Expertflyer can't show seat map close to flight departure
 

Has anybody else noticed this lately?

I always use EF to check for open seats right before the flight closes and try to score a free seat next to me, but today I can't show the seat map for flight departing within 1 hour. EF shows the message: "AIRPORT CHECKIN ONLY"

Maybe a feature of the new AA or just a glitch by EF? Thoughts?

It started a few weeks ago. It blocks the seat map 2 hours before the flight. Not sure why this happened though.

The best place to ask questions like this is http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...sk-thread.html.

Thank you,

/Moderator

GF disappearing P (Business) availability on ExpertFlyer?
 

I am trying to book a Europe - India award using AA miles to fly GF as a way to avoid BA's awful YQ (no availability on AY, EY, or QR and 9W doesn't service the European cities I want to fly from - too many connections to use AB).

When I was looking on EF, I saw P (Business) = 4 and T (Economy) = 4. I was booking for 3 pax and all of a sudden the AAgent tells me there are only 2 seats available in Business (P) so I grabbed 2 there and split the reservation up to grab 1 in Economy on the other.

I went back on EF and now P = 0.

Any idea what's going on here? I've sent an alert but not feeling hopeful that an additional seat opens up.

People took the available awards, or sales influenced RM to withdraw seats from award inventory?

All good points JDiver but the time frame was like this:

T-0: Search EF, confirm availability.
T+2: Get AAgent on hold, she says there are only 2 seats available in Y and grabs them.
T+2.1: Refresh EF, see that P has gone from 4 to 0.

The flight is over 300 days out and has full availability in every fare class and has only one other passenger with an assigned seat (not in J).

I am guessing GF RM has some function to drop P if it sees it's being gobbled up quickly?

AA/ExpertFlyer seat map differences
 

Attempted a search but couldn't find an answer, and this isn't the first time I've seen something similar. What's happening here?
Flying to LIH with some friends in June. AA map shows nothing available in rows 5, 6, or 7. http://s12.postimg.cc/tlruz3pgt/Scr...9_15_13_AM.png
EF shows plenty of availability, and all 5 of us have status.http://s16.postimg.cc/883o3s5mt/Scr...9_16_19_AM.png.

The AA seatmap corresponds with the EF seatmap. This is a glitch with AA. They're showing you MCE for $44, which should be 0 as you're an EXP, but are showing preferred as $0. (As if you were a gold.) But even if it thought you were a gold, it should show all the P (elite) seats. I would call AA and have them assign your seats for you.

I've seen something similar before with EF on a 737 and row 7. AA was making an A/C swap and the new map wasn't loaded, but somehow AA.com knew to block out seats in row 7 which wouldn't exist after the swap (some of which were sold before they were removed from availability on AA.com). There are something like 5 versions of 757 seating on AA and some don't have Y seats in those rows. My best guess is they are keeping their options open for A/C swaps.

If you aren't logged in, it won't show the preferred seats.

When I want to see real seat availability I use EF, not AA.com. AA.com does not distinguish between an occupied and a blocked seat, and what seats it shows as available depend on your status.

Keep in mind that not all seat block types show up as an X within Expert Flyer. Its not uncommon to have seats blocked on a flight but still show as available in EF.

With your flights, they have started blocking out seats in the first few rows of coach just in case the flight gets swapped to the new Hawaii configuration.

That makes sense. AA did the same with rows 10-12 in the 737 when they were reconfigured (again) to 144 seats in economy.

Expert Flyer seat maps differ from AA
 

Hi:
I've not seen this before. For about a week, the seat maps on Expert Flyer show seats 6A and 6B on #700 10/14 (PHL-FRA) as unoccupied while the AA seat map shows them occupied. I called AA and was told they are occupied.

The seats were originally shown as occupied on EF and I submitted a seat alert. A few days later I was notified they were now open (and still are according to EF), but they aren't. Since I presume EF's data comes from AA, I wonder how this could happen.

Any ideas?

FWIW... This is the response I got from EF after inquiring:
Multiple AA agents absolutely insist they are assigned but one did say something seemed strange.