American Airlines Waiving Change Fees

Update 4/8/20: American has extended its offer to waive change fees for customers who have summer travel through Sept. 30, 2020. The offer is available for any of American’s fares, and customers will have until Dec. 31, 2021, for future travel. Fare rules may apply depending on the ticket.

• Any ticket purchased on or before April 7, 2020, for travel through Sept. 30, 2020, will not incur change fees prior to travel. Customers must pay any fare difference, if applicable, at time of ticketing of the new fare.
• All AAdvantage® award tickets are included in this offer.
• Customers are allowed to change their origin and destination cities as part of this new offer.
• Travel must be completed by Dec. 31, 2021.

Update 3/10/20: American Airlines has added new terms that cover flights booked on or before March 1st. Change fee is waived if:

• Are traveling on an American Airlines flight
• Bought your ticket by March 1, 2020
• Are scheduled to travel March 10, 2020 – April 30, 2020
• Can travel March 10, 2020 – December 31, 2020
• Don’t change your origin or destination city
• Rebook in the same cabin or pay the difference

[Update 3/6/20: American has now extended the fee waiver through March 31. Further, they’ve eliminated the need to cancel 14 days prior – now, anytime prior to flight leaving you can change the flight. (ht OMAAT)]

With everyone worried about the coronavirus, American Airlines announced today they are waiving change fees for travel booked between March 1 and March 16th. They join Jetblue and Alaska Air who make similar offers.

Notable differences:

• American is making the policy for all flights booked until January 26, 2021. That’s much longer than the June 2020 end-date given by JetBlue and Alaska.
• With American, tickets must be changed at least 14 days prior to the departure of your original flight. JetBlue allows changes up to 24 hours before and Alaska seems to allow it anytime until the flight.
  • This is obviously a huge limitation in the entire benefit as the whole idea is to give flexibility in times of crisis, and the 14 day window makes it much less helpful.
• With American, the changed travel itinerary must be completed within one year. That’s the same as JetBlue and better than Alaska’s policy giving until December 31, 2020.
• American expressly excludes bookings through AAdvantage award tickets. JetBlue and Alaska include award bookings.
• None of the airlines are waiving fees for flights booked before the fee waiver was announced.

Will be interesting to see what policies the other major airlines roll out.

Hat tip to Dansdeals