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I’m in the midst of planning a trip down to South America and have been working on piecing together a premium cabin flight into Brazil for my buddy and I. I’ve been noticing a weird thing going on…award seats that are showing up on AA’s site are not accessible to Alaska or even British Airways. And in case you’re wondering…I’m not an AA elite anymore so increased access because of status isn’t a factor, and I’ve even put a couple of the flights on hold without any issue. Perhaps a problem would arise when going to ticket, but I’ve noticed an increasing trend with AA marrying segments using their own miles, so it wouldn’t surprise me at all if they’ve taken a step towards releasing more seats to their own loyalists than partners. Let’s take a look at an example.
Here’s a flight from LA to GRU on November 2nd. Both First and Biz are avail all the way through.
However, when you search on Alaska…the space doesn’t match.
I phoned into Alaska and inquired to see if perhaps there was a ticketing glitch, or if it was because they couldn’t have access to the first leg ( their partnership has changed considerably and some fares don’t earn miles, but as far as I was concerned if Saaver space was avail, they could still access the award even if they didn’t sell that specific ticket) – so I also had the rep look for just the JFK to GRU segment in either cabin. Nothing could be found.
I then broke the first leg off and searched via BA for JFK to GRU
Only space on LATAM shows up
I then searched on Expertflyer…
No seats avail.
However…as I mentioned above – no problem putting the ticket on hold.
Thoughts
If this is true – This is a big deal if you’re looking to redeem partner miles on American metal – especially short haul flights that BA and Iberia have access to at favorable rates to AA. If the AA chart is showing space that isn’t avail to partners, it devalues its use considerably.
Perhaps this is phantom space and when I go to ticket I’ll get an error, but typically in that situation the error occurs when trying to place on hold.
With the rising number of occurrences I’ve run into recently with AA married segments it makes me wonder if AA isn’t taking a page out of SQ’s book and opening up more space to their own loyalists that isn’t avail to partners.
Have you experienced this?
Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed or approved by any of these entities.
Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card
Welcome Offer
Earn 60,000 bonus points after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening.
Annual Fee
$95
Points Earned
Transferrable Chase Ultimate Rewards
- 5x on all travel purchased through Chase Travel℠
- 3x on dining, including eligible delivery services for takeout & dining out
- 3x on select streaming services
- 3x on online grocery purchases
- (excluding Target, Walmart and wholesale clubs)
- $50 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit via Chase Travel℠
- The begins immediately for new cardmembers and after your account anniversary for existing cardmembers
- 2x on all other travel
- 10% Anniversary Bonus
- Every year you keep the card, your total spend will yield a 10% points bonus. If you spend $10k in a year, you’ll get 1k bonus points
- Chase Sapphire Preferred continues to redeem at 1.25c in the Chase Travel℠ and the slew of other benefits remain in tact including Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver ( primary ), purchase protections, etc.
- Points are transferrable to 14 Ultimate Rewards partners
- Redeem in Chase Travel℠ for 1.25 cents per point
- No foreign transaction fees
- Suite of Travel and Purchase Coverage
- Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver is my favorite
- Get complimentary access to DashPass which unlocks $0 delivery fees and lower service fees for a minimum of one year when you activate by December 31, 2027.
- $95 Annual Fee
We keep an up to date spreadsheet that lists the best ever offers: You can find that spreadsheet here.
Historically 80k is a very, very good offer and hit in both 2022 and 2023. In 2021, we saw the offer hit an all time high of 100k. Who knows if that will ever come back.
Main Cast:
Cards that earn flexible points and should be used on the bulk of your purchases.
Supporting Cast:
Cards that earn fixed points in the currency of the airline/hotel and can not be transferred at attractive rates. These cards yield benefits that make it worth keeping, but not necessarily worth putting a lot of your everyday spend on.
The Chase Sapphire Preferred® is exceptional starter card and offers transferrable Ultimate Rewards, and pairs well with other Chase cards.
If you carry this card alongside Chase’s cashback cards like the Chase Freedom Flex® and Chase Freedom Unlimited® or the business versions: Ink Business Cash® , Ink Business Unlimited® you can combine the points into Preferred account and transfer into hotel and airline partners
Annual fee is quite low at $95 a year + you get a 10% anniversary bonus on points + $50 hotel credit in Chase travel.
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