chinafish

Hi all,

Sorry this is a bit of a long story.

This is my itinerary:
Etihad miles on AA metal:
AA47 LHR ORD 13/08 First
AA46 ORD LHR 20/08 Business

Avios on AA metal:
AA3158 ORD RIC 13/08 Economy
AA3588 RIC ORD 20/08 Economy

I found out over the weekend that AA has changed equipment and AA47 will no longer have a First class cabin (from old style 777 to refitted 763)

I'm figuring out what my options are at the moment. Obviously I booked for First class so I wanted to travel in a cabin that I booked for. I suppose I could either do nothing and accept the downgauge, or I thought I might try and get my flight changed to AA87 on the same day, which is currently scheduled on a 77W.

If this is successful, this will impact on my Avios booked domestic flight, as AA87 arrives ORD after AA3158 departs.

What are my options here? I'm conscious that today is the last day this flight is priced at 4500 Avios. I called BA to ask what are the change fees on this ticket, and the agent said I need to call AA? Surely this is not right as it is BA who issued the ticket?

Before the change I suppose my "change fee" would be to cancel and rebook which would cost me something like £7.60 in taxes. Doing the same after tomorrow would be the same in taxes but with an additional 3000 Avios?

Any thoughts, advice, greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Fish

highpeaklad

Ideally you need to sort out the AA flight first so you know where you stand with the connection.
With time short why don't you keep your existing ORD-RIC flight and book a seat on the new connection ORD-RIC with 4500 Avios then once you've sorted out which flight you need cancel the other one for £7.60 in taxes.

chinafish

Ah-ha! Why didn't I think of that!

What are the implications on my RIC - ORD leg? Would I be able to cancel the original ORD - RIC and keep the existing RIC - ORD? They would effectively then be on different PNR?

highpeaklad

That, I don't know.

chinafish

Would be grateful if someone could clarify, I booked the domestic flights using Avios on AA flights, through the BA site. I thought any changes should be handled by BA? The agent said I need to contact AA. Is the agent right or wrong?

corporate-wage-slave

I think the misunderstanding relates to the other LHR services (if - for example - you used that to explain why you wanted the RIC services altered). But being unrelated booking, the RIC sectors are actually fully under BAEC's control for any changes - and anything connected with the ORD-LHR-ORD is irrelevant. So if you change the RIC services that's purely BA, on the basis of that trip standing alone, and AA can't touch the reservation. So by all means ring BA again, just don't mention the LHR services since it's nothing to do with this.

chinafish

Got off the phone with BA again.
Looks like what's caused the confusion is that turns out my ticket has been marked on their system as a cash discount booking using Avios rather than an Avios booking. (Bit miffed about that...!)

So the first agent that I called thought I paid cash with AA despite me confirming that I booked on Avios on BA site, and fobbed me off to AA.

So I have options.
- Cancel and rebook today and pay the taxes £7.60.
- Cancel and rebook tomorrow after the rate change and pay the taxes + extra 3000 Avios
- Change booking tomorrow after the rate change and pay £35 change fee.

Decisions, decisions....

chinafish

I found availability in later flights on both the outbound and the inbound using Avios, so have ended up booking new flights.

And once I pressed the button I realised I should have booked separate singles instead of a return to allow myself more flexibility.

Now I'm stuck with 2 return tickets. Beating myself up now for the stupid mistake.