My experience
Thank you for this thread.
I booked a one way into via BA miles and went to book my out with AA miles. The award showed as ticketed but no miles were withdrawn. Email sent over 24 hours later to me asking to call AA. After a lengthy procedure (release certificates to the GSA?), they gave me the phone number to the GSA in Manila.
Since I read this thread, I was not completely shocked when this happened nor when the office asked me to stop by for drop off the money to complete ticketing.
Unfortunately, they were unwilling to take a credit card for the tickets and insisted on my friend/relative to come into the office with cash. (I have neither in the Phillipines).
Money can be wired into their Banco de Oro account (they say it takes 2-3 business days and would not guarantee that it would arrive in time).
Went to a Banco de Oro remittance office (instead of my bank) local to me near Chicago. Per the BDO website, money is deposited the same day into their accounts.
Money arrived by early afternoon the next day (with time difference). Have e-tickets in hand.
Word of caution, they will quote you both dollars and pesos. Suggest that you pay in pesos (and maybe a little extra as cushion) as the remittance office may have a different conversion rate as the GSA office.
They were kind enough to float me the 15 PHP that I was short.