Star Alliance founding member United Airlines offers a nice premium economy fare for trips from London to Auckland, New Zealand. Connections with a single layover in San Francisco start at €1,416 – including at least one checked bag (two when booking directly at united.com). Further, this offer is worth 35,500 Premier Qualifying Miles, going almost 3/4 the way to Star Alliance Gold tier.
Flights between London and San Francisco are Boeing 777-200 service. A Boeing 777-300ER handles flights between San Francisco and Auckland. Both types feature a 2-4-2 seating pattern in premium economy.
Both legs feature long, daytime layovers in SFO. This might not be the worst thing, since San Francisco is an interesting city to explore and a gap between two 10+ hour flights can be very welcome. Since you can add 2 free stopovers, you may even spent some more days in the Bay Area.
Search & Book
Fare rules do not give an expiration date. They do give an travel period (January 12 – December 10) that specifically exludes Christmas travel. Further, a minimum stay of 3 days and a maximum stay of twelve months applies.
You can use Google Flights to find out when this fare is available (instructions). According to its calendar fuction, this fare shows scattered availability all the way until June 2020. It mostly available for flights leaving London on tuesdays. Enter the dates you’ve retrieved in our flight search, where prices drop around €100 in comparison to Google.
Booking through united.com might be more expensive, but gives you better customer service if anything goes wrong, like a missed connection.
Mileage
United issues tickets for all flight segments in booking class R. Most Star Alliance frequent flyer programs will credit 100% of your travel distance.
- 23,768 Award Miles + 4,754 PQP on United MileagePlus
- 23,768 Miles on Asiana Club
- 23,768 Miles on Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles
- 23,768 Award Miles + 320 Points on Miles&More
- 23,768 Award Miles + 2,376 Tier Miles on Azul TodoAzul
- 23,768 Miles on Copa ConnectMiles
- 23,768 Miles on EVA Infinity MileageLands
- 23,768 Points on SAS EuroBonus
- 23,768 Miles on Singapore KrisFlyer
- 23,768 Miles on TAP Miles&Go
- 23,768 Miles on Thai Royal Orchid Plus
- 23,768 CV Points on Vistara Club Vistara
- 23,768 Miles on Avianca LifeMiles
- 23,768 Miles on Aegean Miles+Bonus
- 23,768 Miles on Air Canada Aeroplan
- 23,768 Avios on Aer Lingus AerClub
- 23,768 Award Miles on Emirates Skywards
- 23,768 Miles on Egyptair Plus
- 16,638 Miles on ANA Mileage Club
According to united.com, you will receive 17,836 PQM for each the out- and inbound leg. That sums up to 35,652 PQM. You’ll get Star Alliance Gold (= alliance wide lounge access) at 50,000 PQM.
