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AAdvantage Award on JL / JAL / Japan Airlines (2016-2023)

Old Aug 4, 2015, 1:37 pm
FlyerTalk Forums Expert How-Tos and Guides
Last edit by: Prospero
GUIDE to redeeming AA miles for Japan Air Lines awards:
  • JL awards are now shown show and can be booked on aa.com
  • AwardNexus (free to FlyerTalk members for basic searches) will also reveal, and (for a fee) alert, on JL award seats
  • AA awards on JL must be MileSAAver (AAnytime awards are only available on AA marketed and AA operated flights)
  • There are no onerous fuel or carrier-imposed surcharges using AAdvantage miles for awards using JL
  • JL initially releases awards to AAvantage members 330 days out at 10:00 am JST time (18:00 PDT, 17:00 PST). Note, JL award inventory is released to members of other FFPs 360 day out and updates award and revenue seat award availability once daily ~09:30-12:00 Pacific time
  • JL may release 0-2 F and 0-4 J award seats initially; until taken they remain available up to three months from release
  • No further seats are likely to be released until shortly (~14 days) prior to scheduled departure - but the last F seat will be retained for sale, not released into award inventory
  • No stopovers are allowed on AA awards. Connections may be as long as 23:59.
  • Only JAL Mileage Bank members can waitlist awards
  • All awards for domestic Japan will default to Economy (including international F or J award with domestic segments); these can often be upgraded at reasonable cost at the ticket counter in the Japan connecting airport
  • If JL & QF are showing availability, but AA can't see it, try calling the Australia AA center as it may be a point-of-sale issue

For 2012-2015 posts, please see
ARCHIVE: AA Award on JL / JAL / Japan Airlines (master thd)

For further information, see:
HELP DESK: MileSAAver / SAAver award questions, assistance
oneworld and Other Airline (Partner) Awards info, rules 2014 on
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AAdvantage Award on JL / JAL / Japan Airlines (2016-2023)

Old Mar 26, 2018, 8:19 pm
  #526  
 
Join Date: May 2007
Programs: UA 1K, Hyatt Globalist
Posts: 5,354
Originally Posted by Red259
I searched JFK-PVG should I search individual segments?
Yes. Search JFK-HND/NRT and HND/NRT-PVG separately.
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Old Mar 26, 2018, 8:21 pm
  #527  
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Originally Posted by Red259
I searched JFK-PVG should I search individual segments?
Yes. Search JFK-NRT and NRT-PVG separately, you will see the real award inventory for each that AA should be able to book. It's a BA site glitch in the way it displays results with connections, basically showing space that isn't really there.
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Old Mar 26, 2018, 8:26 pm
  #528  
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: NYC
Programs: Marriott Plat, Hilton Gold, UA Silver
Posts: 2,272
Originally Posted by JJeffrey
Yes. Search JFK-NRT and NRT-PVG separately, you will see the real award inventory for each that AA should be able to book. It's a BA site glitch in the way it displays results with connections, basically showing space that isn't really there.
Yes I now searched the segments separately and it shows one seat available.

Last edited by Red259; Mar 26, 2018 at 8:34 pm
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Old Mar 26, 2018, 8:33 pm
  #529  
 
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Location: NYC
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I checked alaska airlines as well it and shows an open space on these flights as well
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Old Mar 26, 2018, 9:01 pm
  #530  
 
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I ended up calling back and getting new rep and sure enough she checked and immediately said she saw the space so I booked it. Its just frustrating dealing with AA sometimes. In any event I have my arrival and departure flights booked for my long haul segments. although I will probably switch over from JAL to CX close in when CX space opens up. As it is this trip would last three weeks which is a bit longer than I would like and I will want to start it a couple days later. Still it made sense to book more than 21 days out to avoid the close in booking fee and CX seems to have very good availability once I get close in and I'd rather at least have a flight than worry about something going wrong and nothing opening up.
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Old Mar 28, 2018, 7:10 am
  #531  
 
