Originally Posted by
vicfly7
If you are still 5 months from departure, you may want to wait a little bit before doing these cancellations. In my experiences, there will be some chance (depending on the route) that there will be a change of schedule of your flights, and then you may legitimately cancel your ticket (or change them). And the cancellation fee won't increase anyway (for award, make sure you do it 21 days before departure).
That is a very significant risk in the case of an award ticket. OP's situation will require that when he cancels the award seat so that he can book his mother into it, that there will be award availability remaining. Not worth the risk IMHO.