Things to keep in mind before canceling the Chase United MileagePlus Explorer Card

The most commonly issued co-branded United card is the Chase United MileagePlus Explorer card.

It offers:

  • A healthy signup bonus usually in the range of 40,000-70,000 miles
  • Free checked bags
  • Priority boarding
  • A $95 annual fee (waived the first year)

After a few years successfully getting the annual fee waived I recently came up empty handed. What to do?

I mildly appreciated the priority boarding the card offers. While traveling on business even though Group 2 boarding puts you just barely ahead of the small collection of people with absolutely no angle, it generally gets your bag in an overhead bin rather than being gate checked.

But as a result of getting Marriott Platinum status (through this status challenge The Deal Mommy tipped me off on) I have United Silver status through 2018. So the free checked bags and priority boarding the Chase United MileagePlus Explorer card offers aren’t useful to me.

And since the fee-free Chase Freedom Unlimited card earns 1.5 Ultimate Rewards per dollar it doesn’t make sense to put spend on the United MileagePlus Explorer, even with its 10,000 mile kicker for each $25,000 you spend that makes it a 1.4 mile per dollar earner if you spend $25,000 $50,000 a year on the card.

Heck, even when I’m flying with United there are cards that more heavily bonus spend than the MileagePlus Explorer. AmEx Plat gets 5x, Chase Sapphire Reserve gets 3x, and Citi Prestige gets 3x. Sure all of these other cards have high annual fees. But I have them for other reasons, so it doesn’t make sense for me to put any spend on the United card.

I was inclined to cancel the card because I try to avoid flying United if possible. And I wanted to avoid the cognitive bandwidth required to keep tabs on getting the annual fee waived each year. But there were a couple things that made me relent and instead downgrade to a fee-free version of the card.

Slightly better economy award availability

First, by carrying a Chase United card (even the fee-free version) you have access to more saver level domestic Economy award availability (HT: bluecat who correctly points out the availability extends to international flights on United metal) I haven’t found the difference that noticeable for the most part, but while doing some research for an upcoming Brandon Asks post I noticed it was quite useful for positioning flights. I was searching for awards from Phoenix to Dublin in Business Class in these examples.

The difference you see between the two examples is due to the expanded award availability for Chase United cardholders – even the fee-free version.

Without logging in to my United account:

*Without* expanded award availability (4 flights at 70k)

After logging into my United account with an associated Chase United credit card (look at all that green):

*With* expanded availability (12 dates with 70k awards)

Keep in mind: Having the card only unlocks domestic *Economy* award space on United metal. Since these example award searches are for Business Class, these awards are mixed cabin itineraries (the domestic leg is in Economy).

But still, there’s benefit in having a positioning flight linked to your primary flight because it doesn’t cost any more miles or cash. And it provides some amount of protection in case of delayed connecting flights.

Position for later upgrade

Second, it puts you in a position to upgrade the card again if things change. Say for example I start flying United more again and I missed the benefits the fee-based United card offers. Due to Chase’s 5/24 policy if I cancelled the card I wouldn’t be able to get it again at all (even if I didn’t want a signup bonus). And since Chase doesn’t allow cross-family product changes I’d be unable to convert an Ultimate Rewards card to a United card even if I wanted to.

By downgrading the card to a fee-free card I can upgrade later if I want to.

What’s the upshot of all this?

If you find yourself tempted to cancel your Chase MileagePlus Explorer Card it might be better to instead downgrade to a fee-free card.

Downgrade to the Chase MileagePlus Card (no Explorer in the name) and you’ll still have [ever so slightly] expanded domestic saver level Economy award availability, no fee, and the ability to switch back to the $95 annual fee Explorer card if your travel patterns change in the future.

Related reading: More from Doctor of Credit on this and other lesser-known Chase United cards.

A similar pattern presents itself on Citi cards Read more…

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About the author

– Written by Robert Dwyer, contributor at Milenomics. Connect with me on Twitter @RobertDwyer

Comments

  1. Are you sure the card only helps you get better access to *domestic* seats? I travel to Europe a fair bit and it’s been fantastic for getting me there.

    Another big plus is the cards primary car insurance coverage.

    1. You’re right – my Boston bias is showing. There’s not much (any?) international United metal out of here so I think of this benefit for economy domestic flights. But you’re right – it could help with international economy flights on United metal for sure.

  2. I just cancelled my fee free card United Select. I plan on having my wife apply in the next few months for an MPE and also have the hope that it would improve my chances of being approved for additional future Chase cards in the near to medium term. I am having a bit of cancelers remorse though, the immediate effects of cancellation were losing the MPX 25% bonus and the increased portal payouts. I really expected that those benefits would linger for months after cancellation, but they were gone within a week. Not huge losses but definitely a consideration if you are a big MPX or portal user.

    1. That’s a good point – the MPX uplift. I don’t think I’m getting the 25% uplift with my current fee-free Chase Untied card. I’ll have to check why that is – maybe I haven’t associated it with MPX yet and that’s necessary to trigger the 25 kicker?

      1. Yeah, I don’t know about MPX, I’m sure I had my MPE card attached at some point before downgrading it(no idea if that matters). I definitely never lost the 25% after the downgrade, but it disappeared quick when I cancelled.

        1. I checked a little further into why I’m not getting the 25% kicker on MPX. When I had the fee-based United card, it was *not* associated with MPX. Now that I have the downgraded card, I added it to the MPX app and I haven’t seen my rates go up by 25%. Oh well. I’ll update more if I figure out why it’s not working.

  3. Yet another reminder that travel hacking is seriously local. Flying out of MSP, opportunities to fly United are pretty limited for me. I take one big international trip every year. There are no direct flights to GRR on United for my annual Christmas trip. I might make 1 or 2 other domestic trips a year.

    I hold 4 personal cards and 2 business cards from Chase. I am curious to know how many I can hold before Chase feels they are being taken advantage of. Of course, I never let huge balances post on personal cards, and I get more biz cards than personal any given year.

  4. Hi, How can I downgrade the Chase United MileagePlus Explorer business Visa card ?
    I was told by a Chase representative that my only option for a product change is the United MileagePlus® Club Card, which has a $450 annual fee … Is that because it is a business card ? But the Club card is not a business card … Not sure why they are giving me only that option.
    Any help is appreciated. Thanks !

  5. With co-branded airline cards, your miles are transferred to the airline each month when the statement closes.
    So as long as the miles are with the airline, they should *not* be taken back when cancelling a credit card.

    Your concern would be something to consider with a program like Chase Ultimate Rewards/Amex Membership Rewards where those “bank points” are indeed something you’d want to transfer or use before closing a credit card.

    Hope this helps…

  6. Eric: I’ve never heard of this either. In addition to Robert’s great answer, I’ll just add: You *Can* lose UA miles mid statement if you were to cancel the card before the miles were sent to UA. But once they’re in your UA account they’re yours from all reports and personal experience I’ve seen.

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