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I was doing some searches for award bookings and came across phantom award space on Etihad. Specifically it appears to be showing up on routes in and out of the Maldives. Etihad is a great airline and one that I’ve flown two of their business class products: Business Studio and Pearl Business. In case you missed it I wrote an article highlighting the 7 reasons why Etihad’s Business Studio is the best $7 I’ve ever spent.
If you aren’t familiar with Etihad award bookings they are a great use of American miles and you can learn about how to find space in this article I wrote last year.
As you can see here it shows Etihad Guest Seat space ( You can use AA miles ) from the Maldives to San Francisco with a stop in Abu Dhabi
I thought I’d found a ticket and was excited to provide a client with a great product.
However, after calling AA to make sure the availability was there they said they couldn’t find the award avail.
Upon further inspection I found that the space wasn’t available if you broke the legs up.
Here you can see that separating the itinerary into parts shows that one leg isn’t available. It seems that there is some problem with the website showing phantom space when legs are combined; however, when the legs are separated the true award inventory is revealed.
Double checking inventory will save you time and frustrations.
I’d seen phantom space show up before, but this seems to be pretty consistent now with the routing. I haven’t checked a lot of other routes to see if there is phantom space showing elsewhere, but just a precaution I would advise breaking the itineraries up before calling.
Etihad is a great airline and I would highly recommend flying them.
Their products are phenomenal and they provide some interesting opportunities if you’re planning a trip to the Holy Land, or you’d like to see the U.A.E. – even if you’re looking to go to Australia from Europe.
I loved their Business Studio and so did Miles. You can fly the same product on the A380 as I did on the 787 when we took the Around the World trip last year. The U.A.E. was a very cool addition to our trip en route to Africa. I would note that we had to book two separate tickets as the routing was not allowed by AA on a single ticket.
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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