Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[ComeFlyWithMe]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Thank you for that .

I have asked to speak to QF supervisors - its my fault as the booking is too complicated .

The commonest remark is "hey its not our booking, its an overseas one - I shouldn't have made it in NZ !!!
(It wasnt my fault it was directed from Brisbane to Auckland.)

I have sent emails to the generic QFF address as well to the head of QFF and QF customer relations .

NOT ONE REPLY!

Whats even worse is this has happened before - some months back,on this itinerary, I found and requested 2 seats SCL to Punta Arenas to connect with a cruise.

I rang and it went into my itinerary on my frequent flyer account.

Three weeks later , no ticketing back from QFF - I rang whats going on?

Response , "bookings thru AKL are complex and because mine was so far away in time , it had a low priority".

Seats lost as LAN only hold for a couple of weeks. ( there is only one non stop flight on this route daily)

What did Qantas offer to do for me to resolve the situation - NIL.

It took another 21,000 points to find an alternative to the lost seats thru no help from Qantas (if you want I can tell you all the details)

I once thought that I was treated this way because I am a low level frequent flier ( points mainly from cards) but private messages to me suggest even the plats can be treated this way.

So, if you have a decent contact in QF or QFF who actually believes the airline should be responsible for fixing its own mistakes, please let me know. I would love to give him the opportunity to hear my issues.

That's the simpler and fairer approach by QF. Blame the customer for their shortcomings.

 

[Daver6]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Try their Facebook and Twitter, their social media team seems to be much more responsive than other staff. I had a complaint about a different matter (missing points on a shopping transaction through Qantas Mall) and I just couldn't get anywhere through normal channels (rang a few times and spoke to different people but was told it was all my fault) until I used both Facebook and Twitter. The matter wasn't resolved straight away but it did get a resolution, finally I got my points and an apology from Qantas

This. Don't even waste your time calling and email. Straight to Twitter. My approach is always to just ask politely if anyone can help with whatever the issue is.

 

[dumdidum]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

ozflier, have you tried contacting Red Roo? Your issue is much more complicated than mine but she was very helpful and got it resolved for me within the day

 

[Ken1]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

We're planning to book a 280K J Oneworld award to travel in July 2016, travelling to Europe and returning to Australia via the USA, or vise versa. We have booked 280K award itineraries twice in recent years and I'm starting to look at flights available as they're released each day at the moment to see which flights are coming up for March 2016. Several years ago there seemed to be a lot of BA J award seats available but I haven't seen them showing up for a long time. I have also seen a lot of CX award availability but since I've started looking over the past week I'm not seeing CX J seats either.

I've just logged in to BA and see they have listed 2 SYD-LHR seats available on BA16 for Saturday March 19 2016 but when I look at the QF website for that date there are no J awards available - only BA16 SYD-SIN in Y and SIN-LHR in J on BA12. If the BA16 in J shows on BA for booking with Avios does that mean QF should also have the same seats available? In the past that seemed to be the case. On that date there is also CX100 SYD-HKG in J connecting to CX255 HKG-LHR in Y available through QF as a bronze member. I logged in just after 11am Sydney time and didn't see any QF J awards released for March 18, the latest QF dates released.

I'll keep looking regularly to see if there is any pattern of days of the week award flights may be available. On our last 280K award booking I got LHR-SYD seats on QF for a Monday in March 2014 but it didn't seem as if they released any J seats for weekends at that time.

I would appreciate hearing about the experiences of others with searching for J award seats to and from LHR. Has CX been releasing less J seats than they had in the past?

New award availability for QF usually shows up at midnight GMT, 11:00am Sydney time, 10.00am from next week when daylight savings finishes. Are CX and BA seats usually also released for the next day at the same time as QF?

 

[Daver6]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

We're planning to book a 280K J Oneworld award to travel in July 2016, travelling to Europe and returning to Australia via the USA, or vise versa. We have booked 280K award itineraries twice in recent years and I'm starting to look at flights available as they're released each day at the moment to see which flights are coming up for March 2016. Several years ago there seemed to be a lot of BA J award seats available but I haven't seen them showing up for a long time. I have also seen a lot of CX award availability but since I've started looking over the past week I'm not seeing CX J seats either.

