United Airlines just tweeted that they will eliminated fees for close-in award bookings on July 30. Currently awards booked less then three weeks in advance cost an extra $75 and awards booked within a week of travel cost $100. The United website confirms the elimination of these fees.

A real positive change.

Many airlines have these fees, and they have served two purposes — first, just as a junk fee to extract revenue from an otherwise supposedly ‘free’ ticket and second, to discourage the use of miles instead of cash on last minute tickets that might otherwise be pricey by squeezing the potential savings.

United first introduces these fees to the Mileage Plus program on October 16, 2006. Glad ot see they lasted less than three years.