Jan 14, 2016, 5:43 am
Last edit by: medellinfein
Booking Award Seats on EY / Etihad Airways Using AA / AAdvantage Miles
Also see: Earning AA Miles EQM / EQD / EQS on EY / Etihad (master thread)
This thread is about how to book Etihad / EY award seats using AA AAdvantage miles, and sharing success stories. This wiki is new, so anyone with 90/90 who wishes to add helpful information is, of course, urged to do so.
NOTE:AA has removed most EY and QR award access from aa.com due to a glitch booking these:
Please see the archived threads for previous experiences:
Also see: Earning AA Miles EQM / EQD / EQS on EY / Etihad (master thread)
This thread is about how to book Etihad / EY award seats using AA AAdvantage miles, and sharing success stories. This wiki is new, so anyone with 90/90 who wishes to add helpful information is, of course, urged to do so.
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.
- You can now search or book awards for travel on EY (Etihad) on www.aa.com.
- You can search award availability on EY's website. Look only for seats on flights operated by Etihad Airways that are labeled as "GuestSeats". You can also search on ExpertFlyer
- Note: You may see more availability if you search on EY's website using itineraries that do not originate in the US. In other words, to potentially see more availability on a USA-XYZ segment, search for XYZ-USA-XYZ. Expertflyer does not report this additional availability (if any), and US-based agents probably will not be able to see or book it (but see further below for Fiji).
- To expand on this point a bit, it seems that even if you only want to fly USA-AUH (or to other foreign destinations, since they route through AUH), due to an EY website quirk you need to search AUH-USA-AUH in order to find available USA-AUH routes.
- You no longer have to call AA to book them. You may need to request the AA agent to look up the inventory one segment at a time in order to find the inventory in their system. OR:
- It is often or even typically the case that for first and business class awards US agents cannot see the award space that you see on Etihad's site. Your best bet, then, is to call AA Australia (+61 2-9101-1948 ) then press 3 - or the New Zealand number (+64 09-308-4014) (actually South African contractor Mindpearl in Fiji) or Singapore (+65 6349-8444) as an alternative - what you need is the specific call center which is actually in Suva, Fiji (I believe it's our old South African agency friend Mindpearl) or, according to recent reports, in Trinidad (since there have been some reports that the Fiji center has closed). You can put the EY segments on hold so you can flesh out the award afterward and/or pay the fees in USD through the US call center, or simply buy it through non-US call center if you think you won't be making subsequent routing changes (such as adding AA connecting flights within the USA) that would incur fees. (NOTE: calls may get picked up by the local Brisbane office, or rerouted to Trinidad or the USA. As noted, there are reports that the Fiji call center has closed, but people have still been able to book some of the time, particularly if they reach the Trinidad center since that seems to be the call center that yields the greatest success in late 2017 and 2018 - with the big caveat that there are at least as many failures as successes in calling there, including repeatedly. To increase the chances of success, you may have to call several times, since for some reason a given customer service representative at a given time won't see availability even if it shows at the EY site, but another CSR at the same center may be able to do so even a few minutes later. It's conceivable that this difference is due to some CSRs knowing how to search for award availability better than others do, but that's simply a matter of speculation at this point.)
- Note: EY award holds only last 72 hours...irrespective of what AA reservation hold email states
- Booking connections via AUH / Abu Dabhi using one award is now allowed.
- Get both AA and EY reservation codes/numbers: Upon booking with AA, make sure to get the EY reservation number as well as that of AA from the AA CSR, as without the EY number it will be difficult or impossible to deal with EY, such as for checking or managing your reservation online. And of course, if there is another airline involved in the reservation as well (such as BA), get its reservation number.
- A handy EY route map is here: http://flights.etihad.com/routemap.
- The applicable AAdvantage miles award chart is the oneworld and partner airlines award chart.
- Award routing rules are in the wikipost of this thread.
- If you find EY inventory from your continent but not your city of choice, as usual you can include any other AAdvantage award airlines in order to complete the itinerary. E.g. LHR-xAUH-DEL-xAUH-CDG on EY connecting to CDG-LHR on BA.
