New AA Award Chart with Dynamic Pricing
Apr 5, 23, 1:20 pm
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Nov 2002
Programs: MTD pass holder
Posts: 1,141
New AA Award Chart with Dynamic Pricing
Did the redemption rates for Business Awards to Europe just double? I have been watching several routes to Europe in bus and first for several months and while some days were very expensive now all days appear to be at the max. Did my AA miles just suffer a big devaluation? Is this the new normal with AA?
Apr 5, 23, 3:07 pm
#2
Join Date: Oct 2008
Location: New York, NY
Programs: SPG Plat. AA Plat. UA Gold
Posts: 233
New AA Award Chart with Dynamic Pricing
CNBC is reporting that the new dynamic chart will go live today and it appears to be live on the AA site.
Important Note: The partner award chart seems to be unchanged for now, but the new "starting at" prices could be indicative of where that's going as the disparity compared with AA metal is now quite large.
Unclear how they would price an award with a mix of AA and partner metal for those of us (i.e. the majority) not living by an AA hub.
Also unclear how this impacts using partner miles to redeem on AA metal. At minimum, using the AA site to check availability for booking this way becomes a challenge.
International Biz/First seem to have some brutal changes, with the "starting at" prices being higher than previous saver levels.
Example Starting At Pricing in Biz/First
In addition, multiple long haul flights in a one-way journey will now seem to price by segment as well. They also seem to not allowing changes, just cancel + redeposit.
New AA Award Chart
Links
Important Note: The partner award chart seems to be unchanged for now, but the new "starting at" prices could be indicative of where that's going as the disparity compared with AA metal is now quite large.
Unclear how they would price an award with a mix of AA and partner metal for those of us (i.e. the majority) not living by an AA hub.
Also unclear how this impacts using partner miles to redeem on AA metal. At minimum, using the AA site to check availability for booking this way becomes a challenge.
International Biz/First seem to have some brutal changes, with the "starting at" prices being higher than previous saver levels.
Example Starting At Pricing in Biz/First
- Europe - Starting at 75K in Business, used to be 57.5K
- Deep South America - Starting at 90K, used to be 57.5K
- Asia, Middle East, Pacific - Starting at 95.K, used to be 60-80K
Two flight awards are needed if your one-way trip includes two long haul international flights
Keep in mind, flight awards don’t allow changes, but you can cancel and reinstate your miles at no charge.
New AA Award Chart
Links
Last edited by islandguy84; Apr 5, 23 at 4:52 pm Reason: added note about segments pricing individually
Apr 5, 23, 3:17 pm
#5
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Join Date: Jan 2002
Posts: 43,979
An notable change to award rules listed on that page in that changes are no longer allowed. Need to make a change and you now do need to cancel and rebook afresh - so all awards on AA now have the old web special restriction
Originally Posted by AA
Keep in mind, flight awards don’t allow changes, but you can cancel and reinstate your miles at no charge. Flight awards have no blackout dates and are available on all American Airlines marketed and operated flights.
Apr 5, 23, 3:21 pm
#6
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Wow. After all that talk about providing award charts that are supposedly more useful in terms of setting expectations, they phoned it in by publishing what is essentially the new (stealthily devalued) Saver price, slapped a giant YMMV asterisk on it to say you’ll never actually get those prices, and called it a day.
Apr 5, 23, 3:29 pm
#9
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: Washington,DC
Posts: 1,796
Did the redemption rates for Business Awards to Europe just double? I have been watching several routes to Europe in bus and first for several months and while some days were very expensive now all days appear to be at the max. Did my AA miles just suffer a big devaluation? Is this the new normal with AA?
New AA Award Chart with Dynamic Pricing
Apr 5, 23, 3:44 pm
#11
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What is means per my conversation with AAdvantage leadership is that every AA metal award is priced to/from North America. They no longer maintain separate pricing such as 'Europe to Asia via North America'.
Apr 5, 23, 3:46 pm
#12
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Generally speaking today's change means that the milesAAver and AAnytime award types go away, and web special is renamed Flight Award. That's it (for now). There's no change to the pricing algorithm as part of this change, though I expect less pricing transparency in the future.
Apr 5, 23, 4:08 pm
#14
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One thing not noted anywhere other than my coverage of the topic (https://viewfromthewing.com/american...-need-to-know/) as far a I am aware is that Executive Platinum expanded award availability has been eliminated with this change. That was tied to saver. And AA hasn't followed, say, UA's lead in making better dynamic award pricing available to elites.
Apr 5, 23, 4:10 pm
#15
Join Date: Oct 2008
Location: New York, NY
Programs: SPG Plat. AA Plat. UA Gold
Posts: 233
Generally speaking today's change means that the milesAAver and AAnytime award types go away, and web special is renamed Flight Award. That's it (for now). There's no change to the pricing algorithm as part of this change, though I expect less pricing transparency in the future.
In addition, web specials sometimes priced lower than saver awards as well! That was how web specials started in the first place.
This places a floor on awards that’s higher than saver (and web specials).
Even if they (for now) price some things below these new “starting at” rates, this reeks of a phased devaluation.
Just like Alaska did earlier this year, change the published chart, then change the prices a few months later using the new chart as justification for no notice.
Last edited by islandguy84; Apr 5, 23 at 4:24 pm
