Just as a note, here is a
recent report in the
Last minute first class award space thread of award space
not being (re-)released into inventory upon a cancellation.
Originally Posted by
jashsu
One other option if you have a decent amount of points and a lot of upcoming travel: book the desired NH segment as the "outbound" on a new ticket and float the "inbound" sometime in the far future. Then pay VS
a $50 change fee to change the undesired partner segment to another date in the future. When you have firm plans for another trip, change both floating segments to the desired new dates.
Thanks for this advice - no idea why I didn't think of it, and it's what I wound up doing.