Last edit by: Prospero
Covid-19 Update:
For further information on AA awards see:
HELP DESK: MileSAAver / SAAver Award Availability - Help, Assistance & Discussion
and
AA oneworld and Other Airline Partner Award information, rules (2015 on)
N.B. Upgrades on QR book into fares not granted EQD/EQM by AA. If you're upgraded on QR, be prepared for pushback from some AA agents. You may have to submit a formal request with accompanying documentation reflecting you purchased an eligible fare class.
NOTE:AA has removed most EY and QR award access from aa.com due to a glitch booking these:
If you experience difficulties with the AA reservations system, you may be able to book by calling AA Australia (+61 2-9101-1948 ) then press 4 - or the New Zealand number (+64 09-308-4014) as an alternative - although the call center is actually in Suva, Fiji (South African agency Mindpearl) - as they can often see the inventory more reliably, and you can book.
NOTE: USA Canada travel on QR will earn EQ miles etc. in accordance with the fare class purchased.
Links:
Link to AA.com Qatar miles earning etc.
AA miles earning on QR changed 1 May 2016 (Link):
Minimum miles guarantee applies.
Checking QR award availability:
You can check QR availability on AA's site, BA's site, QF's site, www.awardnexus.com (which pulls from BA and/or QF), or the KVS tool. (A certain number of searches are free to FlyerTalk members at AwardNexus; click the "more signup options" link under the green Purchase button to sign up as a FlyerTalk member.)
When checking QR award availability, you have to check each segment individually. Both BA and QF can generate very misleading information if you try to check QR award availability all the way through [xxx-(DOH)-yyy] in one step. Be aware AA can only book 330 days out, even if you see availability farther out.
Awards on QR may not be visible to AA agents if a multi-segment itinerary is requested; broken into individual segments will generally reveal availability, however.
As well, AA Australia or New Zealand (actually MindPearl in Fiji) can often see and book AA awards on QR US-based ones might not be able to.
From danger: For AA awards, Economy is X, Business is U, First is Z. NOTE: Those with Z (First) awards may see "Z (Business Class)" shown on the QR website; this is a known glitch.
As well, QR sells intra gulf two class service as First and Economy, as AA does domestically. This can cause some issues with a Business flight including a Gulf "First" flight potentially incurring an F award redemption.
From hotelmotel: "Got my QR PNR from AA. Popped over to QR and selected seats." (AAdvantage award.)
Days of the week: To/from the USA, especially in business class, Qatar often only offers awards seats for Mon..Thu departures, not Fri..Sun departures. So makes sure you check different parts of the week, and not just always weekends (if you're not finding anything on weekends).
NOTE: At DOH / Hamad International Airport, lounges as follows:
Qatar Airways Al Safwa First Lounge (not a oneworld lounge): only accessible to those flying First Class on Qatar or oneworld airlines and QRPC Platniums flying in ticketed Business (not oneworld Emeralds flying other lower classes of service)
Qatar Airways Al Mourjan Business Lounge (not a oneworld lounge): only accessible to those flying Business Class on Qatar or oneworld (not oneworld Sapphire flying lower classes of service)
Oryx Lounge: Third party lounge.
Qatar Airways HIA First Class Lounge (oneworld lounge): First Class ticketed customers, Emerald members, as well as their accompanying guests, travelling on Qatar Airways and other oneworld member flights.
Qatar Airways HIA Business Class Lounge (oneworld lounge): First and Business Class ticketed customers, Emerald and Sapphire members, as well as their accompanying guests, travelling on Qatar Airways and other oneworld member flights.
Arrivals Lounges (not oneworld lounges): only accessible to those arriving in First or Business Class on Qatar Airways (not oneworld Sapphire flying other oneworld airlines or other classes of service)
See FT: QR Lounges at HIA
Selecting Qatar Airways Seats
If you want to assign a seat after booking an award, you should first try the Qatar website or app. If you experience issues, please try a partner site like Royal Jordanian, Malaysia Airlines, or Sri-Lankan. You can also reach out to the QR Twitter team to fix your record in order to be able to select seats on their own site.
- Sapphire+ status pax are temporarily allowed to use the Al Mourjan Business Lounge
- Only tickets issued on QR 157 stock are eligible for the Extending Our Commitment (EOC) rebooking policy
For further information on AA awards see:
HELP DESK: MileSAAver / SAAver Award Availability - Help, Assistance & Discussion
and
AA oneworld and Other Airline Partner Award information, rules (2015 on)
N.B. Upgrades on QR book into fares not granted EQD/EQM by AA. If you're upgraded on QR, be prepared for pushback from some AA agents. You may have to submit a formal request with accompanying documentation reflecting you purchased an eligible fare class.
