Does AA still fly to Caracas, Venezuela?
 

American had some of the greatest service from the United States to Venezuela with multiple flights a day into Caracas. Just last week I saw tons of availability.

Now, when I search on any day and any departure city in the U.S., there are no flights available.

Did AA discontinue flying Miami-Caracas, or are they just not selling any more tickets? Could this be a currency dispute between AA and the Venezuelan government?

Any insight is welcome. Thanks!

Interesting !
I also flew AA many times to CCS,
checking aa.com from PDX I find... NOTHING !

Still on their route map... which doesn't mean anything.
Glitch or who nose... :)

Couldn't find any news, but the flights have all been zeroed out.
In the words of "Blue Lou" Marini, "Those lights are off on purpose."

Yes, AA still flies to Venezuela.

Flights aren't zeroed out - many are literally sold out. And here's why:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/...9940BN20131005

Though in the interim I believe AA might have stopped sales, not sure. Those flights in November, December, January, though, they are sold out. All of them.

Hugo! Hugo! Hugo!

AA stopped selling seats temporarily... it seems...

120FEBMIACCS«
20FEB THU MIA/EST CCS/EST¥0.5
1 967 J0 R0 D0 I0 Y0 B0 H0 K0*MIACCS 700A 1040A 757 B 0 /E
M0 L0 G0 V0 S0 N0 Q0
2 979 J0 R0 D0 I0 Y0 B0 H0 K0*MIACCS 1235P 420P 763 L 0 /E
M0 L0 G0 V0 S0 N0 Q0
NONE AVBL-1* TO CONTINUE
* - FOR ADDITIONAL CLASSES ENTER 1*C
VILA1«
967 MIA 20FEB FACTS
CL AC AU SA SS
F 1 1 1 0 OI
C 22 7 1 6 OI
Y 160 56 36 20 OI
CCS
1¥30«
22MAR SAT MIA/EDT CCS/EST-0.5
1 967 J0 R0 D0 I0 Y0 B0 H0 K0*MIACCS 725A 1005A 757 B 0 /E
M0 L0 G0 V0 S0 N0 Q0
2 979 J0 R0 D0 I0 Y0 B0 H0 K0*MIACCS 1220P 300P 757 L 0 /E
M0 L0 G0 V0 S0 N0 Q0
NONE AVBL-1* TO CONTINUE
* - FOR ADDITIONAL CLASSES ENTER 1*C
VILA1«
967 MIA 22MAR FACTS
CL AC AU SA SS
F 1 1 1 0
C 22 7 7 0 OI
Y 160 56 34 22 OI
CCS
1¥1«
23MAR SUN MIA/EDT CCS/EST-0.5
1 967 J0 R0 D0 I0 Y0 B0 H0 K0*MIACCS 725A 1005A 757 B 0 /E
M0 L0 G0 V0 S0 N0 Q0
2 979 J0 R0 D0 I0 Y0 B0 H0 K0*MIACCS 1220P 300P 757 L 0 /E
M0 L0 G0 V0 S0 N0 Q0
NONE AVBL-1* TO CONTINUE
* - FOR ADDITIONAL CLASSES ENTER 1*C
VILA1«
967 MIA 23MAR FACTS
CL AC AU SA SS
F 1 1 1 0
C 22 7 6 1 OI
Y 160 56 41 15 OI
CCS

Is this a real question? All flights are sold out, and sometimes planes will travel with empty seats but AA still oversells those flights. There are many reasons for this, including the one posted here. You can expect all seats to be sold out throughout the holidays.

MIA-CCS is probably the most profitable route AA has.

Try going via SJU with AA, via PUJ with GOL, or via BOG with Avianca.

I forgot...LAN also has a direct MIA-CCS but I believe it is only on Mondays and Fridays. That's actually your best option if you want to have a nicer flight and you still want your AA miles to post.

I'm not OP but why wouldn't it be a real question? Did you read the post above yours? There's clearly something bizarre going on in this market.

A little SABRE knowledge will show that AA is underselling these flights. Massively!

See below. In the VILA display AC=Capacity, AU=Authorization Level, SA=Seats Available and SS=Seats Sold.

I believe that the "OI" indication at the rightmost position in each VILA display means "overbooking inhibited" but I'm not certain of this.

So, to take one flight below as an example, looking at AA967/20Feb the business class cabin has been authorized to only 7 seats (way less than cabin capacity of 22) and the coach cabin authorized to 56 seats (vs. capacity of 160).

There is something VERY strange going on here. Since the City Pair Availability display (1) shows all classes zeroed out even though SA<AU a different process would likely have had to run in SABRE to close these flights.

They still flight to Venezuela. CCS and MAR.

I started a thread in Sept about this issue: Withholding inventory, fare buckets? and as time progressed things got stranger and stranger. Meanwhile, the KVS person continues to argue the flights are zeroed-out (as in sold out) when you can see there's some massive underselling going on.

Herb687, obviously you have access to more detailed infromation. To illustrate my case, could you please check what's showing for December 31st 2013*, flights MIA-CCS 975 and 1698. As well as the CCS-MIA, 968 and 914?

This month I have seen spotty availability for random dates in Nov, Dec 2013 and Jan 2014. They change daily and are to specific destinations (IAH, LAS, LAX, MCO) and even MAD (all via MIA). I'm assuming those are coming up as immediate matches to rates published (and available, albeit very temporarily) by UA, CM, DL and IB ex-CCS.

By changing daily I really mean it, they open 6-7 seats overnight (mostly on full fare economy) and whether they are booked or not, they're gone the next day.

Something has been decided internally by revenue management to not sell this many seats, but I'm thinking before the end of the year all those hidden open seats will have to become available. Unless, of course, they start canceling flights and consolidating. Which would be a first for such profitable route.**

Regarding LAN, again, same issue: No CCS Availability for a Year!?. I called LAN yesterday and they couldn't offer me one single seat on LIM-CCS (daily flight) for ANY DATE in 2014. That can't be right either.


*Dec 31st is not a popular date at all for Venezuelans to fly in/out. Despite what you may think.

** On paper, incredibly profitable. In reality, that profit is stuck in Venezuela...in Bolivares [which lose value daily].

Does AA still fly to Caracas, Venezuela?
 

Still flying

I noticed this yesterday and didn't think too much about it, but now it seems like another indicator of the same issue.

Cheers,
LBBZman

All we had stated was that those flights have their Availability completely zeroed-out (which is still true). In other words, AA is not currently selling any [more] seats on those flights (for whatever reason).

As to why they are not selling, only the AA Revenue Management Department can provide an authoritative answer to that question.

So what do you do if you actually have to (or want to) go to Venezuela? Typically, if you wave the right credit card at a ticket agent, an airline will gladly sell you a very expensive walk-up fare and you're good to go. In this case, you just can't buy a ticket. For weeks/months at a time. :eek:

Right. I don't understand why AA isn't just overbooking these things like crazy...it makes no sense.

I don't see anyone selling anything in the market besides full Y...Aeromexico has the most consistent availability and a NYC CCS around trip is over $3000.