fastair

It is 90 days, and it only applies to trans-atlantic LH flights. You can book one for Mar, just can't book it more than 90 days out, unless you use UA/US/AC/SK for the overwater segment, and then you can still connect in FRA on LH to the rest of the world.

The story I heard was it was due to a "trade imbalance" in trans-atlantic mileage bookings. Seems there are more UA fliers who want to go to LH European, African, and Middle Eastern cities, than their are Germans who want to visit Chicago. In a perfect world, the redemption and accrual between the 2 carriers would be equal, or in ratio but they aren't. Drawbacks of having a larger FF base of passengers.

Seems a small price to pay when both carriers opperate the same routes in many cases, to use the US flagged carrier for one flight.

ElmhurstNick

Nope. I did the status match to PremEx at the beginning of 2003 when I got annoyed at AA cutting several key routes of mine to Eagle. Then UA proceeded to shaft me on nonstop price to upstate New York and New England every single time for four months, usually making me go through PIT on US or IAD on UX or else just telling me to suck it up. No thanks... after 17 segments (10 on US/UX) I had to switch back to American to keep Platinum status, and United dropped me back to Blue on 3/1.

Boraxo

Talk about a bad week:

(1) UA secretly changes rules to preclude reservation of *A award travel >90 days.
(2) Oakland A's lose to Angels, miss playoffs.
(3) SF Giants lose to the hated Dodgers, miss playoffs.
(4) 49ers and Raiders both lose.
(5) AA changes upgrade rules to require significant cash payment.

The last item is very distressing, seeing as I had just recently become familiar with the details of AA's upgrade awards and was planning to book my first upgrades for travel in early 2006. Now I am basically forced to book a trip for next summer or burn 90k miles (see below).

What is the point of having an "award" if you still have to pay for it? $15-75 nuisance fees are one thing, but 40K miles +$500? GTFOH!

To be fair, with the advent of US-Europe RT fares in the $300-500 range, I can't blame AA for wanting to change the rules in order to increase revenues for its best product (and one that differentiates AA from the LCCs). But the better course of action would be to raise the # miles needed to upgrade basement fares, rather than add a required cash payment to all awards.

We all love to fly C, but I'll bet that many of us will simply switch to 90K awards, or better yet, the 80K OW awards from the East Coast to Europe (bet that will go over well with BA, IB, etc.!) Given the devaluation in miles, spending another 40K miles v. $500 cold cash is not a bad deal, since the retail cost of a C or F seat is far higher, particularly during the summer.

This change would be more palatable if AA threw us a couple of bones, i.e., lifting capacity controls, at the same time. Not to mention a 6-12 month notification (though 2 months is still better than UA's backdoor change to the *A reservation policy). But I guess we are supposed to be grateful that AA does not plan to adopt UA's annoying HMBY requirement for upgrades.

TerryK

I definitely don't like the new fee.

AA needs two things for this change to stick: 1) Improved J product along the line of BA/CX/QF flat beds; 2) UA needs to be onboard for the fee. I assume AA has plan for business class improvment in the wing before they would attempt something like this. As to UA, unfortunately, I think UA will match as soon as it is out of Chapter 11. AAdvantage and Mileage Plus have been like Tweedledee and Tweedledum in the past several years. Either UA will match or AA will back down. My hunch is for the former.

Yes, passengers on CO yelled and moaned about the fee when it was instituted, but look at what happened?! A lot of CO flyers have trouble clearing upgrade waitlists playing HoKey. BusinessFirst is as full as ever.

777lover

Two things -- actually 3 (see below) that hit me while reading these 10+ pages...

1. I have a funny feeling that when we get this new "R" bucket and have both C and R for upgrades, the bucket for the VIPs will be significantly limited compared to the other bucket -- that way AA can convert some of the VIP travel to mileage travel and get the fee (ie, "sorry no VIP upgds left, but we do have the $250OW upgrades left")

2. I wonder how this will affect "old miles?" If this new fee does not apply to old miles, then those at 40K are even more valuable.

and...

3. You can't trust these ScAAmers . It's over. Weekend trip as prt of an INt'l MR are over unless I have VIPs (assuming that VIPs are not subject to this scAAm)

martin33

The timing seems backward, given that the "old" J seats and service are still in place. Perhaps they intend to see how strong a reaction this provokes in the time before the J product is upgraded.

I also suspect it all has to do with permanent changes in the transatlantic market-- as reflected in and further presaged by EI's bombshell this week: no more advance purchase requirements at all, no more roundtrip-only fares, even a walkup in Y is only $500 each way. The old revenue model is on its last legs, and it's going to be a period of experimentation, one must expect, to develop its replacement.

qgpv

Does this mean that it will take 25K to upgrade from Y/B or will it still be 10K (not that I ever used it, but it would be good to know)?

In any case, if true, the 25K + 250$ is really really bad, when considering how mediocre the J product on AA is.

askworldtraveler

Couldn't read through 10 pages....

yes it's 25,000 miles plus $250 each direction

Yes the $ are for discounted fares

Any ticket BOOKED OR WAIT LISTED prior to the start date will NOT pay

VIP's will continue to come out of the same inventory with expanded availablity

Better seats would sure be great!

Spiff

Source at AA has confirmed:

$250 each way for discounted international tix to Europe, Asia, and south South America.

VIP upgrades do not incur this AAwful charge.

777lover

Nevermind -- answered by Spiff!

Pat H

All my flying is on my own $. I like doing MR's but I sure won't be doing international ones if I can't upgrade with miles. Why would I pay an extra $500 for a cheap MR to LGW? I was going to do NRT when they had a cheap fare but I'm not flying to NRT in coach. AA is not all that convenient for me but I've been flying them because of elite status and upgrade policy. I'll have to rethink all that. How many others will do fewer MR because it's no longer worth it?

AA in CA

Any bets on when VIP upgrades fall into the same abyss.....

This ain't your mothers airline anymore....

Oh...and FWIW....'I'm Optimistic'

LLZ

All fares except Y/B?

TerryK

This is fun! I could see new posts coming up by hitting refresh!

777lover

Right here -- I do MRs to Europe and Asia... need to re-think the whole strategy and conserve the VIPs