I've just logged in to BA and see they have listed 2 SYD-LHR seats available on BA16 for Saturday March 19 2016 but when I look at the QF website for that date there are no J awards available - only BA16 SYD-SIN in Y and SIN-LHR in J on BA12. If the BA16 in J shows on BA for booking with Avios does that mean QF should also have the same seats available? In the past that seemed to be the case. On that date there is also CX100 SYD-HKG in J connecting to CX255 HKG-LHR in Y available through QF as a bronze member. I logged in just after 11am Sydney time and didn't see any QF J awards released for March 18, the latest QF dates released.

I'll keep looking regularly to see if there is any pattern of days of the week award flights may be available. On our last 280K award booking I got LHR-SYD seats on QF for a Monday in March 2014 but it didn't seem as if they released any J seats for weekends at that time.

I would appreciate hearing about the experiences of others with searching for J award seats to and from LHR. Has CX been releasing less J seats than they had in the past?

New award availability for QF usually shows up at midnight GMT, 11:00am Sydney time, 10.00am from next week when daylight savings finishes. Are CX and BA seats usually also released for the next day at the same time as QF?

Have you considered QR to get to Europe?

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Have you considered QR to get to Europe?

Agreed. QR have a very good J product and transit through DOH with plenty of options into/out of Europe in addition to LHR. Maybe they were not a OW airline last time you booked a 280K trip. I wouldn't even consider BA these days average J quality and their taxes/surcharges are just too high unless you don't have any other option. I even avoid AA (as well as BA) across the Atlantic these days - it's IB for us automatically these days - very good availability and cheaper taxes.

QF shows up less award availability online than what there actually is for both CX and BA but if you ring them you should be able to get any awards you can see on BA's Executive Club or CX's Asia Miles. Sometimes there will be trouble getting connecting flights on CX through HKG because they block the combo unless you have a HKG stopover. Often you can find the individual flights have J available but you can't book them together. Not aware where you intend to go in the US but I did read the other day that CX is introducing a BOS - HKG service 4 days a week from this July. CX flights are released 360 days out.

Anat01 posted a very good summary on 14/4/14 titled “How to Search for Oneworld Award Availability” suggest you have a read of that if you're not already aware of it.

 

[Ken1]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Agreed. QR have a very good J product and transit through DOH with plenty of options into/out of Europe in addition to LHR. Maybe they were not a OW airline last time you booked a 280K trip. I wouldn't even consider BA these days average J quality and their taxes/surcharges are just too high unless you don't have any other option. I even avoid AA (as well as BA) across the Atlantic these days - it's IB for us automatically these days - very good availability and cheaper taxes.

QF shows up less award availability online than what there actually is for both CX and BA but if you ring them you should be able to get any awards you can see on BA's Executive Club or CX's Asia Miles. Sometimes there will be trouble getting connecting flights on CX through HKG because they block the combo unless you have a HKG stopover. Often you can find the individual flights have J available but you can't book them together. Not aware where you intend to go in the US but I did read the other day that CX is introducing a BOS - HKG service 4 days a week from this July. CX flights are released 360 days out.

Anat01 posted a very good summary on 14/4/14 titled “How to Search for Oneworld Award Availability” suggest you have a read of that if you're not already aware of it.

Thanks for your replies. I hadn't considered QR before. Where do I see availability for their flights? I've had a look at the “How to Search for Oneworld Award Availability” which I do remember seeing last year. That is really helpful although logging on to the AA website doesn't help if you're wanting to book the day that seats are released for QF 353 days out as AA only release seats I think 330 days out (25 Feb is the latest date showing today while QF have flights for 18 March, BA 19 March and CX a few more days after that).

I've logged into Asia Miles and see a couple of SYD-LHR flights that are not showing on QF, as well as the BA flight that I saw earlier on the BA site that is also not on QF.

We've booked 2 cruises in Europe for July and August 2016, one departing Tilbury in the UK and the other departs from Venice and finishes in Rome. We plan to spend the two weeks between the cruises in Switzerland so we'll book LHR-ZRH and may then travel by train from Zurich to Venice rather than fly ZRH-LHR-VCE in J with BA with our One World award. After the second cruise that finishes in Rome we're planning to fly possibly to New York for a few days so we could fly FCO-LHR-JFK or look at IB to go via BCN or MAD.