NOTE:AA has removed most EY and QR award access from aa.com due to a glitch booking these:
From One Mile at a Time (link)
Bottom Line
For the time being you’ll have to call American if you want to ticket AAdvantage awards on Etihad & Qatar that aren’t for travel to & from the US or Canada. It makes sense that American took these awards “offline,” and now it also makes sense why so many passengers have been having issues with checked bags on awards.
Bottom Line
For the time being you’ll have to call American if you want to ticket AAdvantage awards on Etihad & Qatar that aren’t for travel to & from the US or Canada. It makes sense that American took these awards “offline,” and now it also makes sense why so many passengers have been having issues with checked bags on awards.
NOTE: USA Canada travel on QR will earn EQ miles etc. in accordance with the fare class purchased.
Links:
Link to AA.com Qatar miles earning etc.
AA miles earning on QR changed 1 May 2016 (Link):
Minimum miles guarantee applies.
Checking QR award availability:
You can check QR availability on AA's site, BA's site, QF's site, www.awardnexus.com (which pulls from BA and/or QF), or the KVS tool. (A certain number of searches are free to FlyerTalk members at AwardNexus; click the "more signup options" link under the green Purchase button to sign up as a FlyerTalk member.)
When checking QR award availability, you have to check each segment individually. Both BA and QF can generate very misleading information if you try to check QR award availability all the way through [xxx-(DOH)-yyy] in one step. Be aware AA can only book 330 days out, even if you see availability farther out.
Awards on QR may not be visible to AA agents if a multi-segment itinerary is requested; broken into individual segments will generally reveal availability, however.
As well, AA Australia or New Zealand (actually MindPearl in Fiji) can often see and book AA awards on QR US-based ones might not be able to.
From danger: For AA awards, Economy is X, Business is U, First is Z. NOTE: Those with Z (First) awards may see "Z (Business Class)" shown on the QR website; this is a known glitch.
As well, QR sells intra gulf two class service as First and Economy, as AA does domestically. This can cause some issues with a Business flight including a Gulf "First" flight potentially incurring an F award redemption.
From hotelmotel: "Got my QR PNR from AA. Popped over to QR and selected seats." (AAdvantage award.)
Days of the week: To/from the USA, especially in business class, Qatar often only offers awards seats for Mon..Thu departures, not Fri..Sun departures. So makes sure you check different parts of the week, and not just always weekends (if you're not finding anything on weekends).
NOTE: At DOH / Hamad International Airport, lounges as follows:
Qatar Airways Al Safwa First Lounge (not a oneworld lounge): only accessible to those flying First Class on Qatar or oneworld airlines and QRPC Platniums flying in ticketed Business (not oneworld Emeralds flying other lower classes of service)
Qatar Airways Al Mourjan Business Lounge (not a oneworld lounge): only accessible to those flying Business Class on Qatar or oneworld (not oneworld Sapphire flying lower classes of service)
Oryx Lounge: Third party lounge.
Qatar Airways HIA First Class Lounge (oneworld lounge): First Class ticketed customers, Emerald members, as well as their accompanying guests, travelling on Qatar Airways and other oneworld member flights.
Qatar Airways HIA Business Class Lounge (oneworld lounge): First and Business Class ticketed customers, Emerald and Sapphire members, as well as their accompanying guests, travelling on Qatar Airways and other oneworld member flights.
Arrivals Lounges (not oneworld lounges): only accessible to those arriving in First or Business Class on Qatar Airways (not oneworld Sapphire flying other oneworld airlines or other classes of service)
See FT: QR Lounges at HIA
Selecting Qatar Airways Seats
If you want to assign a seat after booking an award, you should first try the Qatar website or app. If you experience issues, please try a partner site like Royal Jordanian, Malaysia Airlines, or Sri-Lankan. You can also reach out to the QR Twitter team to fix your record in order to be able to select seats on their own site.
Qatar Airways / QR: Redeem AA Miles for Award (master thd)
#662
Join Date: Oct 2014
Programs: SQ Gold, Marriott Platinum, IHG Diamond Ambassador, DL Silver, AS MVP, B6 Mosaic, QR, EY, KE, CX, PR
Posts: 317
Booked CRK-DOH for May 2019 using the AA website. Process took less than 10 minutes from requested to ticketed. Y and J plenty available. Helps that it's not from/to US-DOH though.
