A Trick to Save on American Airlines Business and First Class Flights

There’s an interesting discovery going on right now on FlyerTalk, where folks have found a way to save on American Airlines premium airfares using AA Vacations.

Here’s the idea – if you book your flights through AA Vacations as a package, you save drastically off of what would be available on AA.com. In a nutshell, AA Vacation pull inventory from a different fare bucket than what’s available on the AA.com website, so you’re able to find some really great deals.

I searched for JFK to Madrid – here’s the process step by step.

In all honesty, you might as well stay at the hotel since it’s included, and makes this deal ever better, but you’re under no obligation to do so. The reservation for the hotel is separate from the airline reservation, so if you no-show, there’s no impact on your flights.

I then looked up the price of the reservation on American’s website, and found it nearly $700 more. Wow!

So, this won’t work on every routing or city pair. I’ve tested it, and you’ll mostly find it for oneworld hub routes, with some other additions. My suggestion is to test it out and see what you find.

Some tips:

• No, there’s no link that will take you to the AA Vacations website where you can get cash back.
• No, you can’t use the AARP discount.
• Yes, you will still earn all miles, enjoy elite benefits, and earn elite credit.
• Yes, I would call the hotel to let them know you won’t be coming if you don’t plan on going there.

Save On Other Flights

If you haven’t considered before, I highly recommend enrolling in SELECT, which gets you a ton of travel discounts:

• 20% off Virgin Atlantic tickets to the UK, originating in the US or Canada, plus complimentary Flying Club Silver Elite status after just one flight.
• 5-25% off Cathay Pacific flights, plus complimentary Marco Polo Silver Tier status.
• 5-10% off most Virgin America fares.
• Up to 10% British Airways flights originating in the US, UK, or Canada.
• Save between 8-20% on Qantas flights from the US to either Australia or New Zealand.
• 5-10% off Emirates flights originating in the US.
• Up to 14% off Singapore Airlines flights, originating in the US.
• Up to 5% off JetBlue flights.

For a limited time only, you can get a SELECT membership with significant savings from the normal price.

Have you found any good business or first class sales using AA Vacations instead of the regular AA website?