Strange J availability on AA flights - LIM-MIA

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adenda

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I'm trying to find 2 J seats on a flight from LIM to MIA on AA as part of a OW Classic Reward itinerary. The date I want isn't yet available (it's over 331 days away) but I've searching as close to my date as I can using the QF site to see what might be the options and am getting strange results.

Basically J seats are almost non-existant when searched for as a separate sector but I tried an experiment by using an an alternative destination (DFW) on the same date and - surprise, surprise - I'm finding flights LIM-MIA-DFW with J seats on both sectors - including the LIM-MIA sector. How does this work?

Seems the seats are only available if you travel beyond MIA (in this case)

Curious to know if there is any chance QF can book me the LIM-MIA sector alone in this scenario given their website shows nil availability for the sector when searched as a standalone sector.

(BTW, booking an extra leg such as to DFW won't work as we have a number of flights in our itinerary beyond MIA)

Love to know if anyone knows why this happens.
 
I suspect there is an underlying reason here. MIA is possibly the number 1 destination of choice for most Latin Americans (JFK second?) Hence it is a popular route, so less availability. Airlines are not stupid, and it is a very competitive thing.

Have you thought "outside the square"? One World in that sort of movement effectively means American or Latam. But northern Sth America is definitely Star Alliance territory. Avianca and Copa (and the northern carriers) are huge. AA flies to almost everywhere in the Carribean from the USA. Copa and Avianca cover Sth America to the Carribean very well. Maybe do a combo?
 
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I've thought of that however I've directed all my Star Alliance points of late (not that many) into Velocity. I haven't yet explored the options (if any) for using Velocity points. Advice on that would be welcome.
 
Which means ..... no divorce likely?

Unfortunately. I thnk some people have mentioend workarounds of booking the flight with a connector and then ringing within 24 hours to drop the additional segment. But I think that works for AA/UA members redeeming flights through their own programs. And not always possible to achieve (I believe other airlines like CX will actually block it).

It's not just LIM-MIA - a lot of AA's transatlantic award space is also married. Try finding CLT/PHL/JFK-LHR and you'll often hit a brick wall. Add a connecting flight and all of a sudden TATL flights via those major hubs appear (but still limited).
 
Well we've almost used up our 35,000 miles (in fact Great Circle Mapper says were 200 miles over) so adding a "dummy" segment isn't possible. Just have to slum it Eco - a shame because the 10 other flights in our itinerary are all business including a few stints in QR's Q suites :)

Can vouch for the difficulty getting business award availability from US back to Australia - in the end had to abandon the idea and go home via Europe.
 
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