skimthetrees

So for those more knowledgeable on the back-end systems, what is your guess as to what could have caused the recent failures that affected some specific partners like AS and AA but not others like BA and why it affected only certain partners?

Jimalb

JAL award seats are showing again.

thepinenuts

Here's my guess. JAL provides the award inventory to AS. Every so often JAL does an assessment of awards to AS, part of which is pulling all award availability. After the assessment they provide AS with awards based on the new numbers.

Over the years have seen JAL awards totally disappear and then a few days later they reappear and there are more awards then before. Just my guess.

Kacee

On the routes I've been watching, availability is exactly as it was before the blackout.

This was almost certainly a back-end issue.

daniellam

I think there was an issue on JL's side where their security tables (or whatever it is called) that controls viewership of "Direct Connect Availability" (real time) was corrupt. These tables indicate which reservation system (Sabre, Amadeus, Galileo etc.) and which Pseudo City Codes (Office ID for Amadeus) can view availability and at which "connectivity level" (eg. real time, cached etc.) for each individual fare bucket.

These tables also drive Point of Sale (POS) availability where in some cases different Pseudo City Codes (Office ID for Amadeus) see different availability numbers for each class on the same flight.

AA and AS somehow disappeared from their table for a while.

Note: AA was still showing "cached" availability from JL where only JL flights that have a corresponding AA flight before or after it were showing. I did a test booking (to the point of putting the award on hold by not purchasing it) on the AA site and was able to confirm both the AA and JL segments (this confirms that "viewership" and "bookability" are two different security functions).

relaxonbarton

I was monitoring 2 x 1st Class JAL, ORD to NRT leading up to availability on AA and AS for 15/16 Sept 2020, using BA as a control to show forward availability. AA showed availability for the 15th a day before it would permit the booking to be completed, and AS also showed availability for a few minutes, but when I attempted to book it, the system wouldn't permit it. But I was able to complete the booking on AA for the 2 seats.

Very glad the blockage is over, and that I was able to secure the seats on either AA or AS.

AlexanderK

What’s on BA doesn’t seem to show on Alaska.

BA shows 2 F Seats from NRT To ORD 9/25/20

AS shows nothing :/

just checked same date from NRT to SEA. BA shows seats. AS nothing. Am. I doing something wrong ?

eponymous_coward

The AS calendar has had issues with T-330 day searches, which is the date you’re looking on. Read the JAL award thread. Since if you search on other dates JAL is available, you’re not seeing the same issue as this thread is discussing.

AlexanderK

9/25/20 but can also do 9/26/20. But I know that’s still too far out at the moment

eponymous_coward

Go read the JAL award thread.

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/alaska-airlines-mileage-plan/1807279-definitive-booking-japan-airlines-jl-using-miles-thread.html

Specifically this post:

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/31648491-post1124.html

AlexanderK

interesting. When I use the calendar you can see Flights for 35k + 64 dollars on the calendar but when you click on the day it shows an error and no flights appear.

eponymous_coward

From the referenced post, emphasis added:

Again, this isn't the same issue as this thread is discussing. The AS award booking engine has behaved like this for a while. JAL award bookings at T-330 are problematic. It will clear up in a couple of days or so.

AlexanderK

thanks for clarifying. Will keep checking after the weekend and hope I can find some seats