Posts from me are going to be a bit lighter over the next week as I travel to the Maldives. As you may (or may not) know, I also have a points consulting service, whereby we help people redeem their airline miles. I have several colleagues working with me, and they’re some of the most knowledgeable and passionate people I know in this hobby. This post is from my friend Tiffany, whom you’ve heard from before.
Now that we’ve finally said goodbye to the Dividend Miles program (*cries*), there are many of us with an abundance of American AAdvantage miles. The programs are very different, and we’ve been getting a lot of questions as to how to get the best value for American miles, or even just how to redeem them.
Once you know the rules, it’s pretty easy to use American miles, so I thought I’d go through the main points of the program, at least on the redemption side.
Redeeming AAdvantage miles for travel on American and US Airways
If you’re traveling exclusively on American and US Airways, AAdvantage does offer increased availability for their “AAnytime awards,” which start at double the cost of “SAAver” awards.
AAnytime awards require a downright excessive number of miles, in my opinion, and don’t make sense unless you have a ton of miles and extremely limited flexibility.
So for the purposes of this discussion, we’re going to assume that you’re only interested in saver awards. As far as the other rules are concerned, AAnytime and SAAver awards are equivalent, but I thought this was a good distinction to clarify up front.
Redeeming AAdvantage miles on oneworld and other partner airlines
One of the main tricks to finding saver level award space is to leverage partners as much as possible. While US Airways has decent domestic award availability, American has been incredibly stingy the past few years. For international routes, both carriers are quite good about releasing unsold space to award inventory just prior to departure, but otherwise award availability is pretty depressing in premium cabins.
Fortunately, AAdvantage miles can be redeemed on all oneworld carriers, which gives you a good chunk of airlines to choose from:
airberlin
Finnair
TAM Airlines
Royal Jordanian
American Airlines
Iberia
Malaysia Airlines
S7 Airlines
British Airways
Japan Airlines (JAL)
Qantas
SriLankan Airlines
Cathay Pacific
LAN
Qatar Airways
US Airways
As well as the following partner carriers:
Air Tahiti Nui
Etihad Airways
Jet Airways
Alaska Airlines
Hawaiian Airlines
How to find AAdvantage award availability
While you can use your American miles for any of the above partners, not all these carriers show up on aa.com.
It’s also worth noting aa.com won’t show complicated routings. You’re allowed to make several connections in most cases, and can have very long layovers on international itineraries, but the website won’t display those options by default.
You can still redeem your miles for flights that don’t display on the website, you just need to search elsewhere, and then call reservations with your preferred flights.
My favorite places to search for award space on oneworld carriers are as follows, though many of these will also display on ExpertFlyer:
For flights on:
Search for space on:
airberlin
American*
British Airways
American Airlines
American
British Airways
British Airways
American
British Airways
Cathay Pacific
British Airways*
JAL
Qantas
Finnair
American
British Airways
Iberia
British Airways
ExpertFlyer
Japan Airlines (JAL)
British Airways
LAN
British Airways
TAM Airlines
British Airways
Malaysia Airlines
British Airways
Qantas
American
British Airways
Qatar Airways
British Airways
Royal Jordanian
American
British Airways
S7 Airlines
British Airways
SriLankan Airlines
British Airways
US Airways
American
British Airways
For non-oneworld partners it’s a bit trickier, and in many cases you’ll need to call:
For flights on:
Search for space on:
Air Tahiti Nui
ExpertFlyer
Alaska Airlines
American
ExpertFlyer
Saver space on Alaskaair.com
Etihad Airways
"Guest" space on Etihad.com
Hawaiian Airlines
Different availability for all partners.
Use partner site or call.
Jet Airways
Call reservations
Fortunately, AA agents are quite competent for the most part, so calling shouldn’t be too painful.
American has a zone-based award chart
Programs with a “zone-based” chart charge a given number of miles for awards between two regions. American defines their regions as follows:
AAdvantage Award Zone:
Countries Included:
North America
U.S. (including Hawaii and Alaska), Canada, Mexico, Bermuda, The Bahamas and the Caribbean
Central America or
South America Zone 1
Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Venezuela
South America Zone 2
Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile (excluding Easter Island), Paraguay, Uruguay
Europe
Albania, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovinia, Bulgaria, Canary Islands, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Greenland, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Yugoslavia
Indian Sub Continent /
Middle East
Afghanistan, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Maldives, Nepal, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, the United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan
Africa
Algeria, Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Melilla, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Republic of Congo, Reunion, Rwanda, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe
Asia Zone 1
Japan, Korea, Mongolia
Asia Zone 2
Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, China, Guam, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Saipan, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam
South Pacific
Australia, Easter Island, Fiji, French Polynesia, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Republic of Tonga, Republic of Vanuatu, American Samoa and Samoa
So if you’re wondering how many miles it will cost you to travel between Charlotte and Bangkok, just look at the chart for flights between the US and Thailand.
American Airlines and US Airways flight awards
oneworld and other airline partner flight awards
We get a surprising number of questions about this, but your domestic and short-haul flights are including in the mileage cost of a zone-based award (pending availability, of course).