This trip is mainly to travel around Europe but we'd like to travel via the US or Canada, even if only for a few days, to get the better J luggage allowance (3 x 32kg with QF or BA, 2 x 32kg with CX) whereas we'll only have 40kg travelling to Europe both ways via Asia or Dubai in J. I usually travel with photography equipment including a tripod, multiple chargers etc that fill up half a bag and we also usually do some shopping so we try to fly via the US if possible. We recently returned from a trip to the US with QF in Y and each of our 4 bags (2 x 23kg bags each) were around 20 or 21kg so the 40kg in J may just be enough but we'd rather know we have flexibility with not having to worry about the weight allowance.

One option I am considering is to fly ZRH-LHR-YYC with BA and visiting the Canadian Rockies rather than going via NY. I don't see any options to travel back to Australia with One World from Calgary so we could pay for a YYC-YVR flight and then book CX for YVR-HKG-SYD or pay for YYC-LAX and then try for LAX-SYD on QF.

For the 280K award trip we did between January and March 2014 we flew to LAX with QF, then travelled to and from South America with LA and with BA for JFK-LHR, LHR-ZRH, ZRH-LHR connecting with QF for LHR-SYD and were able to book all flights when they were released with the help of the BAEC website to see LA availability and then calling QF. We were given the 3 x 32kg allowance for all flights on the itinerary, although we didn't have that many bags. When I was planning that trip I had looked at IB but I read some bad reviews for IB at the time so didn't consider IB while I was planning, but recently I've seen some positive comments on AFF about IB so that's good to know I can include them with my planning.

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

The obvious place to see QF availability is on the QF website. You wouldn’t look on the AA site unless you were wanting to book a flight through AAdvantage.
You should be able to see QR availability on the QF site, but maybe search for the legs separately e.g. SYD – DOH and DOH – LHR because the QF platform by default tends to show mainly the options through DXB – QR is the only airline going through DOH between Oz and LHR IIRC so awards are easy to see, if they’re available.

AA availability for both domestic and international awards has gone to the dogs since they joined forces with US Airways in Feb last year. Quite often now you find that only one J seat will be available (sometimes none) so it’s hopeless for couples trying to book a trip. The other annoying thing about AA is that even if they do show availability between 2 cities for their domestic services, often, when you check the details, you can’t get a direct flight and they route you through somewhere else which doesn’t have very convenient transit times.

We flew MIA – MAD 18 months ago with IB and the plane, inflight service and meals in J were great. Their domestic services are not as good (like so many other airlines) but definitely OK for short flights. We’re doing MAD – JFK with them next month so I’ll post some comments if we come across any (unexpected) deficiencies.

Your US / Canada itinerary is eerily similar to what we’re doing. We’re doing JFK - YVR with CX and then we’re paying for Westjet tickets to YYC - which is only a short flight so not much extra expense. That’s an option for you if you don’t want to miss out on NY (I wouldn’t dare suggest to Mrs V. that we bypass NY on any trip). As you mentioned, unfortunately YYC doesn’t have much in the way of OW options. We are flying YYC – LAS (with WS again) and then doing a road trip around Monument Valley, Zion etc. before heading to LAX to fly back to MEL. For those LAX – OZ flights, Mondays seem to have the best availability I found – for most days of the week nothing in J showed up at all. Business people seem not to want to fly back to Oz from the US at the start of a week it seems, hence awards for Mondays are gettable if you’re quick.

Also, it is definitely an option to fly via BNE from LAX – more availability but you just don’t get to travel on the A380.

Our original intention was to fly YVR – HKG – SYD on the way back but it’s one of those CX combos that you just will not get awards for (so don't waste your time) unless you have a stopover in HKG. YVR – NRT – SYD might be an option for you if you decided against the LAX route.

 

[adelee]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

My experience when searching on Qantas for J flights between Aus - US - Europe - Aus in Dec 2016 / Jan 2015 was that no QR J awards were available across any of the routes I searched. Y seats appear to be plentiful, but nothing for J. Having said that, I did see just a few pop up on British Airways site, so maybe the QR J display on Qantas is limited?

