Help pls! Online Frequent Flier Ticket Requests

[Cathyb]

Tuggers: When you want to do an online frequent flier ticket request with American Airlines for two people --

1. Can you do both requests at once? or have to do two orders?

2. When is the best time of day to get online to do it -- say if the date to go to Hawaii was June 25 and July 30th was 'D' Day to grab it?

3. Are you still able to have them hold the reservation for two weeks?

Any other tips now that things have gotten so tight??? TIA

[x3 skier]

1) I have always made the request for two tickets at once.

2) Any time of day has worked for me.

3) No clue

If you can't get what you want on the web, just call them since they can work partners for other seats a lot better than you can on the web.

Cheers

[Anne S]

If you have enough mileage in one account to do two tickets, I would recommend doing it. That way, both tickets will be on the same itinerary.

If you do not have enough mileage for two ticket in one account, you need to reserve each ticket separately from the appropriate account, and two itineraries will be created.

AA used to hold reservations for two weeks, but unfortunatley they have changed the rules, and now the reservations will be held for only five days.

[sfwilshire]

Since we have kids involved, I just bite the bullet and pay the fee to call to try to get all the tickets together. It was $43 or $44 and change each for our last trip, but I couldn't risk getting two or three and not the other one together using four different frequent flyer accounts.

Once before we split into two groups to make it easier to get tickets, but that was when the two older ones were also going.

Sheila

[Anne S]

Originally Posted by sfwilshire

Since we have kids involved, I just bite the bullet and pay the fee to call to try to get all the tickets together. It was $43 or $44 and change each for our last trip, but I couldn't risk getting two or three and not the other one together using four different frequent flyer accounts.

Once before we split into two groups to make it easier to get tickets, but that was when the two older ones were also going.

Sheila

However, since you can put each reservation on hold, it is quite easy to book each ticket separately form separate FF accounts, one reservation at a time. You do not pay anything until you book it. (Speaking of payment, AA now charges $5 per ticket even if you do it online.)

[Cathyb]

Thank you -- Would it be better to have my airline miles transferred over to my husband's before doing the dual request? Does this take much time for AA to do?

Also, when you put the first reservation on 'Hold' -- how long can it stay in that category? Minutes or days? I am a little scared, is it user friendly when doing two reservations?

[Jimster]

You can't transfer your miles to your husband's account unless you are willing to pay a very high fee. Book them individually or talk with an agent and have them take the miles out of each account.

[Anne S]

Originally Posted by Cathyb

Thank you -- Would it be better to have my airline miles transferred over to my husband's before doing the dual request? Does this take much time for AA to do?

Also, when you put the first reservation on 'Hold' -- how long can it stay in that category? Minutes or days? I am a little scared, is it user friendly when doing two reservations?

As I stated before, the reservation willl be on hold for five days. If you do not book it by that time, it will simply disappear. There really is no reason to be scared--it is an automated system and doesn't know/care that you are doing two reservations. Do one, put it on hold, then do the second one, and put it on hold. In other words: you are requesting one ticket two times, instead of two tickets one time. Doing it twice will get you two confirmation numbers, one for each reservation, instead of one confirmation for the two tickets. When you are ready to book, you just go back to each reservation and book them separately.

[Blondie]

Be aware that if the return trip is not yet available and you book only the outgoing leg while waiting for the return to be listed, it will require the RT amount to hold the points. This is what happened to me last year and I did have to do it over the phone so the agent could work her magic. She did not charge me extra as I had been online and could not save half of the trip without encumbering 30,000 miles. You can book any ticket using anyone else's airlmiles as long as the purchase is on the mileowners credit card. AA is the most user friendly system I have encountered.

[lynne]

Hi Cathyb:

What I always do with AAdvantage tickets is to place a single reservation on hold and then call AAdvantage reservations to split the record into two. That way your reservations are linked but you will be able to 'purchase' each ticket with separate aadvantage accounts.

email me if you have any specific questions - Lynn

[Sandy Lovell]

American recently dropped their hold time from 14 days to 5 days. You can now only hold the reservation for 5 days before it must be paid for or canceled.

[Anne S]

Originally Posted by Sandy Lovell

American recently dropped their hold time from 14 days to 5 days. You can now only hold the reservation for 5 days before it must be paid for or canceled.

That's what I've said twice already on this thread.

[Judy]

We have two computers in the house. First we search for two tickets to confirm that there are two ff tickets available on the same itinerary. Then we each get on our computers and book our own reservations from our own accounts at the same time. I suppose someone could grab one of our seats by jumping in there in the nanosecond between when my final "click" and DH's final "click" go through, but it hasn't happened yet.

[lynne]

You will still need to call Aadvantage customer service if you purchase aadvantage awards as two separate bookings or hold the reservation as a single reservation.

If booked as two separate tickets, you will need the reservations linked. If held as a single ticket, you will need to have the records separated into two but they will be linked.

One nice thing about aadvantage awards is that you can change the dates and times of flights (depending upon award availability) without penalty.

[Carolyn]

Originally Posted by lynne

One nice thing about aadvantage awards is that you can change the dates and times of flights (depending upon award availability) without penalty.

If you call an Agent to do this, do they charge you anything? Thanks.

Carolyn

[lynne]

Originally Posted by Carolyn

If you call an Agent to do this, do they charge you anything? Thanks.

Carolyn

Once you are ticketed, and you call an agent to change dates/times at no charge. The only thing you are unable to change is the routing.