I made an award reservation for December 2003 which was put on hold until today. I was short 6,000 points and (gasp!) purchased them but they won't be posted for a few days. The agent advised that she could not extend the reservation and if the reservation expired, the seats would not be placed back into the award inventory. The supervisor extended the reservation and confirmed that the seats could not be guaranteed as available if the reservation was canceled.
Does this make sense?

It may not make sense, but I know from experience that it is true, at least with CO.

I don't think it's "[i]would[i] not be placed back into inventory," but may not.

This can happen for a couple of reasons:

- The flight is selling more briskly than was originally forcast.

- There's somebody on the waiting list for the seat (if your airline has waiting lists for this type of award). If so, the seat may indeed be released back into inventory, but it would be immediately allocated to the next person on the waiting list, so it would never appear to have been returned to inventory by an outside party looking in.

you should have asked if the miles you were buying would post immediately or not. If you did ask--or if the agent alluded to this being the case and then it was NOT, then you shoudl write them and ask for help. You may not get far, but maybe if that is the case, they can refund the miles purchase to you. They should if that is the case.

I guess you did this on AA? I could be wrong but they are the only ones who I know of who will let you make a res when short of award level. If it is AA, they have been able to extend reservations for longer periods in my experience, but when they do fall out, then yes, they do not go back into AWARD inventory. Though this stinks, I think one reason is because they can re-adjust the number of alotted free seats if new people wish to buy tickets. they would rather sell them than give them away.

I dont like it either.

As for the fact that AA has been known to extend and re-extend award reservations, it happened to me when I had set up 4 Hawaii awards using 35k miles each, and one award that required 25K plus money. This award exsited for a short while and so I took it because I had a voucher with that airline. I had been instructed to send it in with a coupon that would deduct the 25k, and also my credit card info to deduct any remaining money due. So the 5th person traveling to Hawaii would be using 25k+money+ voucher and the other 4 were just using my miles.

Since the airline had not yet received the mailing when the reservation was about to expire for all 5 seats, they were able to extend it for me twice... for a total of about 70 days!!! It was good, but that was in the winter of 2001/02... Long ago, if you are considering changes in the airline industry (or the price of gas!)

Good luck! YOu now at least have enough for the NEXT trip.

But isn't it ironic. When the airlines (AA inparticular) changed the hold period to 14 days and did allow for extentions unless you could book it on that date, the claim was to free up awards for other people rather than have someone hold an award indefinitely. So, if you cancellation does not move it to inventory, is it because someone else got it (my undertanding is that there are no waiting lists), or is there one award seat.

------------------
Ms.DtG

On UAL my friend was trying to book an award
seat F class iad-hnl. a single seat opened up so i reserved it.

i told him about it and i cancelled mine and he booked it almost simultaneously. so in this case id say when i cancelled my award ticket on UAL it indeed went back to inventory.

misread what you wrote

[This message has been edited by dgordon (edited 03-11-2003).]

I have found most supervisors at AA to be very accomodating. Ask to speak to supervisor and tell them that you're purchasing the extra miles and that they should be in your account in 2-3 days. The vast majority at AA will extend your reservation for this short time. After all, they need the money.

Thanks everyone for the replies. As it turns out, I got an extension to the 17th. The supervisor N.M. was very helpful--actually he just gave in because he didn't feel like arguing.
I guess the flip side would be true, i.e., if seats aren't selling as briskly as anticipated, they get released for awards.