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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?
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Slightly different problem. I can find 2 separate legs ROM to PHL and PHL to CVG – all show as available at the milesaver rate, but the system won’t put them together. When I call and ask, I am told that they can only be bought separately so the mileage is higher, and cannot be “combined.” This is ridiculous since I booked the exact same flights for another family member a few days ago as a combined rate. This is another way to steal miles from members as the system shows no availability otherwise. The only way to get from point A to point B is to book separate flights with higher miles.
Gretchen – totally feel your pain. try sticking both legs on hold and call in – see if the phone rep will combine them once on hold.
Isn’t this something that other OW partners also do to AA? LATAM is a an example; LATAM Pass and AA availability for LA award flights never matches, much more inventory available on the LATAM Pass website than on AAdvantage when I call.
It seems to me that Qantas is also blocking almost all of its international premium award flights from Alaska’s Mileage Plan. The alliances seem to be breaking down. Further examples are Iberia flights not available through BA Executive Club, and BA premium domestic awards not available through Iberia Plus. This one is especially insidious as the two airlines are part of the same group.
I have been searching Alaska for AA flights for many months. What I see is that saver awards are not showing up. I am searching for flights to europe and no matter what airports (departing or arriving) Alaska has no AA award availability except business, while AA shows plenty on their website.
As an AA elite member, and no one else, I hope this is true.
Similar, but not identical issue: Trying to book DUS-HEL in April 2019. Found two non-stop Finnair economy seats using AA for 12,500 miles plus about $30. Went to BA to see if it was less miles, but BA only shows connecting flights,, not the Finnair non-stop. Ended up doing hold w/AA. Wondered why they don’t show up on BA?
BA.com can’t see married segments but BA phone agents can. They do have to search LAX-GRU and not just JFK-GRU.
Would that require actually ticketing both segments, or booking both then cancelling the unwanted portion?
Gary – very interesting – thanks for the info!
Horrible news for customers (what else is new?), but good to know.
Happened to me last night on flights to Mexico. Not showing up for phone agents, but able to hold on aa.com. Twitter team can’t see it either and I sent them screenshots. Was trying to change an economy anytime to a business saver on the exact same routing.
very weird – hopefully a glitch producing phantom, etc and not an outright change in policy
I think it is only available as married segments. BA is useless for finding connecting flights (not sure about AS). If you search LAX-GRU via JFK on ExpertFlyer you’ll see the space…..
Angel – could be, but the space still showed avail on AA when I broke it apart into segments ( at least jfk to gru was avail) And the AS agent couldn’t see it at all from LAX-JFK-GRU in any cabin…something I haven’t experienced in the past when Saaver is avail on AA.com