A few months ago, the United routing rules drastically changed the way in how their routing rules on award tickets worked. Previously, the United routing rules on awards allowed you 1 stopover and 2 open-jaws on a roundtrip award ticket. But back in August, United introduced something called the United Excursionist Perk, which is basically a stopover with some additional restrictions.
(SEE ALSO: Stopover, layover, open-jaw? What are they and what’s the difference?)
The Excursionist Perk has caused some changes to which flights (and routes) show up on United.com, and United has also since clarified that what is on the website are the only allowed routings, and if it doesn’t come up on the website, then it may cost extra miles.
Tips by Travel is Free on the United routing rules
Drew from Travel is Free already had what I considered the definitive guide to United’s Routing Rules, which now, sadly is mostly out of date. With the new United Excursionist Perk and new United routing rules for awards, he’s published a 4 part guide to the new rules, and some very interesting tricks.
- First up is the post on the basics – this covers the basics of how the new United routing rules work
- New United Stopover Tricks aka the Roundtrip Hack – this post talks about what you can now do with a roundtrip booking on United.
- Going with some concrete examples, first we have 7 practical stopovers with United miles.
- Then there are 5 crazier stopovers you can do with United miles.
These are some of these things that he posted about have already been nerfed, but there is still some great content there.
A note on posting these United routing rules
I know there is always conflict between people and “bloggers” who talk about deals.
(SEE ALSO: Another deal we killed?)
People always talk about publicizing deals killing the deals, and I can understand that sometimes this happens. In the specific case of these United routing rules tips, I do believe that United is aware of these things already. And while I try to be sensitive to truly under the radar deals (like the e-dreams Egypt deal this morning, now dead), I personally feel more on the side of letting the widest audience possible know about deals and how you can take advantage. Your mileage may vary.
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
United will be charging more miles to get from point A to B. It will always be a no win game for the consumer. I’m glad there are always other airlines to explore. United must remember, the consumer can take their business elsewhere.
LOVE this post! We are getting ready to book Australia 2017, can this same concept be used to link AUSTRALIA & Oceania since they are two separate regions?
I believe the United routing rules would allow something like this as they are 2 separate regions as you mention. Best idea would be to just try and book some sample flights on united.com and see what is allowed and how it prices!