FlyerfolioMiles and membership
English

Part of KrisFlyer hub

Status: checked against official sources; automated independent review

FREQUENT FLYER GLOSSARY

What is award reinstatement?

Award reinstatement is the return of miles or points from a cancelled or refunded award ticket to the member's account, which in some programmes also returns the taxes and fees paid on that ticket. [1] [4] Programmes set their own rules on whether reinstatement is automatic, what it costs, and what must be true of the ticket: American Airlines reinstates AAdvantage miles at no charge on award trips cancelled before the first flight departs, up to one year from the date the ticket was purchased [1], while Singapore Airlines publishes a redeposit charge of USD 75 for unused Saver awards and a charge for unused Advantage and Access awards [4].

Facts checked: 18 October 2026

Key takeaways

  • Reinstatement returns miles that a ticket consumed; miles that have already expired in the account are handled by a separate, priced process. [1]
  • American reinstates miles and refunds eligible taxes and fees at no charge when an award trip is cancelled before the first flight departs, up to one year from purchase. [1]
  • Singapore Airlines charges a redeposit fee that varies by award type, and requires the miles, the award ticket and the redemption ticket to be valid, with the ticket completely unused. [4]

Reinstatement, change and expiry are three different things

American separates reinstatement from changing a trip. Award tickets carry no change fees, although a fare difference may still be payable, and when a trip is changed the miles are reinstated to the original AAdvantage account and deducted from that same account even if the new amount is the same. [1]

Singapore Airlines prices each action separately: a change of date on its own flights is USD 25 on a Saver award and listed at no charge for Advantage and Access awards, while redepositing miles from an award or upgrade is USD 75 on a Saver award and carries a charge for Advantage and Access awards. [4]

Expired miles are a third case. American reactivates expired AAdvantage miles for a fee rather than reinstating them from a ticket. [1]

When miles come back automatically

American states that miles are reinstated and eligible taxes and fees are refunded at no charge if the member cancels up to one year from the date the ticket was purchased, as long as the cancellation happens before the first flight departs. [1] Cancelling on aa.com triggers the reinstatement and the refund request automatically in most cases, and a reinstatement can take up to 72 hours to process before the account balance updates. [1]

Mileage upgrade awards follow a parallel rule: Reservations cancels the upgrade award and the miles are reinstated at no charge up to one year after the ticket was bought, provided the member cancels before the first flight departs, but co-payments for mileage upgrade awards are non-refundable. [1]

Redeposit fees for an unused award

Singapore Airlines charges its redeposit fee to put miles back into the KrisFlyer account and attaches conditions to it: the miles must be valid, the award or redemption ticket must be valid, and the ticket must be completely unused. [4] The fee is charged in US dollars or the local currency equivalent, and where several changes or services are used the fees are cumulative. [4] A no-show fee is charged on top of any other applicable fee: failing to show up for an Economy Saver award flight and then requesting a refund costs USD 100 plus USD 75, or USD 175. [4] The no-show scale is USD 100 in Economy, with separate amounts for Premium Economy and Business and First. [4]

A change handled offline by a Singapore Airlines office or the reservations hotline attracts an additional USD 25 or 2,500 KrisFlyer miles on selected services, including redemption ticket changes and redepositing miles for an award; that addition is waived where the transaction cannot be performed online and for all PPS Club members and supplementary cardholders. [4]

Partially used tickets cannot be reworked the same way: no change of route, cabin class or award type is allowed on a partially used Singapore Airlines ticket, and no changes at all are allowed on a partially used partner-airline ticket. [4]

Miles that have already expired

Miles can be reactivated within 24 months of their expiration, in a single transaction, to a maximum of 500,000 miles; expired miles from the same expiration time frame that are not reactivated at that point are forfeited. [1] The rate is charged on the total number of miles reactivated from one account at one time, regardless of when those miles expired, and the transaction is non-refundable and non-reversible, with up to 24 hours allowed for processing. [1] Reactivated miles are credited as a mileage bonus, do not count toward AAdvantage status qualification or Million Miler status, and will not expire as long as the account has mileage earning or redeeming activity once every 24 months. [1]

Exceptions and limits

  • Taxes and fees. American refunds all taxes and fees in full except sale-imposed nonrefundable taxes, taxes it must pay whether or not the member travels, and taxes on a trip that has already started; some countries have different refund rules and American follows those. [1]
  • Reinstatement that needs a phone call. American asks members to contact Reservations for trips that have already started, trips involving travel on partner airlines, and trips changed because of an uncontrollable event since the ticket was issued. [1]
  • Miles back is not a seat back. The British Airways Club states that reward bookings are subject to availability and to capacity controls that limit how many seats are offered, and that reward tickets are issued at the same time as the booking is made. [2]
  • Which account receives the refund. Under the account-linking terms effective 29 January 2025, changes and refunds of award tickets and Cash + Avios tickets between linked British Airways and Qatar Airways Privilege Club accounts are supported offline only, and refunded Avios are credited to the Privilege Club account; they can be moved to the British Airways account only while the accounts remain linked. [3]
  • Reinstated miles can still expire. Emirates Skywards says miles held in a Skysurfer account that were reinstated or extended under its Covid-19 policy are no longer extended or reinstated and continue to expire on their stated expiry date. [5]
  • No cash value. Avios have no fixed or par value and are not redeemable for cash, so a refund returns Avios rather than money. [3]

Sources

Sources checked on 18 October 2026. It covers American Airlines AAdvantage, Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer, The British Airways Club, Qatar Airways Privilege Club (for linked-account refunds) and Emirates Skywards. Other programmes, including United MileagePlus, Delta SkyMiles, Flying Blue, Aeroplan and Asia Miles, are not covered here.

  1. American Airlines: Using miles for travel, checked 18 October 2026
  2. The British Airways Club terms and conditions, checked 18 October 2026
  3. Qatar Airways: linking of British Airways Executive Club and Privilege Club accounts, checked 18 October 2026
  4. Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer service fees, checked 18 October 2026
  5. Emirates Skywards programme rules, checked 18 October 2026