mooreva

Thinking about it, absolutely no reason. Actually, I was looking for J seats, which I try to book at the earliest. Not only were there no J seats on Thursday or Friday, there were no Y MS. Hence, my question. Might as well wait at this point.

caburrito

Pretty decent business savers from LAX-CDG for February. Routing doesn't seem to be the best though.

swag

I just found sAAver award for a midday nonstop CLT-MSY on the Sunday after Thanksgiving, a day notorious for no sAAver availability and 75K domestic coach one way AAnytime pricing. I feel like I've spotted a unicorn.

jrb CO

Very frustrating. Looking to book business milesaaver award for my wife and I for return for Europe. For the last 2-3 days, it gives me several options on the dates that I am considering. I click on that flight to complete the process and it states that booking is no longer available. I then click on a different booking through a different connecting city and get the same response - no longer available.

I delete cookies, go away for a few hours. When I come back and input parameters, it shows those unavailable flights as available. I then repeat the entire process and UNAVAILABLE. This has gone on for a couple days. Why do they show the itinerary as an option if you cannot actually book it?

diver858

Happens with deep discounted revenue tickets as well. Likely an issue where the second seat is not available on one of the legs, confusing the system. Best option is to reduce the number of passengers, try again. In my experience, it will often go through, simply put it on hold, repeat search for the second seat, question if revenue management will release it within the hold period of the first seat - typically 7 days. If not, it may be necessary to book the second at the anytime rate to assure a business seat, or try to book the saver in economy, in the hope that a second business seat will eventually be released - in some cases, 1 week or so before departure date. There will be no change fee to add miles to upfare a saver economy to saver (or anytime) business, but there will be a fee to drop down from anytime to saver, should the inventory become available.

jrb CO

I do appreciate the advice. It is crazy. I literally get 2 pages of flight options, many are not reasonable due to connections, etc... I can try to book with only 1 passenger or 2. I tried all of the options, even ones I would not really want to book due to other issues. Every time the same. "The flight you have chosen is no longer available". Granted many have a leg or 2 on BA, so maybe that is the issue.

flyingeph12

I have also noticed what looks to be more phantom space than usual over the past week. Perhaps one way to check what space is actually available is to cross-reference with another source, like BA.

pennystinkard

I have a modest stash of AA miles (slightly less than 10k), and am wondering whether to continue to be somewhat loyal to AA (at least to the limited extent that I already am). Given everything I've read about abysmal saver availability for redemption on AA, the fact that it does not actually seem to be improving (see latest TPG article on it), and the fact that AA does not exactly have the best premium cabin products in the sky, is it even worth continuing to fly AA on my short domestic trips/transatlantic trips? I'm wondering if I should just top of my miles to make it 12.5k and then redeem it for a short one-way domestic, and then be done with AA forever.

rjw242

I'd suggest taking a look at the consolidated thread on this topic, here:
MileSAAver / SAAver award reduction / scarcity discussion

rbAA

Yes, of course. Maybe not for you, but if you fly at all, you might just think about what works best for you. Last year, my GF and I both made EXP and have used the SWU's for 2018 travel (already ticketed and confirmed.) Plus, she earned 150k+ and I earned 188k+. Just with the ticketed flights for 2018, We'll earn another 133k+ and that's just through August. I needed a couple business class awards for my son and his to-be wife as a wedding gift for their honeymoon, and US-Europe is pricy, especially since it's Anytime J. And, we didn't spend anything near $12k either, using premium cabin tickets on partners.

So, the answer for me is a resounding yes. YRMV.

tom911

If the OP only has 10,000 miles in his account, chances are he's not racking up miles like rbAA has this last year.

pennystinkard- Are you in a market served by Alaska/Virgin America? You might get a lot more miles if you accrue there. All depends where you fly, fare class and partners in play.

Mwenenzi

For an infrequent flyer, with the change of most USA based ffp's to revenue based for flights on own airline, decreasing saver award availability, flying the airline with best fares and best schedule that matches your requirements now has merit. And then treating any ff miles as a bonus, which may or may not, be able to be used.

The grass will not greener on the other side

Dave Noble

If you don't fly on AA, what are the other options?

If they are equally good schedule/price wise , then take whichever works out best for a particular trip ; if AA is the best for a trip , then might as well collect AA miles for that trip than not.

On trips where AA is the best value, then why would you choose to be done with it forever?

andersonCooper

Like Tom911 said, it depends on your travel patterns. Do you fly for work, or fly enough for leisure? Judging from your content, I suspect you do not fly enough to take advantage of FFP benefits, so most likely the answer is no. IMO it's somewhat annoying to maintain activity for fly-once-a-while travelers, so it might be easier to pick the cheapest or most convenient itinerary when you travel.

pennystinkard

Thanks everyone for the responses. tom911 - I'm based on the east coast, so no Alaska for me for the most part. I'm not actually an infrequent flyer, it's just that I hardly ever travel domestically (think 1 or 2 trips a year, max). Most of my travel is to Europe or Asia, and my primary FF allegiance is to Star Alliance (particularly Krisflyer), so whenever I travel abroad I try and accrue miles there. It was just that this past year I needed to travel AA/BA due to a complex routing back from Europe, and therefore had some miles accumulated there. Seems a waste to just not use it, so I was wondering what the best option moving forward is, since I intend to put all my travel for 2018 in Star Alliance (aiming for at least a couple of J redemptions to Asia by late next year). I was thinking using it on a one-way saver from JFK/LGA-ORD would be my best bet. And rbAA - great that AA works so well for you, but I guess I can't justify putting that much spend on AA when I have other preferred airlines for international travel.