American Airlines ticket credits from during the pandemic have been extending out to September 30, 2022. Flight credits from cancelled tickets are also have their expiration dates extended. And, apparently, the process is taking up to a week. American has taken access to these credits offline from member online wallets until April 8.
There’s a manual process for agents to still use these credits, however:
The various credits that American Airlines still has are confusing, so here’s a simple guide to flight credits (at issue here) versus trip credits.
It’s also worth noting that trip credits have issues as well – if you put an itinerary on hold on the website, you can no longer use a trip credit to pay for that itinerary online, and instead have to be ticketed by phone. American says they’re planning to fix this.
Very frustrating that you cannot combine flight and trip credits to pay for a ticket.
I have tickets I booked with AA through the citi thank you portal back in March 2020. I assume these would be part of that extension. In my experience, these are annoying to redeem. It takes a long time on hold with the agent at Citi travel and then they take about 4 days to actually ticket. Can’t wait until these credits are gone!
Bought an expensive ticket around Christmas time and was unable to go due to circumstances beyond my control. After holding for 3.5 hours, an agent offered to move my reservation to the next available day for a few hundred dollars extra, which I was reluctant to do as I wasn’t sure the issue would be resolved by then, but she told me “don’t worry, if you can’t use it you’ll get a “credit” good for 12 months,” which I knew I would certainly be able to draw down over a year’s worth of flights. Turned out I couldn’t use the rebooked ticket either but, was told again on cancelling it that I would receive a “credit.”
Fast forward a month and I book a cheaper ticket and figure I’ll apply my “flight credit.” It was a pain in the neck to use the credit, requiring multiple calls, and finally I’m told – contrary to everything that had been represented by AA previously – that although they call it a “flight credit’ its really just a voucher and could be applied only to a single roundtrip flight departing the USA and the balance would be forfeit. I feel quite rooked by the whole thing, and certainly wouldn’t have paid to rebook the flight had I known that the extra fare wouldn’t be able to be applied to multiple trips until fully drawn down. To AA apparently, a credit isn’t really a credit.
AA’s system in this regard is a mess: a mashup of several versions of “vouchers”. I’ve had open ticket vouchers, flight credits and even a paper version that had to be mailed to Ft Worth for ticketing! And few actual show in one’s wallet. I still have a residual credit of U$80 but my tickets show up in C$s because I’m based in Canada and can’t change the currency default even if my flights are all within the US. And I’m told I cannot convert the currency value to C$s! Sometimes I wish AA would do what AS and AC do which is allow you to convert the $s into miles/points (AC kicks in an extra bonus as an incentive).
Not to mention every time I use my credits that can be used without mailing them off, it can’t be done online and takes almost a half hour of an agent’s time on the phone as the talk with other departments and are often subject to wait time queues too. What a waste of resources!
Why is it taking more than three days for the new American Airlines CEO Robert Isom to restore passenger access to our flight credits in our online wallets?
AA’s credit system is a joke. It costs them more money in time & opportunity loss to pay their phone agents to apply the credits than their ultimate goal with this system: frustrate the customer to the extent that they abandon the credit & let it expire. By not investing to streamline this credit system to something usable for the customer & their phone agents, AA is proving – again – they’re penny smart & dollar stupid.
I was wondering why I didn’t see this online in my AA account.
Someone said the credit can only be used for a R/T? Is that true? I canceled 2 one ways LGA/DFW.
Last question, can I put the squeeze on AA to refund my tickets to my credit card?
Whatever happened to refunds?
What ever happened to AA IT? Late, or doesn’t work at all.
Name an IT shop where this isn’t true. Ever. In the history of software.
1. The first 90% of a project takes 90% of the time and the last 10% takes the other 90% of the time.
2. Adding more people to a late software project only makes it later.
3. Software is the ultimate aerospace product – It weighs nothing, occupies no space, and costs a lot of money.
Airlines are so dumb. They lose so much money because of their shitty system, some employees, and stupid rules. Why should any credit expire? Why can’t you give me a full refund anytime up to 3 days before departure? They always oversell. I’m sure someone out there will buy my previous seat.
I just went the grudge match of redeeming a travel credit. Original itin was Charlotte to Aruba which AA cancelled (and left me and my wife stranded on our anniversary). I saw the credit in my app Wallet with no value indicated and no ability to book online. I called the agent to book apply the credit to a second booking and after three agents and 45 mins on hold, they did an “even” exchange. I call BS because I know the original ticket was mich higher. The attending agent claims she could not see the value.
I had a very frustrating situation with American Airlines and I’m trying to see if other people have had a similar type of situation. I purchased a “refundable” ticket, but when I requested a refund through the online interface, they merely gave me a credit in my e-wallet without actually issuing a refund to my credit card. This credit to my e-wallet expires in 12 months and has other restrictions. If you have had that same experience and in particular if your e-wallet have expired, please let me know about that. There may be a way to address this with the airline.
Horrendous experience today. Went to utilize a $5K + trip credit to book international travel for my parents. Since more than 1 passenger, need to do over phone. First customer service rep couldn’t see the same flights I was on aa.com. Begrudgingly found me a supervisor who couldn’t get the same itinerary to price out, and no option for me to put the reservation on hold for him to book. Sent me to webmaster who ultimately proclaims– this includes a Qatar airways flight sorry we can’t help you. Then WHY is Qatar offered on aa.com???? 4 hours of my life wasted.