American Airlines has added a Basic Economy fare for select long-haul routes, tweaked its checked-bag allowance for certain tickets and added New Distribution Capability bundles, including a "Corporate Experience" offer, the carrier announced.
The Corporate Experience offer, which will be available to agents capable of NDC connections, includes such extra perks as complimentary access to preferred seats and priority privileges for Business Extra travelers, according to an American Airlines spokesperson. American also is offering a "Main Plus" offer through NDC-enabled channels, which gives travelers access to preferred seats including Main Cabin Extra, an extra free checked bag and Group 5 boarding privileges.
Among those channels making that content available will be the Amadeus Travel Platform as part of a renewed content agreement announced on Tuesday. The content will go live in the platform in "the coming months," according to Amadeus.
"This latest deal ensures American's extensive offering, including the latest content via NDC, is delivered to our vast travel seller network," Amadeus EVP of airline distribution and content sourcing Javier Laforgue said in a statement.
In addition, American Airlines as of Tuesday is offering a Basic Economy option for travel to Asia, Oceania, India and Israel. The fare, at a discount to standard economy, is nonchangeable but does include one free checked bag.
American also has changed its checked-bag policy for long-haul international routes as well as for Premium Economy travelers. All Main Cabin tickets on long-haul routes now include one free checked bag, which is a reduction from two free checked bags on transpacific routes; Main Cabin tickets on transatlantic routes and to South America already included one free checked bag. Premium Economy travelers, meanwhile, now get two free checked bags on all routes. They already had that allowance on international routes, but Premium Economy routes to Alaska and Hawaii previously included only one free checked bag.
Those changes are meant to create "transparent fare products and policies that are consistent across our global network," according to American Airlines chief revenue officer Vasu Raja.