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Related post: Master Chart: Here Are The Best Ways To Book Every American Or Alaska Award Flight Within The US And Canada!
Is this now part 3 of a series?
Early last week I wrote about my experience flying from NYC to Cleveland and watching a pair of gate agents argue with a pair of flight attendants and a mother flying with her infant, over her Doona.
Later in the week I walked through my mileage booking process for the trip, which may have seemed daunting, but only takes a couple minutes once you get the hang of it.
“This is a master class in the art of travel hacking and understanding the importance of partnerships. The only part I didn’t understand is why your AA status helped you get upgraded to first class when you booked with Alaska miles? I thought that if you book with miles there is no way to swap out the frequent flyer number on the reservation like you can with revenue fares?”
While officially you are supposed to keep the mileage number that you redeem miles with, no airline actually enforces this.
When you use Alaska miles, the workaround is quite simple.
When booking a ticket, select “New Passenger” or create a profile for yourself other than “Myself.”
If you select “Myself” it will populate your mileage number and you’ll have to call Alaska to change it to your AA mileage number.
Instead, just leave the mileage number blank:
After I redeemed a mere 4,500 miles for the $500 flight, I was given my Alaska and my AA record locators:
Just enter the AA record locator on AA.com under manage trips when you’re not logged in:
And then add your AA mileage number under passenger details:
If you have an AA credit card, that will unlock benefits like a free bag.
If you have Platinum or higher status, that will unlock the ability to select MCE seats at no charge:
After about 15 minutes, you will see a complimentary upgrade request in the reservation as well.
That upgrade cleared 2 days after I booked, and just over 25 hours before the flight. Best of all, I even had an empty seat next to me:
If you book your ticket with BA Avios, the ability to book for someone other than yourself may be blocked. In that case, I just use the Finnair site to modify the mileage number. (When Finnair isn’t working, I have also used the Royal Jordanian website to accomplish this).
Just take the BA record locator and plug it in here:
Then click on passenger details, and change:
You can then modify the mileage details and change them from BA to AA. You also have the option to have 2 mileage numbers, but I do not recommend doing that, as it can make the systems act pretty wonky.
Once you save your mileage number, you can login to AA.com and you should see your BA Avios booked ticket saved under your trips, so you can get your AA card and elite benefits.
Sadly, I haven’t had luck with the same method when using Qatar Avios. In that case, I’ve simply direct messaged AA on X/Twitter to get the mileage number changed from Qatar to AA. You can also call Qatar or American to change it.
I haven’t yet experimented with booking AA flights via Finnair, Cathay Pacific, Etihad, Qantas, or JAL but those can be worthwhile at times. Post your experience with booking for a guest with no mileage number or using the Finnair/RJ sites to edit the mileage number for those bookings!
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20 Comments On "How To Get American Elite And Card Benefits When Redeeming Mileage Awards Via Partner Airlines"
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Booked a couple of aa domestic flights for 11k finnair points
Agent initially didn’t see it then called back to say he did it.
I asked him what changed he said they need to first create a reservation then it shows
regarding adding aa number when booking finnair or qatar I just called aa to add it…
great post, very detailed but well explained.
This is an awesome trick, Dan, thank you for taking the time to write this up in response to my comment on the other post!
Thanx Vlad for your comment….
I used this technique when flying business class on BA from Dulles to Rome via London and back from Geneva to BWI via London. I booked a business class flight using Avios but was not able to select my seats until check in (4 months later after booking). So I changed my booking from my BA membership to AA membership where I was Platinum Pro and instantly got access to select my seats 4 months ahead of time!
Yup, I’ve done the same on BA as well!
If i book aa through Alaska points and i have aa credit card do i get suitcases if i dont use card
Yes
Thank! For a second passagener too?
Same as any AA booked flight.
Dan! your name can be Eleff (אלף in Hebrew meaning a thousand), but you’re worth a million!!!!
BA flight but no luck with either Finnair or Jordan to change to AA status few days ago. And I don’t want to call :). But it’s kind of petty from BA not to let me select seats with the business class tickets. KLM does allow you.
PS I need my AA status on the ticket, layover is long and I visit Qantas, BA, AA lounges in LHR.
What happened on the Finnair site? I’ve had no problems doing that get free seats on BA.
I get this: “An error occurred when retrieving your booking. Please make sure to enter the correct family name and booking reference or e-ticket number associated with your booking and try again”.
I tried the booking reference, the e-ticket number, different browser, no cookies, the app, I switched to the international location, using either first or last name,or full name etc..Everything looks good in my BA account.
Some months ago, it did work well to get my AA number on a different flight.
I’ve been trying all Oneworld airlines, I was able to edit the traveller details (i.e., AA #) on the SriLankan Airlines but it gives me errors when I try to save the info. But when I open the advance traveller information on the same site, my AA number is there!! Not yet on my BA account. I will report back if succesful.
Last comment here: SriLankan did not work but Air Maroc did! I was able to choose my seats within 1 minute.
I booked a domestic aa flight thru finnair. It worked for me to put my aa mileage number on finnair afterwards as you said.
If I book with Alaska Miles for a flight whose first leg is on American and second leg on Alaska , can I get free bag for whole trip
I booked for someone else recently on AA thru Qatar and weirdly my mileage number came thru on their reservation