 

[Ken1]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

We flew MIA – MAD 18 months ago with IB and the plane, inflight service and meals in J were great. Their domestic services are not as good (like so many other airlines) but definitely OK for short flights. We’re doing MAD – JFK with them next month so I’ll post some comments if we come across any (unexpected) deficiencies.

Our original intention was to fly YVR – HKG – SYD on the way back but it’s one of those CX combos that you just will not get awards for (so don't waste your time) unless you have a stopover in HKG. YVR – NRT – SYD might be an option for you if you decided against the LAX route.

Thanks for the information in your replies vetrade and adelee - it's very helpful. Regarding YVR - HKG - SYD, I've seen several examples of that route coming up on QF FF - eg when I looked today I see for Wed 16 Mar CX837 YVR - HKG 1430-1910, CX101 HKG - SYD 2355 - 1205. Does "but it’s one of those CX combos that you just will not get awards for" mean that even though those two flights show up together when searching YVR - SYD through QF that they won't be able to ticket them?

Regarding searching IB award flights - I've seen some listed on BA but do I need to sign up to Iberia Plus to see all award flights? If so, is it the same as BA that you can't use an Australian address?

I won't be starting to book flights until mid July but I want to be prepared for different options when the time comes. If I was to book a CX or BA flight as the first flight in our itinerary that does not show up on the QF website do QF ever waive the 3500 point booking fee? On last year's trip I booked an EK GIG - EZE flight with QF points, separate from the 280K J award, but that flight didn't show up on the QF website but they still charged me the booking fee, even though I asked about having it waived. Usually I try to book the first flight online and then add to the itinerary as each flight is released using 3,500 point change fees.

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Does "but it’s one of those CX combos that you just will not get awards for" mean that even though those two flights show up together when searching YVR - SYD through QF that they won't be able to ticket them?

Regarding searching IB award flights - I've seen some listed on BA but do I need to sign up to Iberia Plus to see all award flights? If so, is it the same as BA that you can't use an Australian address?

I won't be starting to book flights until mid July but I want to be prepared for different options when the time comes. If I was to book a CX or BA flight as the first flight in our itinerary that does not show up on the QF website do QF ever waive the 3500 point booking fee? On last year's trip I booked an EK GIG - EZE flight with QF points, separate from the 280K J award, but that flight didn't show up on the QF website but they still charged me the booking fee, even though I asked about having it waived. Usually I try to book the first flight online and then add to the itinerary as each flight is released using 3,500 point change fees.

Your understanding about YVR - HKG - SYD is correct - you can see the combo online but even if you are able book them then, you will get an email in a day or two to say it can't be ticketed. The QF operator explained this idiosyncrasy with CX connections through HKG to me (for us, those 2 flights would have been perfect, but it was not to be) and I subsequently verified it again with a different operator. I was told that even if QF put it through CX will block it as soon as it shows up on their system.

You don't need to join IB to search for their awards - I've always been able to find the IB flights I was after at QF. I think IB must make more award seats (incl. J) available compared with other airlines because my experience is that you can get them for about a month or more after they have been released. When you're trying to piece together award flights I found it comforting that I knew I didn't have to ring and add IB flights to our itinerary as soon as they were released - I could save some of the 3500 point change fees by booking the IB flights when I had some other change to make.
FWIW you can use your Oz address to join IB Plus.

Regarding change fees, I've always found the QF operators quite accommodating in that regard if it's obvious you couldn't make the initial booking yourself on line. I'm guessing your EK flight didn't qualify for a waiver of the 3500 point fee because it was a separate booking to your OW RTW one.

 

[Ken1]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

The BA site may not be as useful for checking availability of some BA rewards flights not showing when logged in to QF FF after changes BA are making on April 28 with different numbers of points required for different times of the year.

For example when I've checked the BA site each day over the past week I've seen 2 J rewards seats released for next March on most days when looking at SYD-LHR on BA16 and LHR-SYD on BA15 that have not shown up on the QF site. I've also seen some CX flights and combinations of CX and BA flights on the BA and CX sites that have not shown up on the QF site.

I called QF a few days ago to ask if they were seeing flights I was seeing for the BA and CX flights for me to book as a Bronze FF, like BA15 and 16 and some of the CX flights and they showing as available, so at least when I'm ready to book for the start of our 280K OWA in July I know there could be more options than I can see on the QF site, even for airlines with flights that usually do show up on the QF site.