Join Date: May 2012
Location: YYZ-YYC
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Is HND/NRT considered one city? If I book a flight departing from NRT, but then award space opens up from HND would I be charged a re-deposit fee? I have no status.
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Old Mar 28, 2018, 7:16 am
  #532  
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Originally Posted by eugeneo1
Is HND/NRT considered one city? If I book a flight departing from NRT, but then award space opens up from HND would I be charged a re-deposit fee? I have no status.
Yes, switching between co-terminals as your origin or destination will trigger the redeposit fee unfortunately.
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Old Mar 28, 2018, 11:38 am
  #533  
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: NYC
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Originally Posted by eugeneo1
Is HND/NRT considered one city? If I book a flight departing from NRT, but then award space opens up from HND would I be charged a re-deposit fee? I have no status.
yea that sucks. Here us a followup question if you switch from nrt to hnd last minute does it trigger a close in booking fee even if you could avoid the fee by just switching nrt flights?
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Old Mar 28, 2018, 12:40 pm
  #534  
 
Join Date: Feb 2013
Location: Beantown! (BOS)
Programs: AA PtPro (2 MM); Hilton Diamond; Hertz President Cr; DL SkyMiles; UA MileagePlus
Posts: 3,426
Originally Posted by Red259
yea that sucks. Here us a followup question if you switch from nrt to hnd last minute does it trigger a close in booking fee even if you could avoid the fee by just switching nrt flights?
Booking fee I do not know, but HND and NRT both have passenger facility fee which is collected through tickets.

HND's passenger facility fee for transit passenger is 1280 yen per adult passenger. NRT's passenger facility fee for transit passenger is 1570 yen per adult passenger. Difference of 290 yen or US$ 2.71 under today's exchange rate.

Switching flights between HND/NRT should result in collection or refund of US$ 2.70 from your ticket even on award ticket. ☺
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Old Apr 30, 2018, 9:06 pm
  #535  
 
Join Date: Aug 2010
Posts: 191
Trying to search for award space:
BA and Alaska sites have SAN-NRT (1 business) all on JAL
BA and Alaska sites have SAN-NRT-SIN (3 business) all on JAL

Is this typical or odd? When I call AAdvantage will it be similar?
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Old May 1, 2018, 12:19 am
  #536  
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Originally Posted by sdfamily
Trying to search for award space:
BA and Alaska sites have SAN-NRT (1 business) all on JAL
BA and Alaska sites have SAN-NRT-SIN (3 business) all on JAL

Is this typical or odd? When I call AAdvantage will it be similar?
If you see partner space on BA, most of the time you can book this on AA. However many phone AAgents are just bad at partner searches, if an AA agent tells you they dont see it try HUCA at least 3 or 4 times.

That said...the BA site is bad at showing connections, you need to search segment by segment, i.e. SAN-NRT then NRT-SIN, not SAN-SIN.

Looking at your results above, there is really only 1 business seat on the SAN-NRT segment. There is most likely 3 open on the NRT-SIN segment, but the BA site gets confused and displays 3 for the whole itinerary.
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Old May 18, 2018, 10:50 pm
  #537  
 
Join Date: Jun 2014
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I'm having trouble booking JL133 (HND-ITM) on June 17th. It shows up as X4 in both JAL and Qantas; however, BA, AS, and AA see this flight as unavailable. Is there any reason for this?
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Old May 19, 2018, 12:40 am
  #538  
 
Join Date: Jan 2012
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Originally Posted by xfisgsm
I'm having trouble booking JL133 (HND-ITM) on June 17th. It shows up as X4 in both JAL and Qantas; however, BA, AS, and AA see this flight as unavailable. Is there any reason for this?
Have you called AA and asked for that specific flight? AA's search engine does not show JL space, and BA's search engine does not display all available flight options on high density routes like HND-ITM.
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Old May 19, 2018, 1:27 am
  #539  
 
Join Date: Jun 2014
Programs: UA Premier 1K, *A Gold
Posts: 159
Originally Posted by flyingeph12
Have you called AA and asked for that specific flight? AA's search engine does not show JL space, and BA's search engine does not display all available flight options on high density routes like HND-ITM.
Yup, I called both BA and AA and they couldn't find availability on the flight. However, Qantas shows the following, which indicates that the flight is available (so does JL as well).
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Old May 19, 2018, 1:35 am
  #540  
 
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Posts: 2,846
Originally Posted by xfisgsm
Yup, I called both BA and AA and they couldn't find availability on the flight. However, Qantas shows the following, which indicates that the flight is available (so does JL as well).
It might be worth calling again and seeing if a different agent can see the space. I know last year, when JL switched over to Amadeus, some AA agents had trouble finding JL space.

Ah...there's even a blog post on the issue.
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