I bought an award ticket for myself and got my free MCE seat as an EXP. Then yesterday I decided to take my minor son with me, so I bought him an award ticket on the same flights, and called in to the desk today to ask to combine the PNR so that he could sit in MCE as well, and be eligible for the upgrades. The agent moved him to a seat on the same row. However, I cannot see his seat from my record or even from my account at all. Is it not possible to combine PNR�s under the same record locator? Do I need to cancel both our awards and buy two new award tickets together on that flight in order to make sure we are seated or upgraded together?

Combining PNR's like that has never been possible.

If you want both of you to be on the same PNR then the only way that's possible is to cancel both of your current reservations and rebook a new one for 2 pax.

But if you called AA then there's really nothing to worry about, just pull up his PNR to manage his reservation or change his seat. You can always just call AA again to double check that he's on the upgrade list with you.

You can also ask they enter the upgrade request as "do not split" which will guarantee you don't get an auto-processed upgrade for only 1 person. I believe this works also on separate PNRs but others can confirm.

I don't think there's any benefit to being on the same PNR except maybe auto irrops handling.

TCP "To complete party" are the words you need ask AA phone agents
Thread-->FAQ: TCP, "Linking" / link / merge itineraries / PNR (master thread)

If you cancel both awards no guarantee will be able to get a new award for 2 pax at the same cost.
If you go that way, better to book award for 2 pax and when e-tickets received cancel the other 2 awards

As mentioned, you cannot combine PNRs. You may split, but once split, they cannot be recombined.

I have booked a paid ticket for myself and award for family. You can call to assign them a MCE seat if you have access by status.

Very useful to know that "To Complete Party" is the magic phrase to link the PNRs. In one case I called once to assign the family MCE, but it was a one-time thing. When I accessed their PNRs, other MCE seats showed as selectable for a fee. But then a schedule change caused automatic rebooking of one segment, and I and the family were rebooked onto different flights. It took a long call to sort that out, but the agent must have done the TCP because she told me that from there on, we'd be more likely rebooked together in case of another schedule change. And IIRC after this, MCE seats were showing as selectable without a fee for my non-status family.

You can see his (or anyone's) reservation from your account. You need name and confirmation number. Just search for the reservation while you are signed in and it will continue to show up in your trips until the flight is taken. You will also get all notifications as if you were the traveler.

But, as others have pointed out, they will always be separate reservations, which is no big deal. Just make sure that the agent adds him to the upgrade list as well a moving him to MCE. Under upgrades, you should see "requested", and when you expand it you should see "complimentary for xxx".

Good news. This morning, We both got upgraded, 100 hours out. I was able to go into each reservation and selects F seats next to each other.