As flagged by One Mile at a Time, JetBlue TrueBlue has begun adding surcharges to international United award tickets. While TrueBlue doesn’t offer particularly good deals on these flights in terms of the points cost, it is concerning to see such a close partner add surcharges on United award tickets.
JetBlue adds surcharges on United award tickets for international travel
In 2025, JetBlue and United launched the Blue Sky partnership, whereby they have slowly rolled out things like reciprocal mileage earning and award redemption, with additional components such as reciprocal elite benefits set to launch “sometime soon”.
Unfortunately, there has been a negative development in the partnership: JetBlue TrueBlue is now adding surcharges to award tickets for travel on United. For now, this only applies to international awards, not domestic United awards.
As an example, flying Newark to Rome on United now comes with $260 in carrier-imposed surcharges per passenger. Previously, United flights departing the United States only incurred $5.60 in taxes & fees. This example shows the charges for 4 passengers, totaling more than $1,000 in fees on a one-way award.
You’ll find the same thing on United flights to different regions, though the amount in surcharges varies. For instance, I see $305 per passenger in carrier-imposed surcharges on awards from San Francisco to Seoul, South Korea.
While these awards did not offer compelling value anyway in most cases, it is nonetheless disappointing to see surcharges added on United award tickets.
United seems to be pushing partners to make United flights less attractive
Interestingly, this is just the latest development in what seems to be a push from United to make its own flights less attractive when booked through partner airlines. Over the last year or two, we’ve seen Air Canada add United to its “exception” award chart (which causes awards to cost more), Turkish has raised prices on United awards, and JetBlue is adding surcharges. While we can’t say with certainty that United is behind these changes, it doesn’t feel like it could be a coincidence that United awards are becoming less attractive when booked through partners. It certainly seems like United wants to reduce or eliminate the advantage of booking through partners in order to encourage people to book via United Mileage Plus.
That is all exacerbated by the fact that United has become increasingly stingy with regard to releasing award space to partner airlines, often making it difficult to even find the United award you want through a partner, even if you’re willing to pay more.
Hopefully, this trend does not spread
This is a concerning trend, not so much for these specific awards, but more for what it means in terms of the industry approach. Many airlines release more award space to their own members in order to encourage booking through the airline’s own program. However, the extra effort to make award flights unattractive through partners isn’t a trend we want to see perpetuated across other partnerships. In fairness, I think that is probably less likely on the whole since many foreign airline programs stand to gain from making partner awards available, so they get the opportunity to draw new potential customers by making it possible to book their flights with partner miles. Hopefully, the expanded marketing opportunity continues to outweigh the desire to force customers into their own programs.
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This is giving “Jet fuel is expensive, let’s lead the way on fees” vibes.
I am just perpetually shocked that the lights don’t even seem to be on at JetBlue HQ when it comes to loyalty and points. This is the greatest driver of profit for an airline and JetBlue continues to phone it in.
I disagree, respectfully.
jetBlue’s program is more consistent than the wildly devalued programs like Delta’s SkyPesos. Sure, B6 does not partner with a big bank like Amex or Chase as its issuer; Barclays is pretty small scale in the US for consumers. However, jetBlue points can be transferred from most bank currencies (Chase, Citi, Amex, Wells Fargo, and Capital One), so it is more accessible tan more most (like DL only via Amex, AA only via Citi, etc.)
See, I take your comment seriously, addressed the actual topic/substance, instead of telling anyone to ‘shut up’ like you basically told me below. Try less gatekeeping, more discussion.
Boo. Hiss.
Meanwhile, the corporate shills and bootlickers on here be like: “Hit me harder, daddy.”
The tendency to comment on every single post with valueless blather is giving “bot-farm” vibes. Maybe shoot for higher quality lower quantity.
Nah, sometimes more is more and less is less. Besides, this isn’t your site. If the hosts don’t want me, or you, or any of us they can remove anyone they wish. You do you. I’ll do me.