sdsearch

But if it does ticket, and you didn't actually need it, then aren't you out the cancellation fee? Or are you allowed to cancel an award booking fee-free within 24 hours of actual ticketing (no matter when that is relative to your actual booking time)?

Because if you have to pay a cancellation fee, that sounds like an expensive way to test whether you're not locked.

Plus, if you do this multiple times, because you're trying to see if you're locked now even though you weren't locked before, might you get locked just for having made and cancelled way too many award reservations in a short time?

cheaptom

I think the point is that you can waste the miles in exchange for running this experiment. If you have a million miles, then risking 12.5K miles to try this might be worth it to some people, for example.

flyer4512

Since I doubt this thread will ever be about DP's I may as well add on.................there are many 5K saver awards a person can book to do a test, you can travel today ( 1/14 ) Minneapolis (MSP) to Key West (EYW) for 5k miles one way.........one stop and nice flight times also. Why these are so cheap I have no idea.

If a person doesn't have any flights planned I have no idea why they would waste miles ( and possibly draw attention) to their account.

MSPeconomist

In this case one could actually take the "free" trip to Key West and escape from cold snowy weather, even if only for a few hours.

SeeBuyFly

Read the wiki in this thread. There is a cheaper way (1000 miles).
.

flyer4512

5k Miles or $599..............talk about $$ value per mile, lol

Richard Berg

Got the shutdown email & cancelled tix. Based on other DPs, I don't think it's coincidental they did this 1wk before my scheduled return flight from abroad. /me waves to AAnalysts reading this thread

Naturally, they did not spell out what constitutes an "exploitative practice". Hope we find out in discovery. Until then, I hope nobody is planning a mileage run or pudding purchase on AA, as Blake Patton clearly does not give a .... about honoring promotional T&C.

flyer4512

Was the flight they cancelled the return leg of your trip that was on the same record locator as the outbound flight ?

If so how long after the outbound was your flight cancelled ? Thanks

Often1

More importantly, was the return on the same ticket?

E.g., were you left stranded on a single ticket?

flyer4512

Pretty sure that's what I asked although I do book mostly one ways that have different record locators. I guess I just assumed a R/T had the same record locator.

I was wondering if AA has alerts set up if anyone on a locked account flies and the outbound flight notified AA, it just seems like too much of a coincidence people are getting flights cancelled mid trip.

Vballgirl

Hello All. I've been reading and waiting so as to not upset the AA gods...here's my DP

• 5 SUBs total in last 2 years over 6 cards (see below)
  • 2 personal Citi and 1 biz Citi card using physical mailers addressed to my husband (obtained in 2018)
  • 1 personal Citi using an emailer sent to my husband and 1 personal Citi using an emailer sent to an additional AA account created 1 month prior to application. (Obtained 2019)
  • 1 personal Citi using an emailer sent to my husband (Received card in early Dec, and decided to NOT meet the spend and avoid a 6th SUB from showing up.
    • All mailers and emailers were to accounts at same address. Started creating AA accounts when the physical mailers stopped and noticed that they only emailed offers about 1 month after account creation, so overall I created 7 additional accounts (yes, some were pets, but our pets have human names)
  • All apps were done in my name, with my SS# (or EIN for my Business).
• Intl Award Travel just completed successfully on 2 PNRs. Tickets were "purchased" using a combination of the SUB miles and Bonvoy miles transferred in

When this whole situation started, I was really freaked out as this was a big Anniversary trip for my DH and I. He doesn't really like that I play the Churning game, so if our flights had been canceled and I had to explain all this to him, he probably would've gone over the deep end. As backup, I did schedule a couple SW flights, that I only canceled once the plane was rolling down the runway!

Despite my 5 SUBs and 6 cards, I don't think I was ever locked. I would call the AAdvantage 800# weekly, and each time it would match my name and account and start in with the prompts. There was a scare in early Jan, when I tried loading the phone app, and it said my account had 9000 miles in it (I had just over 200K), but it must have been a glitch as the next day it was back to normal. I never had enough guts to try the hotel booking as I felt that might raise a red flag somewhere and start an inquiry into my accounts. I have a couple theories as to why I wasn't locked - Theory 1 - The cutoff for counting SUBs over the past 2 years was perhaps just before I received my last 2 SUBs, therefore it only looked like I had 3 total, instead of 5. The timing appears to be right as the hammer came down in Dec (or maybe earlier) and I'm guessing they needed a few weeks to check with legal and get their ducks in a row before the slaughter began. Theory 2 - I didn't use the gmail trick for my extra accounts. I have access to a couple domain names and was able to use those for my email addresses, perhaps making them look more legit. ?? Again, just a couple theories.

radonc1

(my emphasis on the pets !)
Since this is your first post, please let us know if your status changes.
I would think from the DPs posted in the other thread that you would be a prime candidate for the chopping block. Your information seems to conform to those who have been beheaded.
With that being said, there are those who seem to avoid getting shut down. Good for you

flyer4512

The only way to know for sure that you are unlocked is to redeem miles.

Since you are over the 3 SUB threshold I would burn those miles ASAP as I doubt AA is done locking accounts.

Vballgirl

My thoughts exactly, and if I do get chopped, I’m OK with it. I’ve gotten some great awards over the past few years. I’ll be sad to lose some benefits like boarding group and checked bag, but oh well.

As my theory said I think I’m safe due to timing, but that doesn’t mean AA doesn’t run another query and sweep up those missed in the first few waves.

flyer4512

If you are ok with losing them then why not redeem 100,000 miles for gift cards..................if you survive you still have 100K left and if not at least you picked up about $400 in gift cards

Since Citi/AA let the emailer game go on pas the initial sweep we can more /less guarantee ( given the way they have handled this) they are going to go back and check the remaining accounts.