AA Caps the Number of Segments You Can Fly per Award
It's been a while since there's been a significant change to American Airlines' AAdvantage mileage program. So, we were anxious to see new changes loaded to the AAdvantage award chart website Thursday morning. Turns out, it's not a massive change — but still one that might limit travelers' upcoming award redemptions.
Effective immediately, AA has capped the number of segments that you can fly on a one-way award booking. For domestic award flights, you're limited to just three flights. For international awards, you can only book four segments to reach your destination. If your award booking requires more flights, you'll have to split the booking into two different awards.
An airline spokesperson explained that this shouldn't have much of an impact. AAdvantage redemptions already required that you take the most-direct routing available — even before these changes you weren't able to book circuitous awards to get more out of your business or first-class award. These new changes "are in line with [AA's] most direct routing rule and allows [it] to better support [its] partner airlines."
For domestic flights, this new limitation is a fairly moot point. It's tough enough to get AAward AAvailability on one AA flight, much less four.
However, we can see this limitation being an issue on international flights — especially if you're starting in a non-hub city and heading to a more remote destination. If domestic award availability forces you to connect a couple of times domestically, you might be limited to only 1-2 flights to get from your international gateway city to your final destination. While we can't think of any past award bookings that have required more than four legs, there could be travelers with upcoming bookings that might be affected by this change.
While relatively minor, this is a change that could impact your award booking plans. Make sure that you're aware of this new segment limitation when searching for your next AAdvantage award booking.
Can you think of an AAdvantage award that'll be limited by these new rules?
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The Capital One Venture X Business Card has all the Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card has to offer and more. It offers an incredible welcome bonus and requires an equally impressive spend to qualify. In addition, the card comes with premium travel perks like annual travel credit. (Partner offer)Pros
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Cons
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- Another drawback is that the annual travel credit can only be used on bookings made through Capital One Business Travel.
- LIMITED-TIME OFFER: Earn up to 400K bonus miles: 200K miles when you spend $30K in the first 3 months, and an additional 200k miles when you spend $150k in the first 6 months
- Earn unlimited 2X miles on every purchase, everywhere—with no limits or category restrictions
- Earn 10X miles on hotels and rental cars and 5X miles on flights and vacation rentals booked through Capital One Business Travel
- With no preset spending limit, enjoy big purchasing power that adapts so you can spend more and earn more rewards
- Empower your teams to make business purchases while earning rewards on their transactions, with free employee and virtual cards. Plus, automatically sync your transaction data with your accounting software and pay your vendors with ease
- Redeem your miles on flights, hotels and more. Plus, transfer your miles to any of the 15+ travel loyalty programs
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- Receive up to a $120 credit for Global Entry or TSA PreCheck®. Enjoy access to 1,300+ airport lounges worldwide, including Capital One Lounge locations and Priority Pass™ lounges, after enrollment
- Enjoy a $100 experience credit and other premium benefits with every hotel and vacation rental booked from the Premier Collection
- This is a pay-in-full card, so your balance is due in full every month