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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Sixteen and fourteen year olds are fine in coach.

I'd definitely put my parents in first class so they are more comfortable.[/quote]

This.

How is this even a question?

Grandparents take priority. Although I think they should have offered your kids more money. Like $250 each for spending money on the trip. [/quote]

OP here. Round-trip business class tix IAD-ATH in August are about $7K, but coach was more like $1500. So my parents went with the cheaper and more affordable option even though they probably wanted business class. Now they want to switch. They assume our business class tix are basically free due to DH’s business travel and status. They could have bought business class tix, but chose not to do so. [/quote]

[b]Well, the tix are essentially free...so they are not wrong there.[/b]

We are going to Europe next month and paying about $7k in our own money for each ticket (jobs without travel).
[/quote]

Points/miles person here.  The bolded is often said about using points/miles, but its incorrect.  United miles don't expire, and they can be stored and instead used for future travel.  So there is a significant opportunity cost involved in using them- OP said not long ago that it would be over 700k miles to fly the grandparents roundtrip in business- that's worth at a minimum $7000 in future travel for their family.  While there may not have been a direct cash cost to get the miles, they are a valuable asset and thus there is  cost involved in using them.  And should also note that the type of travel OP's DH does to earn this many miles is not easy when you do it over and over and is essentially unpaid labor.  There is absolutely a cost associated with earning them.[/quote]

I cannot make it through all 26 pages.  Did OP say why they did not use miles just the upgrade portion?  Many people buy the coach ticket and then use miles to upgrade.[/quote]

Yes. That type of upgrade is usually oversubscribed and subject to a wait-list which the grandparents would not clear.[/quote]

OP here. DH booked our original tickets IAD-ATH in a complicated way. DH and DD are on one round-trip itinerary. They used several travel certificates on discounted coach tickets and then applied 320 PlusPoints to upgrade to Polaris Business Class. The two coach tickets were like $900 each, but fully offset by the the travel certificates (given by United due to previous trip irrops / voluntary giving up of seat stuff). The second itinerary was for me and DS. This was booked with 320K FF miles - 2 tickets 100K outbound + 60K return. We usually pair one kid with one adult to avoid unaccompanied minor and no-status problems with kids on their own itinerary. Also, I have gifted GS status from DH, so I can still get priority upgrades without being on his record locator.

But, there’s no upgrade inventory available now for my parents using miles or PlusPoints. DH still has a lot of both. Waitlist only, which DH is confident will not clear for my parents. He called. No way. Only cash upgrades are available and they are $$expensive. [/quote]

PP here who feels pretty pretty good about guessing that this is what you did to be able to do this with 320k miles.

Not surprised at all that there is zero upgrade inventory available in early June for peak summer travel.  What I would say about your idea of booking expensive non-saver business awards for them, is that there is somewhat of a chance of saver availability opening up within 10 days of the dates of travel, and since United charges no change fees, you could cancel their non-saver tickets and rebook as savers if that inventory opens up.  Still relatively low odds (especially for 2), but its possible.  I have done this before successfully, although it wasn't peak summer travel so my odds were better.[/quote]

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