GallyChef

I'm looking at booking an international business class flight on AA metal for sometime in 2020. Saaver availability is next to nil to EZE, but there's loads of various dynamically priced availability, as low as ~80k mi o/w.

Here's the question(s): what classes do these various awards book to? And how does that affect date changes down the line? i.e. if one were to book a ticket at 80k mi, but do a date change to an otherwise higher-priced date, would the system/aagent charge me the additional miles? Seems unlikely... So how DOES this sort of thing work, vis. date changes down the line?

Thanks!

TravelerMSY

From what I’ve seen, The dynamic stuff books into revenue codes. Y/J/I/F. There are fare basis codes and designators that happen behind the scenes though. They can tell what you paid even if they’re in the same booking class. Same as for revenue. There are many more fares than there are booking codes.

I also assume changes for web specials is really cancel/replace for voluntary changes, with add collect refund of miles for the difference, It would pretty stupid if they let you buy a 5k web saver in Y class and let you change to a 50k anytime ticket just because they both happen to book into Y space.

We could probably figure all this out if we had access to the underlying ticket data. Hard to do now that they got rid of that feature on prefunds.

Herb687

Ask an airport agent to print a receipt? Wouldn't receipts printed by ATO/gate agents still show fare basis code and ticket designator?

GallyChef

I suppose I was hoping someone out there had some experience with this, though I suppose it's a newer issue, and has been muted by less travel due to covid...

I agree about web specials: they indeed would need to be cancelled and rebooked. Are all the dynamic style awards web specials, then? Before dynamic pricing there were 2: MilesAAver/planahead, and Anytime (and at some point I remember web specials popping up at pricing similar to milesaaver: inexpensive). Date changes allowed on both the former, but not on web specials. Even today, there appears to still be milesaaver award availability, at least by glancing at the award calendars for selected routes.

An answer may be hard to come by on this forum (it involves a crystal ball to some extent), but my wonder lies in how difficult it is to change dates on milesaaver awards these days. Case in point: I'm looking at travelling to Asia for fun. Last year we booked tickets for spring 2021. Where they're web specials I'm going ahead and booking alternate dates in the fall as a "plan B". Where they're milesaaver awards, will I have trouble kicking them down the road, or should I be looking to book alternate dates?

TravelerMSY

I don’t think there’s any ambiguity on this. Expect to pay the mile difference when (voluntary) changing, unless you’re on the old awards that book into T/U/Z. You might get a pass when changing an active ticket due to Covid, but there’s no way to know until you try. Book something and try to change it a day, if you really need an answer. Or just call an agent and ask There are a few insiders here that could probably look up the rules internally.

They never explicitly said you could change them (web specials) for free without respect to inventory. Just cancel/redeposit/rebook.

I do believe the web specials replaced the old Anytime awards.

You can definitely still change the old milesaver awards at will, assuming the inventory is there. It’s not hard now, but during normal times it’s really sparse, so I’d try to grab what you actually want to fly now. Especially if it’s a partner and hard to get. You’re almost always better off with an active ticket than just having the miles in your account, since you get changes without respect to inventory availability after schedule changes, And a year from now, all these policies may be different.

javabytes

Ever since the change fees were eliminated, it appears AA no longer offers you the choice on which fare to select. If the web special is cheapest for your chosen flight/cabin, then you get the web special. If the Saver/AAnytime is cheaper, then you get that. If you click the Details for a given flight you can still see the fare classes they book into, but once you click on the price there is no more prompt to select either the web special or the standard award. You just end up with whatever is cheapest.

It used to be the case that the cheaper web specials booked into the award fare classes (like T/U), while more expensive web specials booked into the revenue fare classes (like Y/J). Usually it was highly correlated to the published award prices... if the web special was cheaper than the Saver price it booked into the award classes, if higher then it used the revenue fare classes. That doesn't seem to be the case anymore, even the cheap web specials seem to book into the revenue fare classes now.

I'm still not aware that you can change a web special award, my understanding is it still requires a cancel/redeposit/rebook. But even if changes were allowed, you would most certainly pay the difference in miles even if the booking class remained the same.

GallyChef

For the record, there seems to be no ambiguity, and any statement otherwise on my part was unintentional: web specials rules do not allow for changes. Only refund/rebook.

Still, one more question from me if anybody knows: does something like a changeable award ticket (i.e. milesaaver) have any real expiration once originally ticketed? Read: if I book for travel in 1 month, but then change the ticket to a date further out, in theory could one keep pushing the date further out? Or would there be a hard limit, such as 1 year from the date originally ticketed?

Many thanks!

TravelerMSY

Any ticket on AA has validity of one year from the date of issue. After that you would need to cancel/redeposit/rebook if it’s an award. If the space is rare, an experienced agent may be able to do this all on a single call. The reserved space is a separate thing from the ticket.

GallyChef

Confirmed with aagent that milesaaver books into U, while web specials (both more and less expensive) book into J. Interestingly, the unrestricted "Business Award" for 350k miles o/w books into J as well.

Another point to note, that as of 2021, award redemptions must be completed w/in 1 year of original ticketing date. Since I booked last week for 4Q21 travel, I would not be able to kick this down to 2Q22 (unless AA makes an exception).

BostonRU

If a web special books into Y/J fare class, and if after booking it you change the frequent flyer program to a partner airline, would you end up earning miles on the trip?

JJeffrey

No, otherwise everyone would be doing that.

AAExecPlatFlier

all saver space books into Z, U, T

all dynamic, the web specials, and anytime book into F, J, W, Y

if you change your dates you are subject wo whatever the miles requirements are for that new flight/itinerary. Just like a revenue ticket, you make a change u are subject to any fare (in this case miles), taxes, fee difference.

TravelerMSY

Just like with the old Anytime award space booking into Y, theres a flag behind the scenes that inhibits mileage accrual, but it sometimes gets broken during rebooking for irregular ops. They do also sweep advantage accounts looking for it and reverse it. Certainly nothing you can count on.