I had been waiting to cancel and about 16 hours before departure my final segment was canceled. This allowed me to get a full refund.

Interesting to see that AA is now offering a 20% premium for callers who ask for a refund in order to entice a credit. That may or may not be a good deal depending on a whole host of factors. But, what is a bad deal is taking a credit at par when you could have a refund,

It would be even better if it causes you to not have to pay the federal excise tax on at least that 20 percent

Mid January I had another cancellation on my USA-HKG-USA CX award RT that AA ticketed.

I called AA and got my miles reposted immediately and my CC showed the full refund of taxes and fees refunded in 3 or 4 days. First rate service by AA agent!

I would have been open to taking a 120% credit vs. a refund, but when I tried to cancel my flights before AA officially canned them, they would only offer a credit, but no extension of the ticket validity, which for me would have expired in June.

Although one winds up paying the excise tax when one buys the new ticket. Original ticket for $500 includes excise tax. It is cancelled and issued as a credit for $600. One then goes and purchases a $600 ticket which includes the excise tax on the new ticket.

I took the sure thing this morning (refund). Not sure I want to be a creditor in the off chance AA goes chapter 11.

I have a kind of crazy situation. I'm scheduled to fly to Tokyo this Friday on JAL operated and ticketed by AA. Then after the weekend stopover I have a flight to KL (same JAL/AA deal). Neither flight is canceled but Malaysia is on full lockdown for non-residents so they wouldn't let me in anyway. Secondly Japan just established a 14 days self-isolation for anyone from US. So I would get locked up in Tokyo for two weeks and unable to get on that KL flight.
On top of all that I somehow managed to give myself a heart attack last Tuesday. Now I have that to deal with and traveling to KL is indefinitely postponed. AA is offering credit/voucher that would need to be used before the end of the year. My travel insurance says: "don't bother" - you may let them know that you won't be on the flight but deal with us from now on; you have a legit reason for canceling this trip and your ticket should be fully refunded once we process the paperwork.
So here's the question: should I just listen to the insurance ppl or cancel my trip anyway right before the flight? I don't want to mess up anything but since the insurance claim is processing and won't resolve before Friday, I'm nervous. What if someone higher up at Allianz tells me later: "our policy is for clients to cancel first, and then contact us".

EDIT: Since I don't really trust insurance companies, I did call AA after all. My original ticket had a partial refund built in (75% back) so I asked for that. While agents were able to see that I was entitled to that refund their computer systems couldn't process it. So I filled out the form on: prefunds.aa.com but that came up as "non-refundable". I sent the form anyway, including the explanation about the original fare. AA sent an email a few days later informing me about posting a FULL refund. It was posted back to my CC almost immediately after I contacted them. I have no clue why I got every penny back... was it the insurance company work? Did AA take into account a few private messages I sent on Twitter (I told them about heart attack and asked how to proceed, they only offered a voucher). I may never know.

Chapter 11 is for reorganization while continuing operations. Even if that does happen, AA would get DIP financing (likely from the Government and/or major leaseholders) and continue operating normally for passengers. Many of us lived through the US (2x), HP, NW, DL, UA and AA bankruptcies and I don't think any passengers lost any tickets or credits in any of them, unless I'm mistaken.

Is anyone actually GETTING their refunds? Mine has been 'pending review' for over a week.

And all miles stayed intact. Unlike Ansett Australia.

I submitted my refund requests online on Sunday afternoon. Three tickets for about $2,700 each. I checked the statuses last evening and all three said the Refund Date was Sunday and the refund was "Issued to MasterCard ending in xxxx." The credit is not yet visible in the account but there is normally a delay of a couple of days for that even in normal times.

You can add PA, TW, and CO to the list. The first two no longer operate but the miles were assumed by DL and AA respectively.

I gather neither AA nor JAL has cancelled your flights. If AA is offering credit which is good until the end of the year, I�d probably go that route. I�m not sure I would trust an insurance company making promises on a phone call.

Yes. I went to pay my AA Barclaycard and saw the refunds even before AA officially notified me. Three days after request was made.