AA award travel question
 

Hello all fellow travelers. I have a question concerning award travel on AA. It will be my first time using miles and was wondering has anyone had trouble getting the routes the want when the seats are released at 330 days out. Also, I am wondering should I use the one-way option as my return is 45 days from my outbound flight. In the past I used UA awards and waited till the 330 day to book the return and outbound at once, never had a problem, but I don't know how AA is. My route is ONT to ATH. on 3-24-12 departure and 4-13-12 return. Just curious if anyone has just waited to book both at once or did one-way to ensure you get your flights. Thanks if anyone can shed some light on this.

All awards using AA miles are now one-way awards. Seats may, or may not be, released at 330 days out.

Good luck and safe travels!

Thanks miamigrad for the info, so they don't always release them at that point? I guess I will then just keep trying every week or so if I can't get the seats.

if tix not available when you check at 330 days, paying $10 for a month of expertflyer is well worth it.

No, there is nothing set in stone as to when awards are released (if at all). 330 days is the -earliest- they may be released for AAdvantage mileage redemption, for example, but may not show up for many days after that. Again, if at all.

Since your itinerary will include travel on partner airlines (AA doesn't serve ATH), fishee's advice to monitor via ExpertFlyer is good advice. You may also want to search via a service like KVS or AwardNexus.

FYI: For these partner awards, you'll have to call AA to make the reservation. It cannot be done online via aa.com.

As noted in #2, awards are one way. The problem is what do you do if you take ticket the outbound, and there are no milesaver awards for the return. It most cases, AFAIK, one way TATL fares are a bit more expensive than 1/2 of the roundtrip fares. Unfortunately, AA doesn't give you the 1/2 of the roundtrip fare, if 1/2 of the trip is on an award. That would be great.

Only if you are paying hard cash for the return leg. In most cases, you can use more miles and get the AAnytime award on the return leg back.

- Since your travel is off-season, I do not expect much of a problem of going either way. In the past, I would simply book a roundtrip far in advance with a desired departure date and then change the date for the return leg when the tickets are released. Note that AA allows one to change award tickets for free as long as the same inventory and the same carriers are available. The gamble here that some carriers could drop some destinations and/or schedule would become very inconvenient. Then one-way awards win. One note though is that for partner awards you have to use phone or counter service and pay the ticketing fee if you are not EXP. I have noticed that you are flying to ATH and, therefore, have to use non-AA metal and cannot book the award(s) on-line. If those fees are still in place you will be paying the ticketing fee for each of the two one-way awards vs. single fee for the roundtrip. There was no ticketing fee for changing the award tickets in the past. EXPs are exempt from the ticketing and mile reinstatement fees.

Bears repeating that there are NO round-trip awards anymore.

Yes, my friend Alex_1, the other carrier is Iberia Airlines. British Air was also a choice but they are charging an enormous fee now for gas tax as the CSR told me at American. I guess the one way option here is the better way to go as stated by others only having to pay the $25 fee twice. Thanks for the info though.