This is a quick example of what I’ve observed for a while – that since last year, AA award availability has improved from the pathetically lacking state of a few years ago. It’s still not always great, but it’s much more plentiful than during the said terrible state.
Doctor of Credit reminded us this week of the AA Reduced Mileage Awards. If you have the Citi AA Platinum card or Aviator Red card, you get 7,500 points off on a domestic round trip, making it 17,500 points instead of 25,000. It’s been a while since I took advantage of this, and the list of discounted destinations looks pretty good. For example, I’ve had my eyes on Durango, Colorado for a while – home of San Juan National Forest, Million Dollar Highway and the Narrow Gauge Railroad. Since it’s on the reduced list for April and May, I checked the middle of May (shoulder season) from San Diego, and found weekend availability (leave Friday, return Monday) for one passenger:
The above screenshots show the normal “saver” award rate of 25,000 round trip (and you do have to find saver availability). But because it’s on the reduced list, it’ll set you back merely 17,500 AA points. You must call to book, but they abolished telephone service fee for this a few years ago. Small beautiful towns are usually not cheap to fly into, and the same itinerary, if booked as a revenue ticket, prices at $474 – the cheapest option of any airline on those days. There’s even more availability on the previous weekend. This is an actual redemption that I would happily take myself – if I didn’t have other plans already.
Do note you can fly the same itin for even cheaper with LifeMiles, assuming you can find saver United availability. It’ll set you back just 15,000 points, since CO and CA are both in the same domestic zone. LifeMiles has greatly increased in utility to me due to this sweet spot.
Another small town destination of interest to me – Gunnison, CO – was reduced only in April, and I couldn’t find weekend saver availability, so it’s not great across the board, but the Durango itin is a very good deal IMO. So have a look at the Reduced Mileage Awards, and maybe you’ll score a great place to explore!
{ Island Lake, San Juan National Forest. Credit }
The improved availability is variable at best. I searched for two business class seats for late Summer into Fall for Athens and found zero availability for any day. Nothing. Maybe my experience is an exception, but given AA’s history of not making any worthwhile redemptions available, I’d like to see a lot more evidence before saying that things are better.
I agree – we’re seeing small steps. What you’re looking for is a big step. Hopefully they get there too.
Really? These are literally the worst times possible to travel. For us working folks who want to take a weekend trip, leaving ass crack of dawn on Fri returning Mon night is garbage.
I’m a “working folk who want to take a weekend trip”, and this works for me. Do you think leaving Mon returning Thu is better?
What? No? Are you serious? i think Leaving Fri morning or Fri evening, returning Sun afternoon or evening or even Mon morning is much better. Again, the only availability cited here is for horrible travel times. In this case, you point out that the cash price is a lot of $$$, so fair enough, but often the available flights have cash prices that equal out to < 1 cpp.
You mean the airline isn’t handing out saver award availability for the most desirable times of the week that everyone wants, aka the busiest and most profitable flights? Who woulda thought?
Want to also point out how extreme the gaslighting is of AA apologists. Like you believe *this* counts as an improvement? Do you remember what availability was like 3-4 years ago?
I didn’t say it’s an improvement of pre-dire state. I said it’s an improvement of the dire state, which it 100% is. I would NEVER have found this kind of availability 2 years ago.
Last year I flew from Durango to Washington DC via PHX. There were only 2 economy seats available the entire summer. And only in one direction. Thankfully, one of those dates worked. The only reason I considered Durango was because AA had no availability to Montrose. Despite having Montrose award travel on “sale” for summer quarter. I kept checking every day to see if award availability would open up, even after I purchased tickets, but AA never did.
For what it’s worth, UA availability was just as dismal.