AA adds $25 fee, cuts award hold time allowance
 

American has joined the stampede for $25 fees for second checked bags. Elite level frequent flyers, full fare pax, and people on international itineraries are exempted. http://www.aa.com/apps/netSAAver/Vie...omotionContent

Next, AA is reducing the length of time one can "hold" an award reservation to 5 days (currently 14.) This will make it much more difficult to book round-trips at the 330-day opening, unless your trip is five days long or less. (At present you can book the first leg and put it on hold for up to a couple of weeks while waiting for the availability window to open for the return.)

bummer on the award travel - I have enjoyed AA liberal hold times.

AA's FF program continues to go down hill, making your miles worth even less each time they make a change like this. I remember back in the days when their program was the best of all the airlines.

I have some miles expiring (not enough for a ticket) in June and I'm just going to let them expire. Future miles flown on AA (if I must) will go into my Alaska Airlines account, whose miles never expire, at least.

That hold time change does hurt a lot. I may change things to start accumulating miles on another airline.

Keith

Where can I find documentation on the change to holding a reservation?

Keith

<i>Where can I find documentation on the change to holding a reservation?</i>

https://www.aa.com/aa/pubcontent/en_...ookanAward.jsp

About 3/4 of the way down. No reference to the old standard.

Andrew,
AS expiration policy http://www.alaskaair.com/as/mileagep...icy-Change.asp

OMG, is it gonna stop!! Just got an email that CO is raising change fees: Domestic Ticket $150 (from$100) and International Tickets $250 (up from $150).......

Thanks for the heads-up, Patty. Southwest (no change fees) is already my preferred domestic airline. I'm still going to let my AA miles expire (really don't want to fly AA anymore - nothing to do with this recent fee thing). For USAir, I keep some 16,000 miles by eating at Burger King once a year or and using a credit card to earn about 6 miles. I'm going to do the same for Alaska, I guess, with a different credit card.

&lt; AA's FF program continues to go down hill, making your miles worth even less each time they make a change like this. &gt;

I don't see how the changes that Gardyloo posted has any thing to do with AA's miles &quot;worthing less.&quot;

The 14-day hold time for award res is very generous. I don't see how it makes a difference unless you are booking international biz awards. From speaking w/my brother, rkkwan, who knows the ins and outs of CO, AA's award seats are a lot easier to get than CO's - esp at the 25k level.

With oil prices this high, how on earth are these airlines going to survive without adding fees and/or raising fares?

BTW, I cannot even recall the last time I had 2 checked luggage on a domestic flight, if ever.

yk, are you UNMASKED????? :D

Andrew, if you have enough spare AA miles for a ticket, I'm sure you can find some willing recipients :) rather than let them expire. Actually, the donation to charity would work well too.

I don't fly AA (because it's never been the right fare at the right time, but that could change), but none of the airlines I use have ever had such generous hold policies. So I can appreciate that AA regulars might be upset, but it's not like other airlines are better.

International Biz Awards is about the only ones I book.

They just made that much less easy, while not making any more money for AA. At least the $25/bag brings them revenue.

Keith

Yes, Keith, reducing hold time does wind up saving AA money indirectly, as does each one of these new restrictions. Why else would they change it? By reducing the hold time, they indirectly increase revenues by making it more likely you'll book a conventional ticket, incur a change fee, etc. I guarantee you, some pencil pusher in the belly of AA has a spreadsheet showing exactly how much each one of these changes can save the company.

Like changing the mileage expiration from 3 years to 18 months, for example - why would they do that? Certainly not to benefit the customer. Again, before making the change, someone had a spreadsheet showing management how much money that would wind up saving AA.

When does AA $25 extra bag fee go into affect? Is this second bag or where does it start? I just got hit by Delta -- after I bought and paid for my ticket they want to levy the extra fee. If you not economy you can check up to apparently 3 bags. Not sure this is right to make charge after purchase. Anyone know of any ATA rule that this might violate?

Just looked at the link in the original post and the answer to most questions. If you buy thru CheapTickets as I did you get charged. Wonder what full economy fair realy would be?