United Airlines boasts both an award-winning app and loyalty programme. As one of the largest airlines in the world, the US carrier is setting standards for customer-centric travel and modern loyalty working to stay ahead of rapidly evolving expectations.
The airline’s app is the most downloaded app of any US carrier and acts as a “digital doorway” to United. Talking through the airline’s award winning app at Aviation Festival Americas, Luc Bondar, COO and President, MileagePlus at United Airlines, explained multiple UX focused features including that:
“The app itself is contextual. It changes in the moment for your needs and it serves up the information that we think you need right now. So, for example, I’m flying out of Miami later today and my app is already pinging me to say, ‘hey, we noticed you haven’t checked in yet.’ And it will surface if I go to the app, it’ll bring check-in right up to the top to say, ‘here it is.’ It makes it really easy, just open the app, one click, and I’m where I need to be.
In contrast, I’ve flown on other airlines and when you’re trying to check in, I’m going through five clicks to try to find where I need to go. So, changing the app experience for each individual user as they’re interacting in the moment has been really powerful for us.”
Bondar also shared some of the loyalty features that reinforce value for every traveller. This includes miles pooling which will be a game changer for families, allowing members to combine points across accounts for easier redemptions. The programme has also eliminated miles expiry in a bid to establish a life-long relationship with each passenger.
Watch the full interview now to learn more about how the airline is driving personalisation at scale, building organisational resilience, and putting customers first in a period of volatility.
Questions asked include:
- What is the most critical challenge the industry is navigating at the moment?
- How are you building organisational resilience in the face of disruption, economic shifts, and the evolving landscape?
- What are you doing to modernise United’s loyalty programme to keep pace with passenger expectations?
- Follow up (1): What about the passenger experience more broadly (app features etc)
- Follow up (2): How is tech supporting this?
- What are United’s strategic priorities for the remainder of the year?
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