- WARNING: While this trick is great for new bookings (especially if you have patience to get lucky for call to be routed to Fiji office), modifying booking on partner airlines is always risky especially when an overseas center is involved, Your original seats are immediately released and while new reservation is supposedly confirmed, it may actually not the case until ticket desk actually issues ticket after approval of the partner liaison. Weekend/Holidays/Time-Difference can delay issuance of ticket and if something goes wrong, there is always risk of being SOL. (Mistakes by agents are rare but not unheard of).
- SEAT ASSIGNMENTS: You cannot choose seats until after ticketing. Even then, the regular web site will not allow seat assignments to be made for AAdvantage award bookings. The mobile site (which can be reached with either a mobile or a desktop browser) may work in some cases. Calling EY to make seat assignments always works, as long as you can give them the EY record locator, and as long as AA has issued the ticket (which can take a few days, you will get e-mail). Call 1-877-690-0767, press 1 for English, then 2 for First/Business, then 2 for existing bookings, then they will tell you the call is ending - but it's not: they have added "press 1 to speak to an agent", so finally, press 1 to continue the call. After this, you should have someone on the line quickly to help you. They will ask you a series of questions such as "What class are you traveling in?" and "Where are you going?" Alternatively, you can choose your seats on the Etihad website and app by using the EY record locator to find your award itinerary.
- Availability: EY award availability using AA miles can be fairly good, including in business and first class - IF you get past the big, aforementioned challenge of actually booking award seats that the EY site shows as available but that AA agents have trouble finding. But it ebbs and flows quite a bit in at least two respects (in addition to the general rule that the further in advance you seek availability, the better, as well as reports that availability is easier to find from one to three weeks before a flight): 1) availability showing at the EY site and 2) even if availability shows at the EY site, the ability of non-US call centers (especially the "least bad" ones for finding availability, which might have been Fiji and might now be Trinidad) to find that availability. So if the EY site is not showing availability for a given day or week, and if you have flexibility, check other dates. And if availability seems to be particularly constrained across many dates, particularly if you are searching many months in advance, check again periodically to see if this has changed (or arrange an alert via ExpertFlyer, if it provides such a service for EY flights).
- "Baby-sit" your tickets: Though this advice could apply to many award bookings, EY's systems can be glitchy and the airline apparently is going through some financial challenges. So it makes sense to check online or via phone occasionally with EY to make sure everything remains in order, particularly if there have been even minor changes in things like your flight times. And if there seem to be problems, including with checking in online or other procedures, the EY forum here at FT can be a source of useful advice about whether or not those problems are worth worrying about.
- Itinerary: You can use https://www.virtuallythere.com/new/login.html to enter your EY record locator and last name to 1)display your complete itinerary 2)save a pdf 3)add to outlook/ical 4)view ticket # and different times the ticket has been reissued
- AA lounge access: If you book a premium cabin itinerary on EY with domestic connections on AA, you will not be able to access the Admiral's Club during your domestic layovers because EY is not a member of OW.
Please see the archived threads for previous experiences:
- How to: Use AA Miles to Book Award on Etihad / EY (Archive - 2015 and earlier)
- Success stories booking awards on Etihad using AA miles (Archive - 2015 and earlier)
- Booking AA Award travel on Etihad / EY - [2015-17 ARCHIVE]
Booking AA Award travel on Etihad / EY (master thread July 2017 onwards)
May 24, 2020, 3:22 pm
#1621
Join Date: Jan 2018
Posts: 113
I've experienced the same. I'm saying there's no availability for anything. I've never had that happen before. Even for AUH-JFK that is available on Etihad's site on saver.
May 24, 2020, 4:39 pm
#1622
Join Date: Sep 2017
Location: DCA/IAD & BUF
Posts: 1,400
Are you calling? Ethiad availability showed up for a good long while on the website, then it disappeared, supposedly due to issues with baggage charges. It came back out of the blue for a few months. Then it was gone again. I haven't seen any Ethiad flights on AA's website since the virus crisis. Others have been reporting success with calling though.
May 24, 2020, 4:48 pm
#1623
Join Date: Aug 2004
Programs: AA (EP), Hilton (Diamond), Marriott Bonvoy (Titanium)
Posts: 8,937
If the space is showing as available in EF, then some AA reservations centers will be able to book it. This thread has hundreds and hundreds of posts on this exact topic. If the space is not showing in EF, then AA is unlikely to see it.
