siankaan1

Hi, I'd appreciate some advice...

We currently have two SAAver award seats in coach, STL-LAX-HNL on January 8.

I'm continuing to look for a Saver business award to replace this. But if necessary I'm willing to go with an AAnytime award in business class instead.

The question is, when to pull the trigger? Obviously I want to be in front of the free upgrades, but I don't want to change the award type if there is any reasonable chance of two SAAver awards opening up in business.

We're flexible about departure and arrival times and routing, NOT flexible about January 8.

Advice? Thanks!

diver858

Assuming elite status, there is no 21 day award travel fee, so that will not be a concern.

My advice would be to set EF (or similar) alerts for both Saaver and Aanytime award seats - availability of saaver (at least 1), and when aanytime goes below a certain threshold (say 4, if 2 are traveling together), pull the trigger on either.

Another risk: EXP upgrades. While unlikely to HNL, they can occur 100 hours out, so I would pull the trigger within 5 days or departure.

dll

You can downgrade any time if SAAver seats open up on the flight. Perhaps better to do it now.

And on that routing (STL-HNL), I'd 100% advocate for a routing through DFW vs. LAX. In January AA are running a 777 on BOTH DFW-HNL flights meaning a comfortable lie-flat seat.

Checking seat maps on that flight you'd be wise to act fast; not many seats left on either of the daily DFW-HNL flights in Business.

siankaan1

Great advice, thanks. Only four seats left DFW-HNL on the best routing for us. I've put two of them on hold for the moment.

dickinson

Make sure you act before your hold gets cancelled due to conflict with your already ticketed award itinerary.

enpremiere

There should be no difference in taxes/fees or other charges when moving from a Saaver to any AAnytime award and given that AAnytime gives you practically "last seat availability", as long as there is inventory available in the class that you're moving to, you'll get them.

But.... keep in mind that all elite statuses are not equal!
"The reinstatement charge is $150 per account for the first award ticket. Additional award tickets reinstated to the same account at the same time will have a $25 charge per ticket
This fee will be waived for Executive Platinum members using miles from their account"

Your FT profile shows a lifetime AA Platinum status which would mean that you would get dinged for $175 if you went from an AAnytime to a SAAver award should the SAAver award open up.

diver858 is right; be wary of waiting too long as EXP upgrade runs may take place, removing even open inventory.

If you have access to EF, I'd blend the advice of diver858 and dll and set alerts for routings via BOTH DFW and LAX (the 777 via DFW is clearly the preferable one).

enpremiere

PS: Have a great trip!

869

Saver ain't gonna open up on 777 from DFW with 2 seats left 50+ days out

davidsc111

another option...AA Flt#692 (PHX - HNL) is flying an A333 with lie flat seats this winter. Maybe more of a chance for saaver routing through PHX.

dll

Had forgotten about that, and possibly a more ideal routing than DFW, as there's always a chance (however slim) of winter weather in Texas.

zzpitt

I was actually able to snatch 2 instant SWU upgrades on PHL-PHX-HNL on Saturday 1/6 with the PHX-HNL leg on the A333 a few weeks ago. Originally wanted to route through DFW for a longer trip in the lie flat for DFW-HNL, but couldn't pass up instant upgrade on the PHX route vs. waitlisting for DFW.

As an aside, I almost routed it PHL-CLT-PHX-HNL because Flight 692 actually routes the A333 from CLT-PHX-HNL, so I was very tempted to get the transcon on the same bird instead of the usual A321. But, the earliest we could go PHL-CLT on Saturday morning left only a 35 minutes layover, and I was worried if there was any type of delay that didn't end up giving us much wiggle room, and we could potentially end up with the entire journey on old birds instead of at least having the lie flat for half the journey.

siankaan1

Thanks for the suggestion....on 1/8 only six unassigned seats in business, so I think same situation as DFW, there will be no SAAver awards opening up.

I'll go ahead and change to AAnytime through PHX as a hedge on the weather.

Thanks everyone.

If something DOES open in SAAver, $175 to redeposit miles will be okay.