It would appear from the document that "...compliance with the
customer service rule that requires carriers to hold a reservation at the quoted fare for 24 hours
without payment or allow a reservation to be cancelled within 24 hours without penalty"
Given the "or," I would imagine that AA's point is they are obligated to offer one or the other. When they were still doing the 24-hour reservation (without requiring payment) process, I always understood it to mean that I was not allowed any refund if I chose to actually ticket the reservation within 24 hours. As an example, I could hold a reservation for up to 24 hours and let it expire without any cost/penalty to me. Alternatively, if I chose to ticket it immediately, I was waiving my 24-hour hold option, but was also not availing myself of a non-existent (at the time) 24-hour refund policy.
Is that the rule? Or everyone else's understanding of AA's policy at the time?