DaveInLA

No kidding. Glad to be wrong. How could so many be clueless about this?

JonNYC

Well, to be honest-- and in yours' (and others' defense)-- it's confusing.

I'm not 100% sure on almost any aspect of these pre-devaluation placeholder bookings -except- that date changes on booked awards will be guaranteed.

Every time I think I have my head wrapped around some aspect of these bookings (routing changes, carrier changes, etc, on ticketed awards) I find myself getting re-confused.

The authoritative early thinking was an approach of "any/almost any change presently allowed w/ fee waived (as shown in list below) would be allowed w/o new mileage levied" for pre-devaluation bookings:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/541310...in/dateposted/

I know a couple of the most prominent bloggers were on-board with this thinking (as was I) early on. Not sure where they stand at this juncture.

Now, personally speaking, I'm unsure on what works and what doesn't -and- have found sources within AA in violent disagreement on certain aspects as well.

SO, easy to have been wrong, partially wrong, etc., on this.

iadisgreat

No one ever needed to worry about locking in a price prior to our current situation. The devaluation coupled with CX somewhat reducing available award inventory has put high pressure on what is out there. Previously, EXP could book and cancel willy nilly without regard to fees (or carrier or cost in miles) and other flyers could lock in something around their desired date and fiddle with it fee free. Now, EVERYONE needs to lock in a price for some time in the future by the same deadline. Since the above has led to almost everything having been spoken for, leaving only close-in flights being available, this method is kind of the last ditch way to take advantage of the low rates.

Basically, in my opinion, no one needed to think about these kind of things due to the pretty generous nature of AA's change rules and associated CX award availability.

nk15

Since CX is not listed on EF, there is no way to set alerts for CX F awards anywhere, right?

ahchiu

regarding the placeholder option, you'd have to pay the $75 close-in fee for booking within 21 days...no biggie i guess to secure the pre-deval pricing.

iadisgreat

Only if you have no elite status.

nldogbert

hhmm... ok. For me it is still a no go. I have been checking daily on availability on BA and it does show 2 seats available for the HKG-AMS sector for the dates I want, but everytime I call AA, they see nothing.. they do see the BA options though (not what I want due to timing reason).

Will just have to keep trying I guess

AspiringWorldTraveler

I have never used anything but the free community package, but AwardNexus.com has an alert setting - bit pricey for me (also because I had all the time in the world to search daily). Wandr.me also has an automated search and there have been posts where a macro will do the work for you (but you still have to click to initiate the program). But no, no other alert system I am aware of for CX awards.

Just keep trying, and try to check at the "right" times of the day.

dihorul

I've put on hold a ticket LAX-BKK, I got the flights to BKK in the class and date that I need. For the return I have the class that I want, but couldn't find the date that I need. After I fly LAX-BKK, can I still change the date for the return flights without penalties?

ckpeter

Yes. Date changes for the return would be free even after you have flown the outbound.

nightkhan

That was me too. But has this method been proven to work with AA? From what I've read everywhere no one has confirmed this would work. If it does, learn something new.

eoyn

Hey guys, just a quick question, was wondering if anyone is aware of any F seat available on CX from August onwards JFK - BKK...ive been searching the BA site to no avail..

tng11

Just as a data point to add to some of the earlier posts:

I had booked a YYZ-JFK-HKG-TPE CX F award, which I cancelled, but did not do a miles redeposit knowing that I might have use for the ticket later on.

2 months later, using the ticket number I called in to rebook the ticket to YYZ-ORD-NRT-HKG-TPE in a mix of JL and CX. I received a new PNR, but it was handled similar to a simple date change through a simple ticket exchange, there was no miles re-deposit and fresh deduction that took place.

So from that it seems unnecessary for everyone to hog all the CX award space for the next year if you have no intention of using it. Hopefully once the dust settles that the cancel without re-deposit/rebook method works without requiring increased mileage, people will start returning seats to inventory!

TravelLawyer

While I think this is true for some people, I think most people are holding itineraries that are not "ideal" but are holding as back-up in case their ideal routes/dates don't appear (i.e. the people split up on multiple flights on the same day or next day). I can't imagine there are that many people sitting on hundreds of thousands of miles just to speculate bookings that they won't use.

susiesan

Uh, yes they are. There are numerous people here who have admitted to having upwards of a million AA award ticketed itineraries they are holding and will decide later which one they will actually use. These people are EXP so it costs them nothing to redeposit the miles when they cancel one of their trips.

I myself just ticketed an itinerary for a vacation to Vietnam for next January. Ideally I want to go late Feb. or early March. As soon as my ideal dates become available I will change my travel dates. If I have to go in January I will, but I am definitely going to Vietnam on vacation.