Award Seats Back Into Available Inventory
 

I was in the process of booking an award flight using ANA miles. I got to the last screen when I had to input my credit card. After checking all of the information, I attempted to book the flights, but then got a message saying it had timed out. Now the award seats are gone. I remember reading that once you get to a certain point in the booking process with ANA, the seats get pulled from the available pool of award seats even if you don't book the itinerary, which is what seems to have happened with me. Does anyone know if/when the seats go back to available award inventory?

Only NH revenue management could tell you that ... and they won't!
Every airline has its own algorithms for determining the ratio of paid to award seats on each flight based on data ... just because you grab an award seat during a booking or cancel an award booking doesn't mean the seat goes back into the award "bucket" ...

Not sure if this necessarily makes a difference, but I was using ANA miles to book flights on OZ and BR.

Never had this problem before even with NH Metal. Someone might of took the seats through a different carrier. NH's site does glitch a lot and I do end up having to call in sometimes.

Call ANA to complete the error-ed out booking. You never know. It could still be alive and linked to your ANA PNR. Do it quickly though, just in case the booking still exists.

Canceling an "O" ticket used to go back into inventory, now it seems not to :(

NH Web Timeout
 

Per ANA, online bookings will time out if the transaction is not completed within 30 minutes. Uncertain about the award seats returning to inventory.

It could have been assigned to someone on a wait list rather than go to available inventory.

You are right!!!

I just canceled an "O" on NH booked with UA miles, it went back into inventory immediately and my friend was able to grab it (nothing was available before my cancellation).

So my next question is, when does the wait-list expire? T minus xx???

I had this happen recently with a normal paid fare. I got a credit card error, and then the fare was no longer available with a new booking. I phoned ANA (Diamond desk) and to my surprise, they gave me the fare that had disappeared. Seems like calling--at the time you encounter the problem--is worth a shot.

Bumping an old thread.

Any other data points on canceled awards going back into inventory? I currently have a partner F award booked via VS but want to extend the trip by a day. There is NH availability but not partner availability on the inbound the next day (and no more availability on the outbound), so ideally I'd cancel the VS and rebook on NH. Obviously the safe thing is to keep the itinerary as is, but I could really use the extra day.

Its a gamble really, and depends on whether there are NH mileage users waitlisted on the F segment. The space would go to the waitlisted before being returned to the award pool.
You can call in to VS and try to change your ticket, see if there is any availability seen from their side.
Otherwise, not worth the risk IMHO.

You can find out how long the wait list is by calling ANA reservations. The main question is even if op is #1 on the wait list whether cancelling the VS ticket will return the seat to the availability pool or not. Only revenue management knows for sure, but if its months out and only 0 or 1 other F seat has been confirmed, i'd say odds are good.

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.

Just as a note, here is a recent report in the https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/all-...ard-space.html thread of award space not being (re-)released into inventory upon a cancellation.

Thanks for this advice - no idea why I didn't think of it, and it's what I wound up doing.