Originally Posted by seanc724

I recently tried to make a booking using miles from SE Asia to the Middle East zone, specifically Nepal. I was told it would have to be made as two separate bookings due to 'mileage restrictions,' which nobody could quantify. The route from HKG to KTM was one fare and then another one to HKG. I tried every city in SE Asia and it all came up the same. If i fly through Doha or Abu Dhabi it's the same deal: two tickets required.

Similarly, a coworker of mine changed an award ticket to HKG. Her old route was DFW -> LAX -> HKG. She will be in Vail the weekend before so she added Vail on to the beginning of the flight. She was called back and told that they needed an additional 50k miles for the two people to fly from Vail to DFW, again, even though it's still a NA to Asia 2 ticket. I have flown ATL -> ORD -> HKG and am flying ATL -> JFK -> HKG -> RGN, all on one NA to Asia 2 award so it can't be a limit on distance or segments.

Is AA trying to secretly raise the price for award travel in an inconspicuous manner? Are they trying to phase in distance-based awards like BA?