but still an improvement.

Original post: According to trusted aviation insider JonNYC United Airlines will introduce mileage pooling. Members will be able to join one pool and add miles to a collective account, the pool leader can then determine how those miles are used. Aeroplan previously offered this but has suspended family sharing, whereas JetBlue, British Airways & others all offer variations of this. I assume there will be some preventative measures that aim to stop things like selling miles and accumulating orphaned points (e.g transfers of at least 1,000 miles).
    William Charles
  • On March 26, 2024, 16:45
Tags: united airlines

View Comments (59)

  • Any updates to the pooling program, particularly as to the idea of creating/using a pool to transfer some of a family member's miles to the pool leader. and then having that family member leave the pool (but leaving the miles with the leader). Thank you

    • The FAQ "What can pooled miles be used for?" may not be clear: "Pooled miles can be used to book United or United Express award tickets only."

      But "Miles Pooling Terms and Conditions" spells out "operated": "23. Pool Miles can only be used to purchase Award Air Tickets on United or United Express® operated flights."

      For regular miles, it spells out "partner airlines": "Use miles to book award flights on United and Star Alliance™ partner airlines."
      https://www.united.com/en/us/fly/mileageplus/use-miles.html

    • it only says "Pooled miles can be used to book United or United Express award tickets only. Pooled miles cannot be used to purchase upgrades, seat assignments, onboard food and beverages, inflight Wi-Fi access or anything else." So, a United award ticket does not mean for flights on United operated planes only. You can have a United award ticket and United sells its own section of seats of a partner airline, say Austrian. The ticket is still a United ticket even for the Austrian operated segment of the flight. The fact they don't even take the time to enumerate the exclusion of award flights in partner airlines, means it is allowed. This is just my reading.

    • It's not clear, they do not explain in the FAQ whether we can use them on partner award flights if the ticket is bought as an award ticket from the united.com.

  • See, I told you. Rumour said that they need money to fix those planes and the doors. Now they made enough money and pull it, much worse than any Credit Unions. They're not pooling, they're TOOLing you

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