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Answers (8)

AA cheating on Award Miles Availability

AA cheating on Award Miles Availability

  1. Anonymous Guest

    Dear Lucky,[IMG]http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=10yq9v7&s=9#.Vu1zuOIrK70[/IMG]

    I am a frequent reader of your excellent blog.

    I was attempting to book an award flight from Sydney to Copenhagen (one-way) before the award chart devaluation. There is ample award availability on American Airlines’ website in January, but the system is blocking me from proceeding with the reservation by saying
    ‘The flight you selected is no longer available. Please modify your request’.

    This is the case for all dates in January, where there is award availability regardless of the particular flights and carriers.

    I am suspecting that they are blocking the reservations so that we are forced to buy award tickets after the devaluation.

    The American Airlines call center is saying that they have no availability in their system, while acknowledging that the website is saying otherwise.

    Your advice in this matter would be greatly appreciated.

  2. Anonymous Guest

    Hey Benji, sorry you’re having to deal with this! It sounds like it’s phantom space on the website, unfortunately.

    There aren’t any direct flights between Sydney and Copenhagen that you can use AA miles on (or at all, I think), so try looking for the individual segments and see if that helps.

  3. David W Community Ambassador

    When running into issues like the one you’re describing, it’s worth checking for award space using BA and JL as well. If AA shows space but BA and JL doesnt, it’s probably phantom space, like Tiffany says. If all 3 tools showed space and it wasn’t bookable, then it’s a bigger issue.

  4. JGB New Member

    Having the same issues – BA shows the space but AA is not at all. I hung up and tried a different agent, same thing – 2 dates with F on CX on BA site but not found on AA! I do think they are purposefully blocking these until after devaluation!!! Really annoying….

  5. JGB New Member

    Plot thickens…trying to hold SIN-DOH-LHR (Biz & First) on Qatar — AA agent sees it but unable to hold them/book them/even as separate bookings….Called down to Supervisor but suggested sending it to “Award problem desk.” No issues holding biz class seat but First class is being BLOCKED by a something/someone within AA.

  6. David W Community Ambassador

    [USER=206]@JGB[/USER] For Cathay, what dates are you looking at? CX and BA release and show seats a year in advance while AA can only book seats 330 days in advance. BA does sometimes show phantom CX F seats. I’d check for the seat JL as well.

    for QR, that is a strange problem. Would you want to route via AUH on Etihad? I think EY SIN-AUH is pretty easy to get on awards in both First and Business

  7. JGB New Member

    Hi [USER=29]@David W[/USER] – both CX seats still showing – maybe it’s me! Sep. 10 & 11th from HKG-LHR.

    Thanks for your suggestions – EY would def be my first choice but I only have enough for one award and a flight to Europe via DOH all on QR allows for that.

    I finally was able to hold space – CDG-DOH-SIN, with the first segment in F (A380, which I’ve yet to try w/QR) and second leg on A350 (hoping there are no equipment changes!) I was even able to add a BA club flight from LHR-CDG all for 70K.

  8. Daniel B Gold

    I also noticed the same thing when in the past I tried to book let’s say BNA-VIE on Finnair right after midnight as AA’s schedule opened up. Availability did show up immediately, but the same message that you got popped up every time showed up for me as well. I kept checking and waited until 2.30am, and then suddenly I was able to book it. It happened to me three times with different flights such as those on Airberlin. I am not an expert, but believe that it takes time for AA’s system to actually populate the indicated availability with actual flights.

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