bobert24

I feel like that's (maybe a small) part of the reason these premium award seats are so hard to find these days. You've got a lot more people out there with 6-7 figure AAdvantage account balances, all looking to redeem them for premium awards they would never be able to afford otherwise. I'm not saying that AA revenue management isn't releasing a record low number of seats, but the increased competition for those fewer seats sure isn't helping anything.

Exactly. While economy redemptions aren't as good as they once were, it's really the premium awards that are suffering. There aren't many international routes that I haven't seen at least some coach availability for on most days.

rufflesinc

econ 101, supply and demand. Look at UA, after their deval 3 years ago, premium partner awards are far easier to get. Even UA metal is not too bad even though they weren't devaled as bad.

richarddd

Credit card churning for AA miles has pretty much disappeared, AA devalued rather severely and award travel has also been cut back severely. There's more than pure market supply and demand here. AA made a business decision to cut back.

enviroian

Yet they still continue to hack' em off on every flights 45 minutes before landing.

Paulchili

Exactly.
I had no problem ALWAYS finding premium awards at T-330 even during the height of churning days.
The problem started during bankruptcy and got worse under US management - as richarddd said - a "business decision".
I hope it comes back and bites them in the behind

susiesan

Isn't Miami the only gateway city for LATAM? AS I would be originating in Kansas City, that's the easiest for me to get to with only 1 connection in DFW or ORD.
Where else does LATAM fly to SCL and EZE from if they do?

Paulchili

They also fly out of JFK, LAX, DC & MCO (most with connections in Lima, Sao Paolo & others)

sdsearch

Not quite:
Read recent posts (and/or the descriptions of the links in the wiki) carefully.

flyingeph12

As Paulchili notes, LATAM flies out of JFK (to LIM, SCL, GRU and GIG), LAX (to LIM and SCL), IAD (to LIM), and MCO (to LIM--note there is only Y on this flight--and to GRU). In addition, I have also been able to route through MEX.

Note also that for business class, it is cheaper if you add a connection in LIM because NA-SA1 award plus a SA1-SA2 award totals less than a NA-SA2 award. Below are just some of the possibilities for getting to SCL/EZE:

MCI-LAX-SCL(-EZE) (57.5k)
MCI-LAX-LIM-SCL/EZE (55K -- but make sure the LAX-LIM and LIM-SCL flights are different flight numbers)
MCI-DFW/ORD-JFK-SCL(-EZE) (57.5k)
MCI-DFW/PHX-JFK-LIM-SCL/EZE (55k)
MCI-DFW/PHX-MEX-LIM-SCL/EZE (55k)
MCI-DFW/PHX-MEX-GRU-SCL/EZE (57.5k)

These are just the (somewhat less convoluted) routings that come to mind immediately. So you see-- there are actually a number of possibilities to get to South America.

macdonaldj2

I just did a quick search as I'm GRU based for haha's GRU-LAX/NYC/DFW/MIA has ONE saver date in C and 2 in F for their entire schedule...both dates are this weekend. I assume this is the norm...I'll use BA to check LATAM availability as I assume it will be vastly better.

FlyerTalkUserName

I just did a search of MIA-CDG through EOS. There's 2 saaver J seat available tomorrow then nothing. Is AA starting to release more award space close-in? I don't recall any previous data points on AA releasing any close-in award space a la CX?

I'm in way over my head but maybe this is somehow related to the last few posts of the recoding of domestic F to J thread?

Thread here: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...l#post27743140

no1cub17

Wow interesting ... I will say though that CDG is no LHR. I remember last year also seeing scattered premium saaver space to CDG. More interesting to me at least is that there's U space but no C space!

FlyerTalkUserName

Agreed on CDG. Non-hub-to-hub nonstops are usually easier in my limited experience. Specifically chose a European nonstop to filter out BA space.

KHTravelBitten

I over-accumulated AA miles for our first class trip to HKG last year, so I'm left with a bunch of them and wondering if they can be used at all. With the unfortunate situation of premium award space that I'm hearing about, what would be the best way to use AA miles for premium travel? I assume partner redemptions are probably the way to go, but which ones have the better award availability?

sdsearch

Which airlines have better award availability varies with the destination, the date of travel, and how far out you're booking, and how many seats you need.

For example, to South Africa from the USA, QR may have have J availability (at least) at exactly 330 days out but on Mon-Thu departures only. If you can only travel on Fri-Sun departures, QR has no availability for you.

So that's why you have to do the search yourself (or else hire an award travel consultant service), to see what's actually available for the trip you want to do. (Plus you have to understand AA's routing rules on top of that, to know whether it will be one award or two. There are destinations that need one award across the Atlantic but two awards across the Pacific, and then there are destinations that need one award across the Pacific but two awards across the Atlantic, and then there are some even more specific routing rules for some destinations.)

You can search on other oneworld airline sites for those partners that don't show up on aa.com, or for convenience you can use Award Nexus (www.awardnexus.com), for which you can sign up for free as a FlyerTalk member (click "more signup options" under the green Purchase button), and where you can search through both BA and/or QF for oneworld availability with a single easy consistent user interface. The results will also show more clearly (than any airline site I've seen to date) which flights are 100% in the cabin you asked for and what percentage of each flights is in the cabin you asked for (if it's less than 100%), and by default it sorts the flights which are 100% in the cabin you asked for at the top.

For the routing rules, see this thread:
starting with its comprehensive wikipost (which includes a section on "routing rules", but covers lots of other stuff too).