ARCHIVE: AA Award on JL / JAL / Japan Airlines (master thd)
 

I am planning my next trip going to Asia and would like to take JAL using AAdvantages miles.

I have signed up the JAL JMB program and was able to see the availability for some transpacific flights, and that seems to be the only way that I can check JAL's availability as it is not searchable in AA.com and currently JAL availability are not view-able in ba.com

I am wondering if as long as JAL shows there is availability then it should be available for redemption for all other OneWorld airlines, of course, including AA/BA..

Hope some experts here can answer!

Thanks:)

I'm not sure about searching on JAL's site, but chances are availability on that site won't match up with what is available to you using AA miles. You say that JAL availability isn't viewable using ba.com, why is that? I used ba.com to check availability for my flight on JAL in August and it worked just fine.

"Due to some system work taking place on BA.com, it is currently not possible to book partner reward flights on Japan Airlines" <-This is shown in BA.com "spending avios" page..

I guess this could be related to the JBV they just signed. Is it vital that you book the trip right now? You could just wait until availability is viewable on ba.com again. I haven't used their tool to look up availability, but I think the award search tool at Qantas is supposed to work well, but I hear it shows phantom availability for some airlines (but I don't think JAL is one of them). I haven't used it before though, so I don't really know for sure.

I often redeem awards on JAL and although I can't say that is 100% the case, everytime I have seen award availability on JAL's site, AA has been able to see it as well. I have an award ticket to BKK on JAL in J, however, only Y was available NRT-BKK. Two weeks or so ago, J opened up on my flight per JAL's website, and AA was able to move me up.

Yes, per oneworld agreement, inventory available to general members of one's program will be available to members in all other alliance members' programs.

Is this really the case? Because I just searched on JAL's website for SFO-HND Dec 23-30 and it showed availability in business as wide open (not just on the specific dates but for pretty much every day in that period), but there's nothing even close to showing up on either BA's or Qantas's site.

I've also heard that CX release more award inventory to their own members than they do for partners.

A few things to considered:

- If the flight shows as available for "waitlist" then it can only be waitlisted using JAL miles, and not redeemed with other programs.

- The QF site has never supported searching for JAL awards, so you would not see any JAL award flights. The BA site normally does, but for the past few weeks had issue which has only been recently resolved. During that time, you wouldn't had been able to see JAL awards.

- At this point, to book available JAL awards, unless you are a member of BA or JL, you will have to call your airline and have a phone agent book it for you.

- It is true that availability at the CX Asia miles site can sometimes be not available to other partner airlines. This is one of the few exceptions.

It also looks like JL only releases to partners a maximum of 4 award seats in coach per flight. I am wondering if there is a way around this apparent 4 seat per flight limitation. (I haven't searched business availability as much, but it seems to be capped at 2 seats per flight available for partners).

If you search award availability on jal.com, you'll see up to 9 seats available per flight, but I've only seen up to 4 seats available for the same flights on ba.com. I recently called AAdvantage to check availability of coach seats on a JL flight with 9 seats available on jal.com (before ba.com JL searching functionality had returned) and the agent confirmed that only 4 seats were available, and also said that 4 seats are the most she has ever seen available on a JL flight.

As a work-around to this 4-seat per flight limitation, the AAgent suggested placing 4 tickets on hold and seeing if JL will release more. It wasn't clear if she had seen this strategy work reliably in practice or if it was just an idea that had just come to her.

I have noticed that when 4 or fewer seats are available on jal.com for a particular flight, the number reported by ba.com matches that reported by jal.com. I'm hoping this suggests that JL does not have two "buckets" of award seats (one bucket for partners and a separate bucket on for JAL members), but just simply allows JAL members to reserve a greater number of seats at a time. My untested theory is that if one were to ticket or place on hold 4 coach seats on a JL flight using AA miles, the remainder of the award seats viewable on jal.com (capped at 4 at a time) would eventually also be released to partners as being available.

I didn't try the agent's strategy yet since I'm not ready to book, but I'm wondering--does anyone have any experience in this regard? Namely, is it standard practice for JL to release another batch of 4 award seats to partners when the first batch of 4 has already been used up? (Assuming, of course, that another 4 seats is still available to JAL members). If so, how long does it take JAL to release additional seats?

figured i'd post my question here.

i have a flight booked on JAL using AA miles. how can i choose seats? I got my japan air record locator # and it pulls up on the JAL website, but it doesnt seem to want to let me choose seats.

Guessing i need to call in to select seats?

duplicate

AA can request seats on JAL. JAL can give you seats.
You can call either, but I would trust seat assignment more if they come from the airline you are actually flying on. I say this, because I have contacted other carriers for better seating, and my AA reservation still shows the old seating. And, yes, I do fly in the seats that are listed in the partner's system.

Just to follow up on my own idea here... Based on one new data point, it looks like my theory holds true. That is, JL makes available more than four award seats per flight to partners, but only reports the available seats four at a time.

I called up AA and had them put four seats on hold on JL flights (four seats being the number JL was reporting as being available). Within minutes, I checked on BA.com and saw four more seats available on the same flights. I called back AA and they were able to place on hold additional seats on the original flights. When I remarked that this was fast, the second AAgent said in her experience the additional seats released by JL after a hold are released immediately. Perhaps I could have avoided the second phone call if I had just waited a few seconds with the first AAgent. Unfortunately, we're split into two PNRs, but the AAgent said this was unavoidable given that JL only releases four seats at a time.

i am about to change my HND-JFK award ticket for NRT-BOS-JFK, so i can travel a little bit later and also try the 787... is it that complicated to select seats in advance for the NRT-BOS leg on JAL?

Does anyone know if AA telephone agents will allow me to hold a JAL award seat for the standard five days while I wait for miles to hit my account? (In this case I plan on purchasing them).

Thanks.