It will be interesting to see if the BA changes mean that some flights in peak periods are no longer available for QF FF redemptions. I know I can also check award flight availability on the CX site through Asia Miles or Marco Polo but the BA site is handy for seeing how many reward seats are still available.

Details of the BA changes are as follows:

https://www.britishairways.com/en-us/executive-club/club-changes

We’re making some changes to the Executive Club

From 28 April 2015, you’ll notice a difference to the way you earn and spend Avios with us. We’re making these changes to be able to offer more reward seats to you, and to ensure that the Executive Club continues to evolve and deliver a competitive and rewarding loyalty programme in the future.
The majority of these changes will come into effect at 00:00 British Summer Time (GMT +1) on 28 April

Changes to reward flight prices with British AirwaysWe will introduce variable Avios pricing for reward flights depending on the time of the year, the cabin and zone. At busy peak times of the year we will have a standard Avios price and for less busy, off-peak times fewer Avios will be needed.
This means that for two thirds of the year you will require fewer Avios than now to fly on reward seats in Euro Traveller and World Traveller. In Club World and First the Avios price will increase and the amount will vary depending on the time of the year.
Taxes, fees and carrier charges must still be paid in full and the cost of these will not vary depending on if you are travelling during a busy or quieter travel period.


Changes to reward flight prices with our partner airlinesIberia will also introduce variable peak and off-peak Avios pricing for reward flights but their peak and off-peak calendar dates will differ from British Airways'. However, Iberia flights from London to Madrid will be priced as per the British Airways calendar and Avios rates.
Calendar of Iberia peak and off-peak periods
Our other airline partners will continue to offer a single year-round Avios price for reward flights.
Taxes, fees and carrier charges must still be paid in full and the cost of these will not vary depending on if you are travelling during a busy or quieter travel period.

 

[ozflier]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Try their Facebook and Twitter, their social media team seems to be much more responsive than other staff. I had a complaint about a different matter (missing points on a shopping transaction through Qantas Mall) and I just couldn't get anywhere through normal channels (rang a few times and spoke to different people but was told it was all my fault) until I used both Facebook and Twitter. The matter wasn't resolved straight away but it did get a resolution, finally I got my points and an apology from Qantas

Ta for that - I'm moving on Twitter and Facebook and have approached a travel journalist.

 

[adelee]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Hi all. I've recently spent some time on the phone to Qantas trying to turn my CX ADL-HKG / HKG-JFK legs from a stopover into a transit, and wanted to share some information I learned during this process. As alluded to in the past on this forum (and VeTrade has provided particularly useful info re this issue), often, individual segment CX flight award appear to be available on the Qantas or other Oneworld websites, however when trying to add them in to a multi segment itinerary, they are blocked. The advice I've received from Qantas in the past in regards to this issue has been quite inconsistent, and most operators will simply state that there is no availability (even when we can see it on the website).

The helpful person (Narelle) I spoke to today advised me that CX actually have different availability quotas for 'long haul' (multi segment) vs 'short haul' (single segment) awards, and there is often short haul availability still displaying when long haul availability has completely dried up. For me, I've been looking at separate single segment ADL-HKG and HKG-JFK availability, and finding plenty of J seats that would turn my stopover into a transit. However, the flights I want are not available when I call up the call centre and try to add it into my multi segment itinerary.

The moral of the story is that multi segment availability without a stopover on CX does exist, but it is hard to find - and you need to search for the multi segments together, rather than individual segments only. I'm still no closer to reducing my time in HKG in December to under 24 hours, but who knows, maybe some long haul availability will open up later in the year!

 

[madrooster]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

The moral of the story is that multi segment availability without a stopover on CX does exist, but it is hard to find - and you need to search for the multi segments together, rather than individual segments only. I'm still no closer to reducing my time in HKG in December to under 24 hours, but who knows, maybe some long haul availability will open up later in the year!

This is not CX specific either. An example of QF doing it on a commercial fare... I found on QF11 SYD-LAX only had L class and above available, LAX-JFK had S and above and SYD-JFK had S and above as well. Basically if one were to stopover in LAX, you would have to upfare to a L class ticket. If there was to be no stopover, then you could use S class. For those who don't know the QF commercial classes, L is the class above S.

