If you’re flying on United Airlines, you may be able to purchase priority boarding for $9 on your next flight.
My biggest concern when traveling for business: missing out on overhead bin space.
There are few annoyances worse for the road warrior than boarding late and being forced to gate-check a bag. Thankfully, whenever I fly United I don’t have to worry…as long as I board early. But since that is not always possible I am increasingly traveling with only a small bag that can fit under my seat. Even first class overhead bins can fill up early.
And while boarding early is annoying (I always prefer to board last unless I am reviewing the onboard product), I’m just thankful for the opportunity–I’d hate to be in Group 4 or 5 and barely stand a chance at keeping my larger carry-on bag with me.
United is breaking out priority boarding from its Premier Access package, offering the perk on an a la carte basis. Initially, priority boarding will cost $9/flight, regardless of the flight. That $9 will get you Group 2 boarding, allowing you to board with:
- Premier Gold
- Star AllianceSM Gold
- Premier Silver
- Star Alliance Silver
- Customers who have purchased Premier Access
- United MileagePlus Explorer, Club, Presidential PlusSM and Awards Cardmembers
I certainly fear the “if everyone is elite, no one is elite” issue:
Yet $9 is still going to be worth it if you have an important carry-on bag you do not want to check.
This option will NOT be available on all flights. It will also not be available to Basic Economy customers. United tells me, “Availability is closely controlled based on flight, date, time of day and day-of-week restrictions.” I’m admittedly still skeptical, but United assures me:
We do not anticipate any significant impact on the current boarding group size.
I guess we will soon see.
This is a useful offer because it is cheap and because many customers do not need Premier Access because they already have PreCheck to clear airport security.
CONCLUSION
The key for this program’s success will be how carefully United limits the number of priority boarding positions it sells. But in the right circumstances, I can see where this purchase would make sense.
I feel like this cheapens up earning status with the airline. They should board their early board buy ups behind all of the elite fliers who have earned their status by actually paying for flights and acrruing status.
As someone with top tier airline status it is a great perk to be able to board early and not have to fight for overhead space.
Ugh. Terrible idea. What they really need to do is to increase the number of boarding groups and push the damn Explorer cards down to Group 3. As an aside, I didn’t know that Awards cards got Group 2 too. 😮 Club and PP get Premier Access, so I guess they stay, but those sub-$100 cards should really get booted.
Group 2 is way overcrowded…
I think the whole issue around fighting for overhead space is really over hyped specially now that the basic economy folks don’t bring a carry on.
I’m regularly in the second to last groups to board, and honestly it’s not that big an issue. Maybe 1 in 10 gate check (for smaller planes typically), and even gate check is like an extra 2-3 minutes max (I’ve timed it), which really shouldn’t be an issue. Stand for 2-3 minutes and browse your phone while bag comes.
My experience (almost 100% on United) has been different. Do you fly United or another airline?
I’m loyal to schedule and pricing, last three flights have been from Seattle on Delta (to Austin), to ORD/Asheville (on United), to DFW/Midland (on American).
All 3 without status, second to last non-basic-economy boarding, no real issues getting bag on except on the smaller planes when connecting from hub to smaller city.
I think for folks who have better status, they tend to pick a seat in the first few rows (which means you have less bins to find a space before you reach your seat). Pick a seat around row 20ish or so, there’s bound to be space by the time you get to your seat.
Back in 2013 when I started flying Delta weekly for work and I had no status, Delta offered $10 per segment priority boarding. I purchased that twice each week until I achieved a status that gave me priority boarding. Doing this allowed me to find a space for my rollaboard. I did not see any boarding line differences when I did that versus when I later had DL status.
I am also a UA 1K and have been for years. I am not sure how this will work out for UA. The DL and UA boarding processes vary greatly in that DL is organized and UA is a total mess. UA has still to re-group their boarding groups (and not have pax queue one hour prior to the start of boarding time). I just think this will be messy for UA. Everything with UA is just plain messy.
I agree that UA needs to push down the credit-card elites to Group 3.
In determining a price, I would have at least used the checked bag fee as a starting point. I assume this will include access to priority security as well?
It has been interesting to see the evolution of security lines with the advent of PreCheck. Most premiere fliers don’t even use the premiere access lanes as they have PreCheck. In some cases, I have used premiere access despite having PreCheck because there was no line. Faster to take off my shoes than wait with all the others!
I’ve flown United three times this year and never had an issue as a non status passenger. In fact I got a whole row of 3 seats to myself each time, needless to say plenty of overhead space. All my flights were to/from IAD.
Haha I love that Come Fly With Me segment
Well I just boarded a United flight in mid-group 2 and the overhead bins are full. United continues to prove why it is a crappy airline.
Wow. What route?