Please kindly excuse my personal and silly questions since involving both a lot of money and miles (at my situation): Thanks!

When I book my thanksgiving trip (2 weeks ago?), the agent told me I must ticket my itn by certain date to maintain the fare. I hurry and keep calling my friend to confirm and finally done. BUT now the same date same fare still available! Why airlines need to set that "deadline" to "scare" us?

The same situation appears. I maintain reservation at BA ($500) and AA ($1100) for my christmas trip, both say must ticket by 15OCt (BUT the fare code said "7 days before departure). But an AA resvation agent "unclearly" told me there would be a cheap fare for AA after Oct16!!!

If I wait... BA's fare may jump up, if I go for BA, then I will lose nearly 30K AA miles.

Confused situation.