cyberkarl

Sorry if this is elsewhere--can't find it on site, on aa.com, or web search. I don't think it is possible to book RT itinerary using miles for only one segment (and paying fare for other) on AA.com. Is it possible if I call customer service? Don't feel like calling AA right now--probably a nightmare. But want to book within next week or so....

I thought about booking 2 one ways (one with miles, buying other), but the one way fare is more than 2x the roundtrip fare...

Thanks for any help.

SpammersAreScum

All award purchases are one-way, so for a round trip you're buying two. Unfortunately, I don't believe there's any way to get cheaper one-way fare by saying you're using miles for the other.

If there were 2 of you traveling, you could of course by an RT for one person and the two one-way awards for the other...

Antipode

I'm fairly certain it's not possible to combine paid segments and award segments on the same reservation/ticket.

There are a couple of things that could be happening here:
1) (under the assumption that 2x is a typo and you meant more than 1/2 the RT fare) One direction of your roundtrip is more expensive than the other: e.g. roundtrip is $400, but that's calculated as $300 for the outbound and $100 for the return. You might want to check something like ITA that will give you a better idea of the fare breakdown to see if this is what's happening. If so, you might try to see if the more expensive direction has award availability and the buy the cheaper direction with cash, but it's probably more likely that the expensive direction doesn't have award availability than the other way around.
2) You're in one of the remaining markets where roundtrip fares are cheaper than two one ways. You're basically just going to have to go all award or all cash unless you want to pay a premium to buy a one way revenue ticket and one way award separately.

Often1

One may not combine cash and award segments on one ticket. Thus, this will be a 2-ticket itinerary.

I would price out the two segments as one ways, both with miles and cash. The miles cost ought to be the same for both segments, but the cash ticket may cost more in one direction than the other. Purchase the cheapest cash segment and use miles for the other direction.

Note that on two tickets, you face double penalties, if any apply, to any changes, presuming that the changes need to be made in both directions.

justhere

I doubt that 2x is a typo as it's probably an int'l itinerary.

SeeBuyFly

You can't, but even if you could, you would of course still pay the one-way fare since you're paying for one-way.

cyberkarl

Thanks for responses. 2x was not a typo. Is at CLT-LHR flight. RT business class was around $3800. One way business class on one of the segments was over $8,000. But refundable, so there's that.