Originally Posted by Happy

Yes, you are absolutely correct on the AS booking engine.

However, I am talking about AA's award and its booking engine, not AS when I said with AA award you must call in to book, and it works similar way - the LI may not necessarily be, but must be FO.

Both AA and AS programs allow the LIFO routing on a single award. With AA you could not book this online, must call in (and pay $25 booking fee to boot unless you are EXP.) With AS, you CAN book this online as it is offered as one of the options should such be available. The AS phone agent gave wrong info to the OP about all flights must be on same date - this simply isn't true as you and I both are aware of.

I hope this clears up the scenarios.