on the road to status: sfo/hnl edition. united's travel-with-a-friend policy

yesterday, i ran after work to get to the airport. i thought that a 19h08 departure time was doable, and that i could easily slip away from work before 5. but life usually throws in a detour, and so we ended up racing to the airport in order to make the deadlines on time. just a few notes:

1) baggage drop off time is 60 minutes internationally for united, just like it is for air canada (trans-border). the bf and i got to the counter at 18h05 with our single piece of luggage that needed to be checked. the united agent was a bit curt, seemed a bit irritated that we didn't use the kiosk first. i think she was irritated that we were using the business class check-in counter too, even though it is a published benefit for star gold members). i did this because rather than waste my precious remaining 3 minutes fumbling on the computer screen and have something go wrong, i'd rather let the agent do it for me. the agent "forgot" to give us a priority baggage tag, and i was too in a rush to notice. interestingly, those traveling with star gold members who do not have status themselves also receive waived baggage fees on the same PNR. learned something new there.

2) the bf used the nexus iris scanner for the first time yesterday and did it like a pro. the machine went out of service for me when it came to my turn, so i used global entry for the very first time. you don't need to use the blue declaration cards when using global entry. global entry is available at all canadian pre-clearance airports, so i think i'll be doing global entry from now on.

3) joe and i got to the gate 27 minutes prior to departure time. interestingly, united has now moved to a system of separate lines for its different boarding groups. group 1 was already done by the time we arrived, and group 2 was almost done as well. i knew i was group 2 due to my star gold status but interestingly enough, my "travel companion" on the same PNR was also group 2 despite not having any status. this is great because now we don't actually have to check in luggage ... joe can board comfortably knowing that he will definitely have space available in the overhead compartments. this is definitely different than two years ago, whereby in vietnam, we were in different boarding groups. not that it mattered, because the vietnamese gate agent gave him a priority boarding sticker after she saw that we were traveling together.

4) there were a few seats left in premium economy, all of which were middle seats. it was not oversold after all. and i'd rather sit with the bf than in between two random strangers, even if there is more legroom.

5) our luggage was among the first to come out despite not having a priority tag. i honestly wished that priority baggage would mean priority baggage, and that if you're supposed to get a priority tag, that you actually get one. but having two "accidents" on united's part meant having the correct, expected outcome for me. so i'm happy in the end.

all in all, we are in san francisco, all in one piece. we arrived 30 minutes early, and we are now 800 status miles ahead.