United Adds MileagePlus Points Pooling for Friends and Family

The airline announced a new feature to allow MileagePlus members to pool their miles together, available immediately on the carrier’s website.

MileagePlus Pooling Allows Five Members to Collect Miles Together

In most loyalty programs, members are allowed to transfer miles between each other for a nominal fee. However, United will now allow groups to come together to combine miles into a single joint account.

“We’re always looking for new ways to provide the most value to all of our loyalty members,” Luc Bondar, chief operating officer of MileagePlus, said in a statement. “MileagePlus miles pooling further reinforces United’s position as the leader in family and group travel and gives our members more flexibility to use their miles.”

Under the program expansion, groups of five MileagePlus members are allowed to come together to share and redeem miles from a single account. The option is available to any five members, not just those who are connected as immediate family.

A pool works when a MileagePlus member 18 or older creates a pool and becomes a “pool leader.” From there, they can invite up to four more members to join their pool if they have an active frequent flyer account. While the pool leader must be at least 18, flyers of any age can have a MileagePlus account and join the pool.

Miles are not immediately contributed to the pool by all members. Instead, members will have the option to choose how many miles they want to put into the group account. From there, the miles can be used to book a ticket through the United website or mobile app.

While members will be allowed to collectively use their points, they cannot apply their Premier Qualifying Points towards one member earning elite status. Moreover, any Premier Qualifying Points earned from flying will only apply to the flyer traveling on the award ticket, not the entire group. Members will also not be allowed to pool Premier Qualifying Flights, PlusPoints, or TravelBank cash.

Although United claims they are the first “major U.S. airline” to offer points pooling, they are not the first overall. Frontier Airlines introduced family pooling for their Frontier Miles program, but only expanded it to all elite members in 2023.

Will you pool miles with your fellow FlyerTalkers? Share your thoughts on the FlyerTalk forums.