• How long can I hold a reservation at a guaranteed price? / What can I do if my held reservation reprices at purchase?

Reservations made on AA.com can be held at the current price without payment for a limited time to allow passengers to verify their travel plans and/or monitor price changes. The publicized guarantee is “up to 24 hours”, however, in practice, the hold is valid until 11:59 pm local time on the following day, and this is consistent with the AA Conditions of Carriage, which state: “When you make a telephone reservation with American Airlines or when you make a reservation via AA.com, the fare quoted will be guaranteed for 24 hours or until 11:59 p.m. Central Time the following day, whichever allows you more time. If you elect to make changes to the itinerary within this time-frame, the ticket price may change.”

An important caveat is that if the fare rule expires during that time, the hold will no longer be valid and will automatically reprice. Fares are often structured with advance purchase requirements at 3, 7, 14, or 21 days prior to departure. Reservations including segments marketed by other carriers (non-AA flight number) cannot be placed on hold and must be purchased immediately, although reservations including AA codeshare flights operated by other carriers are eligible for hold.

If you find that AA.com reprices your held reservation when attempting to purchase, and you are sure that the fare rule is still valid, a telephone call to AA Web Services may resolve the problem. You may need to complete the purchase on the telephone, which technically will invoke a $25 telephone booking fee, however, some agents may waive this fee at their discretion. Also, if you hold a reservation in one currency and then try to complete the purchase with a credit card denominated in another currency, it will automatically reprice to the prevailing fare. To avoid this, ask AA Web Services to change the currency on the original held reservation to the currency you wish to use for the purchase.

Note that held reservations do remove slots from fare inventory and hold specific seats on seatmaps. The inventory and seats are released automatically when the held reservation is canceled, but do not necessarily return to the original inventory class. Thus, members who manually roll holds online often check that there is at least one inventory slot remaining in the original inventory class, and that the fare price has not changed, before cancelling and renewing a hold. It may also be possible to call AA Reservations and ask them to extend the hold for another day if the original inventory is still available.

AA.com: Hold Your Reservation | Extend Your Reservation Hold | Conditions of Carriage: Lowest Fare Availability/Guarantee
FT: Hold / Held Reservation guarantee - 24 hours or midnight? (consolidated)
FT: Rolling / extending a 24-hour Hold / Held Reservation online
FT: Hold / Held Reservation repriced when using different currency at purchase
FT: Trial offer: Pay to hold reservation and fare for 7 days (Mar 25 – June 2011 only)