Etihad points to fly AA to Hawaii
Hello. I have just joined FlyerTalk and am looking for some advice. I want to fly my family from Newark to Hawaii in April (8 months from now). I've read about the terrific awards tickets using Etihad to fly on American. My hope is to fly business class from Newark, through Dallas, and on to Honolulu or Maui. I checked on ExpertFlyer and there are seats in the 'U' category for the flight on April 10th. However, when I called Etihad directly, they said they can't see the availability, and that American may be waiting until much closer to the date before releasing those seats to Etihad.
Is there any way to book these tickets this far in advance? I don't want to wait and keep checking, and risk that I don't get the flight, but the alternative is to use many more Alaska Air miles (which shows plenty of availability) to get there on the date we want.
I would appreciate advice from anyone who understands how the Etihad/AA process works. Thank you!