ashill

There is? I don’t think many airlines always release award seats when the schedule opens. And as many of us have said, you might as well complain to Alaska Airlines about the weather in Seattle. Alaska uses Sabre; the cost to change to something else is absolutely enormous both in dollars and in disruption, so there’s no way Alaska will do it to make awards available when partners’ schedules open. And the cost to Sabre of changing their system to accommodate bookings more than 331 days out is similarly prohibitive, I believe. (I’m no expert on Sabre, so it’s possible I’m wrong. But I doubt it; Sabre is famously difficult to work with and improve, having a code base that dates to the 1960s, maybe 1950s.)

ETA: reading around, I think I may be wrong about this still being strictly a Sabre limitation. But I still suspect it would be enough work that it's very unlikely that AS will change their systems to allow bookings more than 331 days out.

WillTravel4Food

There's plenty of legwork to be done that can play to your advantage. Doing repeated queries against the various FF program websites to find the trends when seats open up, how many seats are released, time of day they release inventory. Knowing the number of days out (e.g., 331) and tracking how many days pass before the seats are no longer available is a big help in knowing how big is the window of availability. The same can be done to find close out (e.g., within two weeks) availability. For example, people who are working JL awards know they open J seats about two weeks before the flight. JL also releases J seats at 331 (IIRC) and pulls most remaining availability after a set number of days (I'm not sure on the exact number at this point). I don't know about you, but I don't wait until 331 days away from the target flight date to learn what the lay of the land is going to look like. If the loss of availability between 331 and 365 is a deal breaker, then AS (and AA, and perhaps others) is the wrong program for your needs.

sdsearch

Is it any different at DL or UA?

I basically thought that all USA-based airline programs had this 330ish day limitation, and it was only airlines in other parts of the world that released seats at 360 days.

channa

UA has a slightly longer booking window than AA/AS. But not as long as BA or some international carriers.

pdxasflyer

+1. This. Have completed two trips this year resulting in 2 F, 2 J on CX and 4 F on BA, with strategy on the return leg for CX resulting in 4 F. The key is patience, and yes: hard work.

This may be true now (have no idea) but in 2003, 2006 and 2011, was able to book awards at T-363 (+/- a day) on BA, and T-360 on CX. I was worried as you were, but have learned that with patience and diligence, awards are still doable.

CDKing

The agents were able to do a lot of things they weren't allowed to do when using the old system. AS plugged most if not all of those holes.

Happy

Then collect the miles of the program that let you book the earliest then.

But then you would complain why BA charges so much more than AS on the same award....

It is up to you to pick the program that works the best for you - be it the earliest booking window or the lowest cost or the better cancellation policy or the additional stopover....

Of note, tell us which program allows anyone to cancel an award free of charge up to 60 days before departure? Except AS.
tell us which program only charges 50K for a CX business class award North America to Asia? and for that matter 42.5K between ER and HKG? except AS.
Also tell us which program let you have a stopover even on a one-way booking as long as it is an international itinerary? Except AS.

If you are so keen on the earliest booking window, then forego all of the above advantages AS offers, and just go for BA or Asia Miles and pay a lot more. Nobody stops you.

MasterGeek

kaka

asiamiles

garykung

Yes absolutely.

Just because AS has partners, AS is not obligated to align its program with others.

milypan

Probably because such a program would not be financially sustainable?

SamuelS

Some of the GDS also only have full inventory pushed down at 331 days out. Many corporate TA's can't issue tickets for travel more than 331 days out.

If a subset of airlines releases spaces 1 - 35 days earlier than this, then I think it's perfectly reasonable that their own frequent flyer members get access at this time, and AS is very much in line with the industry standard by working to 331 days.

ashill

More to the point, when a program is very asymmetrical with partners, partners tend to drop out. I think that was at least a factor in AA and AS severely curtailing their partnership: AS's program was so much better than AA's that I (and probably a reasonable number of others) flew primarily AA (hub captive at the time) but credited it all to AS. That meant AA was paying AS for one of "AA's" customers, instead of the design of frequent flyer programs, in which a majority customers credit to the airline they fly most and use partners to fill out the network of their "home" airline.

Now, I don't think AS or any of their partners give a second thought to the 331 day vs 360 day booking windows; I'm pretty sure it's just an artifact of the reservation systems, and the cost of changing it way outstrips any potential benefits. From a customer point of view, it's just a fact that's not going to change. For me, it's a very minor (almost completely negligible) negative of AS's program. If it's a more significant negative for others, OK; consider that in your valuation of AS as a program.

eponymous_coward

Yeah, no kidding. It's one thing to have that relationship in an alliance like BA and the oneworld partners do. But BA, QF, et.al. aren't flying SEA-DFW or SFO-JFK. If you can get more miles, qualify for elite status easier, and almost as many benefits on AA as an AS elite flying out of an AA hub, why would you stay in AA's program? Why is it to AA's benefit to be that generous to AS elites and kneecap their own program by enabling a direct competitor in domestic markets to offer a better one? The world's changed a fair amount in the last decade- less competition, less need to be nicer to other airlines in the USA domestic space, more incentive to throw an elbow.

Happy

But you would pay a lot more.

The point is, you cannot have your cake and eat it too. But that is what the poster wants.

Life is a compromise. Choose which compromise(s) you are willing to make. simple.