Originally Posted by CO Insider

Hi aeroman62, we are aware of this issue where we're intermittently showing some partner flights as available when they actually aren't. Based on our last assessment, we're seeing this happen with certain flights operated by Alaska Airlines (First Class rewards mostly) and to a much lesser extent Northwest and Gulfstream International. We are working to resolve this issue, which involves not only our own IT group, but also the IT groups of our partner carriers. As for why we weren't just able to confirm the space for you, unfortunately our options are limited when it comes to flights operated by our own partners. We can't overbook reward seats for flights we don't operate ourselves.

At a minimum, I'd like to offer to reverse the American Express Membership Rewards transfer that your partner made (sending the points back to his American Express Membership Rewards account). If you're interested, please send me a PM with his OnePass number and we'll take care of it.