I am Platinum and was recently told by an AA rep on the phone that they won't/don't charge the redeposit/change fee if you're essentially "upgrading" your award ticket and keeping the same route. I asked because I went ahead and booked coach DFW-PVG tickets figuring eventually J/F would open up but I wanted to be certain I had seats on the flight. She said no problem and that if I later find and want to go in J/F that they would not charge me the $150 fee to do that.

I hadn't heard this before...