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

The helpful person (Narelle) I spoke to today advised me that CX actually have different availability quotas for 'long haul' (multi segment) vs 'short haul' (single segment) awards, and there is often short haul availability still displaying when long haul availability has completely dried up. For me, I've been looking at separate single segment ADL-HKG and HKG-JFK availability, and finding plenty of J seats that would turn my stopover into a transit. However, the flights I want are not available when I call up the call centre and try to add it into my multi segment itinerary.

The moral of the story is that multi segment availability without a stopover on CX does exist, but it is hard to find - and you need to search for the multi segments together, rather than individual segments only. I'm still no closer to reducing my time in HKG in December to under 24 hours, but who knows, maybe some long haul availability will open up later in the year!

Just to add to the conversation before people get their hopes up too much looking for the multi segment vs single segment availability via HKG................ Narelle's "different availability quotas" would imply that CX uses some modified fare class system to differentiate between single or multi segment flights. That is not the case; whether single or multi segment, all award seats book into the same class i.e. X for economy, U for business and Z for first. Multi segmented flights are therefore simply a combination of single segment ones and both use the same fare classes. In short, I think "Narelle's" comments really only create expectations where they're probably not warranted.

CX simply blocks transits through HKG to control the number of ppl using their award seats through their main hub, without having a stopover - and I think it's unlikely to be related to and multi segment quota. It's actually not surprising that CX do this considering how many members of other airlines' FF programs (especially QF) would transit through HKG on award tickets if they could

CX does have multi segment awards available on their flights but my understanding is that (in the context of OW awards, at least) they exist only for segments connecting (transiting) through a city other than HKG.

 

[snabbu]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Interesting.

I have a 280k coming up with two separate sub 24 hour transits in HKG.

One is CX-QF, no problems. The other is CX-CX.

The itin has been ticketed for months now - should I be concerned about the CX-CX transit?

 

[adelee]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Interesting.

I have a 280k coming up with two separate sub 24 hour transits in HKG.

One is CX-QF, no problems. The other is CX-CX.

The itin has been ticketed for months now - should I be concerned about the CX-CX transit?

I don't think so. I believe you can transit through HKG using a multi segment CX. I currently have a ticketed CX AMS-HKG-MEL that is transit only (I'm just trying to get rid of the stopover the other way). I have also had Qantas call centre staff confirm the availability of a couple of CX multi segment transit ticket options today. As far as I know, if CX isn't going to allow something, their computers will kick it out immediately - there shouldn't be any problems once ticketed.

 

[vetrade]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

Interesting points made. Judging by your comments snabbu and adelee, I'm now thinking it may be that CX allows multi segment transits through HKG if one of the cities either side of HKG is a "lower level" destination where demand for award seats is not very competitive. In adelee's case AMS could fit that category. I'd be interested in the details of your CX connecting flight segments snabbu to test my theory further.

Admittedly, the CX transits via HKG I've tried to book in the past have been from/to prominent cities (LHR, JFK, LAX, YVR, JNB, NRT etc) and into/out of SYD, BNE or MEL combined with info about non-availability through HKG directly from QF staff. Unfortunately, as others have mentioned, QF staff regularly provide inaccurate or misleading info - which is why thrashing out the specifics on forums like this is so informative.

FWIW I was told that even if you do happen to be able to book a transit through HKG (via a call to QF), CX will block it within 2-3 days maximum; in which case if the connecting flights have been ticketed for some time there should be very little risk of losing those bookings.

 

[snabbu]

re: "oneworld" award (140K/280K/420K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

My CX-CX is MEL-HKG (CX104) then HKG-SIN (CX659).

As the 659 is intra-asia maybe it doesn't fit your theory of being a prominent city... perhaps prominent isn't the right word but more like a "major international destination" like LHR/JFK/ORD/etc as you describe above.

In saying that, my previous 280k award involved ORD-HKG-PER where both segments were on CX and was a transit, back then I had no problems.

Could it be that this "no transit through HKG on CX is allowed" idea is more about YMMV and a HUACA is the way to get around the perceived issue?