Using American Airlines miles to book awards
Follow by Gary’s using US airways and my using Delta miles, I want to talk about American airlines this time. They have fairly straight forward booking procedures, but sometimes their hidden routing restriction can become very frustrating experience, I hope what I write below can clarify something and make you award booking procedure smoother.
Stopovers/open jaw: AA miles have three different award products, AA only, all partner award and oneworld awards.
With AA only and all partners award, no stopover is permitted other than American Airlines North American international gateways for award to Asia, Europe, India and Central/South America, which means any North American gateway city will work, That is, whatever city you depart North America from. So if you’re flying Cathay from San Francisco you can have an SFO stopover. Or if you’re departing BA from Las Vegas, you can have a Las Vegas stopover.For international connections, any connecting greater than 24 hours will be considered as another award. For domestic, 4 hours.
Since all awards are priced as one way, so open jaw is not relevant anymore
Oneworld awards are distance based(all flying distance), you can have as many stopovers as you want as long as total segments are less than 16. Also, one open jaw is permitted.
Routing restrictions: Believe or not, AA only and all partners award have very strict routing restriction even though some routing are most ideal and logical. Some are published, some are not, you don’t really know them until you try to price the award. This FT thread has a summary, but that’s just part of them. People reported award to New Zealand via PPT will be counted as two awards; adding a domestic segment within Jordan triggering additional mileage; from Asia 2 to Easter Island will be counted as 2 awards no matter how you route via and many more.
Oneworld award are distance based, so there is really no routing restrictions to talk about
Segments: I don’t know, no one really knows, all priced by computer, some 2 segments simple award may price incorrectly, some multi segments award are priced without any problem. The max I did was 4 segments for one direction.
Oneworld award has 16 segments max restriction
Fee: $25 ticketing fee if you are not EXP or the EXP member does not travel on the same trip. Also, there will be “close in” fee if miles are not come from Gold member or above, the fees are $50 for 20 days-6 days prior to departure or $100 for departure within 6 days. Also, award involves British Airways will be charged fuel surcharge.
Hold: 5 business days for all awards, however, if award originally contains Royal Jordan, no extension can be given unless rebooked the original RJ flight provided seats are open. Also, you can only hold one PNR for the same airline with similar departure date, they will call you to make you choose one.
Award searching tool: The best way to search awards are using British Airway website, even better if you have KVS tools, AA shares same award inventory with BA website, whatever you see, you can call AA to book.
Change or Cancel: No fee if changing date only, all other changes such as routing, carriers and city pairs will incur award re deposit fee of $150. However, no fee will be charge for changing from lower cabin to higher cabin even if miles were originally pulled as lower cabin provided all others remain the same. EXP member exempt from all fees above.
How many miles will my award cost?
Award chart for all AA awards
Award chart for all partner awards
Award chart for one world awards
Award blocking and IT glitch: Should be none, there were several minor glitches, but I don’t see them lately, if the agent tells you no seat, he/she probably does not look closely enough, especially with multiple closer departure flights with 2 cities
How long will my call take? The correct booking procedures with AA agents are telling them flight one by one. Don’t tell them all segments or just origin and final destination at one time, give them second segment after they find first segment.Especially true with award mixed of Cathay Pacific and Dragon air. Also, better to tell them exact flight time and number, especially with multiple closer departure flights with 2 cities. Most time, my call takes only around 5 minutes.
Got questions, just ask, I hope what I wrote about above can help you in the future.
nortrom said,
Hi Troy,
Just FYI, I booked a stopover at Boston a few months ago, CDG-BOS(stopover)-ORD-DAY.
Troy said,
@nortrom, thanks!
Gary said,
“With AA only and all partners award, no stopover is permitted other than American Airlines North American international gateways for award to Asia, Europe, India and Central/South America, which are LAX, ORD,DFW, MIA, JFK, RDU and BOS.For international connections”
Troy, I believe any North American gateway city will work, not just American’s hubs. That is, whatever city you depart North America from. So if you’re flying Cathay from San Francisco you can have an SFO stopover. Or if you’re departing BA from Las Vegas, you can have a Las Vegas stopover.
Troy said,
@gary, Thanks, I correct them!
Alex said,
I don’t have extensive time to edit now, as I am traveling this week, but a handful of details in this post are simply incorrect. I will try to offer edits sometime soon.
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