pkerr

I'm planning an award trip to Australia in F. There are quite a lot of Saver Awards in F available in March. (1,2 or 3)
I figured best bet for flights would be the most direct so I checked the most likely suspects. SFO, LAX and DFW

Here's the strangeness that I found:
SFO-SYD the want to send me to LAX. Fine. I'll just get myself to LAX.



Here's the LAX results:
The want to send me to DFW. Fine. I'll just get myself to DFW.


Here are the results for DFW:
And lo and behold... there aren't ANY flights out of DFW.



So with all that is this a glitch? Do I need to call? Your suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks

guv1976

Not a glitch. AA can -- and does -- offer SAAver availability on connecting-flight itineraries even when they do not offer it on nonstop itineraries.

travelingbob

I suggest you look real closely at the AM and PM ...... both flights have really long layovers .....

firemandan9

First time I've seen married segment logic with a partner award in the mix.

SeeBuyFly

deleted, now irrelevant

CNMAZ

DId you double check that all segments are in First, some times the domestic will be in first but the international will be coach.

SeeBuyFly

Good catch, that's exactly what is going on. Looking at the details will show that the QF flight is in economy.

When the system adds a domestic F flight, it displays the whole trip as F, which is hugely dishonest. But it can't pull that trick if there's only one segment (QF) and it is Y, so it doesn't show as F.

The giveaway is the line in red that says "First or Business is not available on all flights".

aztimm

When I first started looking for award travel to Australia, I noticed this same thing. The AA website will, "price," the trip as F or biz, even if only 1 leg is in that class...and it doesn't need to be the over-water leg. You may see similar results if you do searches for LAX-CNS, with a SYD-CNS leg in QF F.

There's a thread that describes this in general; it isn't unique to award travel to Australia:
Phantom / false AA award availability with AA partners (master thd)

My suggestion would be to use Expert Flyer to search. Set up alerts for all of the over-water legs (such as LAX-SYD, LAX-MEL, SFO-SYD, etc.), as those will be the more difficult to find. When you find availability there, then come back to the AA site and try to replicate it. The AA site won't always show if there is availability. If that happens, then you can call.


Mod note: we may eventually merge this into the thread linked above, or into one focused on award travel to Australia.

enpremiere

And the sound of laughter coming from AA's management team as flyers sign up for the Barclay/Citi cards anticipating that they can redeem miles towards travel with meaningful connections and routings.

Sigh...

enviroian

pkerr

EXACTLY. After further investigation that's what it was.
Thanks all for looking into this. Operator error.

aztimm

Yes you can redeem AA miles for travel on QF in coach, biz, and first.
Sometimes AA.com will allow online booking, but not always. If you find availability on Expert Flyer and it doesn't show on AA.com, then call.

There's plenty of info on this subject in this thread:
AA miles awards: using / redeeming AA miles on Qantas (QF) & related (consolidated)

mvoight

Did you check connections from STL as your profile says that is your home airport?

CALlegacy

You might investigate using HA through HNL or even some routing on FJ. I guess those things are in the references mentioned. US-SYD in J is known as one of the most difficult bookings out there but not necessarily impossible with creativity and flexibility. Phantom availability in J is possibly a deliberate cruel joke but more likely just stupid functionality of the search engine and pretty well known. On the other hand MilesSAAver is readily available in Y if you can stand it. More interesting might be when Premium Economy becomes bookable as an award.

deeruck

Yes you can. But it isn't easy to use aa.com to search for dates with availability, due to the logic that the OP found. If you see Saver availability, it likely means that the system has found a way to route
you on in domestic J for a segment.