#663
Join Date: Oct 2014
Programs: UA, Marriott, Sixt, Avis
Posts: 1
Spoke with AA agent on Feb 8 looking for Jan 2020 DOH-US availability in business, who said that they received a memo earlier that day regarding temporary unavailability of such award space. Agent said there was no time frame indicated as to how long this may last. Not sure whether this is indicates bigger concerns down the road...
#664
Moderator: American AAdvantage
Join Date: May 2000
Location: NorCal - SMF area
Programs: AA LT Plat; HH LT Diamond, Maître-plongeur des Muccis
Posts: 62,948
Spoke with AA agent on Feb 8 looking for Jan 2020 DOH-US availability in business, who said that they received a memo earlier that day regarding temporary unavailability of such award space. Agent said there was no time frame indicated as to how long this may last. Not sure whether this is indicates bigger concerns down the road...
#665
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: Austin
Posts: 4,629
#666
Join Date: Sep 2016
Posts: 54
Thanks for suggestion. Update and DP - managed to book return ticket ZAG-DOH-MLE for 3 pax for Dec 24-26. It was not possible to complete the booking at aa.com website, even though some availability was shown. So I did call up the aa number in australia - they actually saw more flights/seats available and made the booking without charging any handling fees. I also used ExpertFlyer to find/monitor availability, however although it was showing plenty, only few seats were actually visible/available to the cs rep when I called.
#667
Join Date: Dec 2004
Posts: 5,631
That is interesting, because EF does not show QR award availability. Were you booking awards, or paid tickets?
#668
Join Date: Sep 2016
Posts: 54
I booked award tickets.
#669
Join Date: May 2017
Location: SIN
Programs: AS MVPG75k, AA Plat
Posts: 741
Does Z space always trigger F award pricing? For SIN-CAI in business, AA website suggests SIN-DOH-AMM-CAI, but DOH-AMM on QR Z, and then it keeps erroring out saying the itinerary is no longer available when I try to press continue.
#670
Join Date: Sep 2014
Location: NYC
Programs: AA EXP, 1865 Voyager, *G
Posts: 112
FYI, if it will help anyone, I'm likely to release two (2) A350-1000 Business Class Q-Suites from DOH->JFK (QR701) on 26-May tonight or tomorrow.
Finishing off our honeymoon and decided to go via AUH and First on the A380 a couple of days later.
Finishing off our honeymoon and decided to go via AUH and First on the A380 a couple of days later.
#671
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: Florida
Posts: 29,750
Have you called AA to find out more?
#672
Join Date: Feb 2017
Programs: AA : EXP / AR : ORO
Posts: 55
Last Sunday I booked a return EZE/DOH/MLE in J for May 2019. Seeing QR awards on AA.com made the whole process much easier.
There was plenty of availability in May and June (very rare for the EZE/DOH flight - via GRU, now in Q Suites).
I'd had it on hold for most of the week, but when I tried to renew my reservation, all availabilty dissapeared.
So I just went ahead and ticketed it last Friday.
90,000 miles each way + $200 total in taxes.
Considering that I will be spending roughly 24 hours in the air, it's quite a good value.
There was plenty of availability in May and June (very rare for the EZE/DOH flight - via GRU, now in Q Suites).
I'd had it on hold for most of the week, but when I tried to renew my reservation, all availabilty dissapeared.
So I just went ahead and ticketed it last Friday.
90,000 miles each way + $200 total in taxes.
Considering that I will be spending roughly 24 hours in the air, it's quite a good value.
#673
Join Date: Jan 2013
Programs: Delta PM, Hyatt Plat, IHG Diamond AMB
Posts: 52
Seems to be zero biz availability JFK-DOH in the next few months into the summer... did this recently change?
#674
Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Kansas City, MO
Posts: 71
#675
Join Date: May 2017
Location: SIN
Programs: AS MVPG75k, AA Plat
Posts: 741
Last Sunday I booked a return EZE/DOH/MLE in J for May 2019. Seeing QR awards on AA.com made the whole process much easier.
There was plenty of availability in May and June (very rare for the EZE/DOH flight - via GRU, now in Q Suites).
I'd had it on hold for most of the week, but when I tried to renew my reservation, all availabilty dissapeared.
So I just went ahead and ticketed it last Friday.
90,000 miles each way + $200 total in taxes.
Considering that I will be spending roughly 24 hours in the air, it's quite a good value.
There was plenty of availability in May and June (very rare for the EZE/DOH flight - via GRU, now in Q Suites).
I'd had it on hold for most of the week, but when I tried to renew my reservation, all availabilty dissapeared.
So I just went ahead and ticketed it last Friday.
90,000 miles each way + $200 total in taxes.
Considering that I will be spending roughly 24 hours in the air, it's quite a good value.