There is one huge exception with AAdvantage though:
American generally doesn’t allow you to transit via a third region
This is honestly the most maddening and, in my opinion, stupid rule out there.
American already has rules about Maximum Permitted Mileage on award tickets, and AAdvantage requires the “significant” carrier in an itinerary to publish a fare in order for a routing to be valid.
The “no third region” rule grinds my gears because it seems to mainly be based on old relationships, and doesn’t take into account the current route network. So you can’t connect in Asia on the way to Australia, for example, even though every other legacy carrier would allow the routing.
Want to travel between the two oneworld hubs of Santiago and Hong Kong? You literally can’t on a single award.
There are, however, a few exceptions to the rule:
Traveling Between:
And:
Third-Region Connection Allowed In:
North America
Central America or
South America Zone 1
North America
South America Zone 2
North America
Europe
North America
Indian Sub Continent /
Middle East
Europe
North America
Africa
Europe
Doha*
North America
Asia Zone 1
North America
Asia Zone 2
Asia Zone 1
North America
South Pacific
Central America or
South America Zone 1
South America Zone 2
Central America or
South America Zone 1
Europe
Central America or
South America Zone 1
Indian Sub Continent /
Middle East
Europe
Central America or
South America Zone 1
Africa
Europe
Central America or
South America Zone 1
Asia Zone 1
Central America or
South America Zone 1
Asia Zone 2
Central America or
South America Zone 1
South Pacific
South America Zone 2
South America Zone 2
Europe
South America Zone 2
Indian Sub Continent /
Middle East
Europe
South America Zone 2
Africa
Europe
Doha*
South America Zone 2
Asia Zone 1
South America Zone 2
Asia Zone 2
South America Zone 2
South Pacific
Europe
Indian Sub Continent /
Middle East
Europe
Africa
Europe
Asia Zone 1
Asia Zone 2
Doha*
Europe
Asia Zone 2
Doha*
Europe
South Pacific
Asia Zone 1
Asia Zone 2
Indian Sub Continent /
Middle East
Asia Zone 1
Asia Zone 2
Indian Sub Continent /
Middle East
Asia Zone 2
Indian Sub Continent /
Middle East
South Pacific
Asia Zone 2
Africa
Asia Zone 1
Asia Zone 2
Doha*
Africa
Asia Zone 2
Doha*
Africa
South Pacific
Asia Zone 1
Asia Zone 2
Asia Zone 1
South Pacific
Asia Zone 2
Asia Zone 2
South Pacific
The “Doha” exception is specifically to flights on Qatar Airways, and you must both arrive and depart Doha on Qatar to take advantage of this rule. It’s also worth noting you can’t double dip — a routing from the US to Europe to Doha to South Africa won’t price as a single award.
Stopovers, open-jaws, and one-ways
For those of you accustomed to Dividend Miles, I have some bad news.
American no longer allows stopovers on award tickets. Period.
You can have connections of less than 24 hours on international itineraries, but that’s it.
However, you can have open-jaws to your heart’s content, given AAdvantage prices all awards as a series of one-ways. This should give you much more flexibility overall, though it is sad to lose the value of stopovers.
Holding AAdvantage award tickets
American will allow you to hold award tickets for five days, which is incredibly helpful if you’re transferring in points from SPG.
The exception (with AAdvantage there’s always an exception), is for travel involving Iberia or Malaysia Airlines. American still has a manual ticketing process that can result in awards not being issued for up to 24 hours after you’ve provided payment. This doesn’t play nicely with the ticketing deadlines Iberia and Malaysia impose on their award inventory, so it’s not uncommon for Iberia and Malaysia flights to fall out of the record, even when you think you’ve ticketed your award.
Many AAdvantage agents are aware of this, and won’t hold flights on these carriers for more than 24 hours. The reservations line is about to inherit a whole bunch of US Airways agents though, so it’s a good thing to be aware of. The good news is that both Malaysia and Iberia consistently return seats to award inventory, and if for some reason the flights are pulled after ticketing but prior to final issuance, it’s a pretty easy fix.
Changing AAdvantage awards
American doesn’t charge any fees to change award tickets as long as the origin and destination and award type remains the same. You can change the routing, dates, times, airlines, and so forth.
If you do change the origin, destination, or award type (like switching from an AAnytime award to a SAAver award, downgrading, etc.), the change fee is $150 for the first passenger and $25 for each additional passenger on the same record.
In order to redeposit an AAdvantage award ticket, American charges $150 for the first passenger, and $25 for each additional passenger on the same record locator. In other words, if you need to redeposit an award ticket and have three people on the same record locator, you’d pay a total of $200 in cancellation fees, which is comparatively reasonable.
The policy for making a change from one award type to another is that you must reinstate the award ticket, which will cost $150 (though this generally isn’t charged if you’re upgrading the class of service).
Bottom line
While I’m sad to see US Airways go, American miles are still incredibly valuable. Once you understand the general rules and guidelines you’ll find many more opportunities to use your miles.
How have you used your AAdvantage miles? Any favorite redemptions?
The post How To Redeem American AAdvantage Miles appeared first on One Mile at a Time.