Good morning, and welcome to today's community discussion thread! Today's posts will appear here throughout the day, but this thread is for going off-topic. Did you love/hate something about today's coverage? Are you tracking other news I missed? Or, do you just have a general question about rewards travel? This is the place for your wandering thoughts.
Today's posts on OMAAT:
- Virgin Atlantic Points Sale: 70% Bonus Brings Cost To 1.20-1.48 Cents Each
- SAS Free Starlink Wi-Fi Rollout: All Airbus A320neos Now Have The Service
- Four Seasons Yachts Cruise Review: Suites, Dining, Amenities, Service, And More
- Oh My: Syria’s Passport Photo Was Stolen, Watermark And All
- American Airlines Eliminating “Premium” First Class: Exact Timeline Revealed
- American Airlines Retrofits Boeing 777-300ERs: More Business Class, No First Class
- Southwest Airlines To Open Airport Lounges With Chase, 11+ Locations Planned
- How Much Are Airline, Hotel, And Credit Card Points Worth?
- Atmos Rewards Introduces The Best Lap Infant Award Policy In The Industry
- An Honest Conversation About Blog Monetization, Making Money Online
Daily threads stay open for a week, so it's never too late to jump into a recent conversation.
I'm wondering what the "baseline" award fare is for AA's premium transcon routes in J. Award search tools are showing me 35k Atmos points/40k AA miles for LAX -> JFK on certain dates, but can it theoretically go cheaper? AA's official award chart shows "Business starting at: 15,000" for flights within the U.S., but I'm assuming that this does not apply to transcon J.
If lower than 35k, what are the cheapest award fares you have seen for these routes?
@brewing_altitude For point-to-point, 40K AAdvantage is entry level pricing on those premium transcons. Obviously if you're willing to connect between JFK and LAX, you can find a cheaper fare. It's also possible you may find a cheaper fare if flying nonstop between JFK and LAX but connecting onwards on the same ticket, either on the front or back end. However, I'm not finding any great examples of that right now, and the savings would likely be minimal.
I hunt for these deals (J/F on AA/DL/UA/B6 for NYC-LAX/SFO, sometimes using AS points, but their availability has reduced, a lot, lately). Of course, the game is always changing, and sadly AA is ditching F on a321T, so enjoy that 1-1 and Chelsea lounge access while you can. To answer your question, yes, you're in the right range; my personal best for JFK-SFO (AA177) was 41K AA points + $5.60, one-way, per person, booked last-minute, back in April 2025, and those tickets were going for $4K cash-price (10 cpp). If you can find that or better, take it.