cmtlatitudes

Last week I placed a HNL-PPT Business Saver award on a five 5 day hold. A few hours before the hold was supposed to expire (based on the local time zone of the origin flight and the email I received from AA stating the must purchase deadline), I checked the Purchase link and found that the itinerary had been canceled. I assumed at the time this was some sort of a disconnect on the time zones and waiting until a few hours before the midnight local time. Fortuitously this actually worked better, (or so I thought), as the trip planning logistics weren't playing out well with the date, the award was still available, and additional research time would be helpful anyway. So I put the same flight on hold for another 5 days again, with a mental note to make a decision sooner than a few hours before the midnight local time deadline this time (midnight 5/30 HST time). I've been working it and am much closer on getting acceptable trip planning logistics in place, although still don't have it all pulled together but expected to with a couple days remaining to work out the kinks for a go or no-go. For no particular reason I went in to check the Purchase Link this morning, about 630am EDT. Bizarrely, for the second time, my Award Hold is cancelled. This time two full days before the Hold was supposed to expire. (Well, AT LEAST two full days before the hold was to expire, because I don't know when or why the Award was actually cancelled. It could have been cancelled an hour after I put it on Hold, for all I know.)

So now I'm thinking my assumption about the time zone disconnect on the award hold the first time, was in fact not what was going on, and it's actually something else. Any ides what this might be?

All I could think was the award hold has been cancelled by Hawaiian Airlines because it's a System mistake and the award does not actually exist? The cancellations twice with no communications before the Hold expires are frustrating. That will certainly be aggravating from the time spent over the past week researching and planning, but at least the French Polynesia knowledge gained is useful for future efforts. My concern is more understanding what this most likely means when it happens twice like this?

and more crazy -- I just checked again, and the award is still showing available to select in AA's system, same flight, same date, etc! I put on hold again, (third time a charm?), but now am wondering what the heck is going on, if the award is actually even real/available, or some internal cutoff point less than 5 days that isn't identified by AA for this route? (Does that happen???) Date is mid September 2019, so 3-4 months out. If makes any difference on timing.

I haven't tried to purchase, because the planning logistics are complicated & high $$, the flight times not great, lots of compromises on preferred accommodations with the date available -- all in all I'm still not completely sold the 65K miles is a good investment with everything factored together. So $150 to redeposit is not a huge loss in terms of the overall trip cost and to have more time if it comes down to it. I just don't like having to do that without understanding what is happening. Checking here before spending the 1-2 hours on Hold with AA. :-)

aaupgrade

While holding AA awards for 5 days works just fine, anecdotal evidence documented in posts here on FT indicated that holding partner awards can be problematic depending on the partner. Especially waiting until the full 5 days minus a couple hours. FWIW, it's probably actually HA canceling the hold, not AA. When making partner awards, which is where I usually book award travel, I always do my research and planning and book and purchase it immediately or if I need to put it on hold to secure other aspects of my travel, do that ASAP and usually purchase within 24 hours at the most.

Having put this on hold a couple times I would guess you are already over the 5 day expiration from your first booking, so go book and pay for it if it is still available.