May 24, 2020, 5:03 pm
#1624
Join Date: Jul 2016
Location: DC
Programs: AA PPRO, HH Diamond, National EE
Posts: 603
May 26, 2020, 9:25 pm
#1626
Join Date: Aug 2004
Programs: AA (EP), Hilton (Diamond), Marriott Bonvoy (Titanium)
Posts: 8,937
Is the space showing on EF? That's the key. It doesn't matter what the AA web site shows, that's often wrong. The EY site might be showing availability for its own members.
May 28, 2020, 7:37 am
#1627
Join Date: Mar 2008
Posts: 1,535
Etihad Guest login shows nothing (Guest awards anyway). Expert Flyer also shows nothing. For entire months (I gave up with my clicker finger getting sore). Granted, I cannot remember if Etihad's site required the "round trip" booking method to show availability (JFK-AUH and you had to actually construct it as like AUH to JFK to AUH in order to see the flights) but Expert Flyer shows the same thing. Zero.
Maybe they're actually going to get rid of the A380 that far out (looking March-April of 2021 so far).
Jun 6, 2020, 4:20 pm
#1628
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
Thanks. It turns out that there is indeed a technical problem which renders online booking impossible at this moment.
I searched e.g. 8/1 DUS - AUH - SIN on expertflyer and it shows N5I2 - called the AA reservations and they immediately made the booking w/o problems. All flights are not visible on aa.com nor on aa app.
I searched e.g. 8/1 DUS - AUH - SIN on expertflyer and it shows N5I2 - called the AA reservations and they immediately made the booking w/o problems. All flights are not visible on aa.com nor on aa app.
Jun 17, 2020, 4:26 am
#1630
Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Here today, gone tomorrow
Programs: Nothing shiny :-(
Posts: 2,493
When I search on Etihad for Guest seats it gives me different (Etihad) mileage amounts for different days, even though they are all Guest seats. Are these all bookable by AA?
Jun 17, 2020, 9:44 pm
#1631
Join Date: Aug 2004
Programs: AA (EP), Hilton (Diamond), Marriott Bonvoy (Titanium)
Posts: 8,937
Any Guest seats that show on Etihad's site for redemption by Etihad members may or may not be available to AA. If they are available, the award cost in AA miles is the same, because AA's partner awards are fixed. You can search for Etihad award space on ExpertFlyer; if it shows available there, it should be bookable by some AA agents at some call centers (as discussed extensively in this thread).
Last edited by anabolism; Jun 17, 2020 at 9:58 pm
Jul 23, 2020, 1:57 am
#1632
Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: Sacramento
Programs: Hyatt Globalist, HH Diamond, Marriott Platinum, Amtrak Select
Posts: 1,340
Anybody already go through the process of cancelling? Booked in Apartments for Early October SYD-AUH-JFK. Since the A380 isn't flying, obviously I'm not going to be in the apartments. Oddly, Etihad still marketing both flights as A380s, but only selling E/J tickets.
AA's policy seems to be through Sept 30th, and for AA flights only, so I'm not exactly sure what I'm able to do right now. Most interested in the 215K miles I spent for each of us, but would also like to get the ~$350 in fees back.
AA's policy seems to be through Sept 30th, and for AA flights only, so I'm not exactly sure what I'm able to do right now. Most interested in the 215K miles I spent for each of us, but would also like to get the ~$350 in fees back.
Jul 23, 2020, 2:41 am
#1633
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Jan 2002
Posts: 44,584
Once the flight is cancelled or changed to an aeroplane that does not have 1st class, then you will be entitled to a refund; outside of that you are down to any special exemptions that AA may offer for October onwards
Jul 23, 2020, 5:49 am
#1634
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Sydney, Australia
Programs: HH Diamond, Marriott Titanium/LTG, IHG Platinum
Posts: 1,921
Anybody already go through the process of cancelling? Booked in Apartments for Early October SYD-AUH-JFK. Since the A380 isn't flying, obviously I'm not going to be in the apartments. Oddly, Etihad still marketing both flights as A380s, but only selling E/J tickets.
AA's policy seems to be through Sept 30th, and for AA flights only, so I'm not exactly sure what I'm able to do right now. Most interested in the 215K miles I spent for each of us, but would also like to get the ~$350 in fees back.
AA's policy seems to be through Sept 30th, and for AA flights only, so I'm not exactly sure what I'm able to do right now. Most interested in the 215K miles I spent for each of us, but would also like to get the ~$350 in fees back.