Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[timbervolt]

Hi,

I watched Matt's recent webinar on booking a QF RTW Award flight. He showed how he finds out which airlines with F cabins fly to a city and from where they originated. Would someone enlighten me how to do this please?

 

[Aussiejosh]

Hi,

I watched Matt's recent webinar on booking a QF RTW Award flight. He showed how he finds out which airlines with F cabins fly to a city and from where they originated. Would someone enlighten me how to do this please?

OW first class routes thread - FlyerTalk Forums

 

[azza_1992]

Nearly had an awkward situation unfold this morning - posting here to restress the importance of making sure your flights get ticketed!



I called up yesterday to make minor changes to one flight and add two more flights in the middle of a 9 leg itinerary.

The call centre agent made the changes, but mentioned there was something wrong with the system and would call back shortly once their supervisor manually calculated the new taxes and surcharges. Sure enough, within half an hour the agent called back with updated price estimate and to collect my credit card details, and all seemed in order.

"Is there anything else that needs to be done, or are these tickets now confirmed?"

"All sorted, enjoy your trip."

Thankfully I'd read other ticketing horror stories on here, and despite all flights showing in the Qantas booking via the app, I kept checking my email waiting for the e-ticket to come through.

My paranoia paid off this morning when I noticed that all Cathay flights, including those unchanged from yesterday, had dropped out of the booking on the Qantas app.

I called immediately and was expecting the worst based on the tone of the new Qantas agent as she got me to read out what extra flights were previously the booking, including a prized J seat between HKG and Europe in Summer.

Thankfully all were still available and the flights were properly ticketed before I got off the phone. The call centre agent sounded as relieved as I was, and reiterated a couple of times that she'd be providing feedback to the agent I was dealing with yesterday.

All good in the end, but can anyone more familiar with these bookings say what actually happened here? Do booked-but-unticketed flights on partner carriers get released after 24 hours?

 

[Familyman1]

Hopefully you can help me with a question about transits/stopovers: if I do a stopover with a surface transport section, do the cities at the start and end of the surface transport sector count as stopover cities.

So what I really want to know is, is the following within the rules for a 140,000 point Oneworld itinerary:

BNE-HKG(Stop)-LHR(Stop, surface)-BGO-HEL-SIN(Stop)-HEL-DUS(Stop, surface)-HEL-PVG(Stop)-HKG-BNE (34,713 miles).

You can see that HEL appears 3 times but is this 2 transits and 1 stopover and therefore OK.

 

[cambriamarsh]

Here's another curly that I would appreciate some advice on.

Looking to go AKL-TLV in Sep 19 in J but PE to HKG on a daylight flight (or even Y if needs must...) would be fine. If I was able to see PE/Y on the AKL-HKG leg and J on the HKG-TLV leg would they potentially be subject to the married segments rule or would the fact they are in different classes potentially avoid that issue?

Thanks for any insights you can offer.

cheers, CM

 

[exceladdict]

Hopefully you can help me with a question about transits/stopovers: if I do a stopover with a surface transport section, do the cities at the start and end of the surface transport sector count as stopover cities.

So what I really want to know is, is the following within the rules for a 140,000 point Oneworld itinerary:

BNE-HKG(Stop)-LHR(Stop, surface)-BGO-HEL-SIN(Stop)-HEL-DUS(Stop, surface)-HEL-PVG(Stop)-HKG-BNE (34,713 miles).

You can see that HEL appears 3 times but is this 2 transits and 1 stopover and therefore OK.

Off memory, earlier correspondence in this thread suggests that you are within the rules, however, some QF phone agents argue (incorrectly?) that it counts as two. Are all segments available online? Try a dummy booking and see if it gets to the pricing/checkout page.

Here's another curly that I would appreciate some advice on.

Looking to go AKL-TLV in Sep 19 in J but PE to HKG on a daylight flight (or even Y if needs must...) would be fine. If I was able to see PE/Y on the AKL-HKG leg and J on the HKG-TLV leg would they potentially be subject to the married segments rule or would the fact they are in different classes potentially avoid that issue?

Thanks for any insights you can offer.

cheers, CM

I think there was a case a few pages back of someone being able to book separate classes and not get caught by MSC, despite being caught by MSC when trying to do J the whole way through. Are you able to get to the pricing page? Alternatively, if you search AKL-TLV, does it show up as a mixed class option?

 

[cambriamarsh]

I think there was a case a few pages back of someone being able to book separate classes and not get caught by MSC, despite being caught by MSC when trying to do J the whole way through. Are you able to get to the pricing page? Alternatively, if you search AKL-TLV, does it show up as a mixed class option?

Thanks for this, I haven’t seen a mixed class offering from CX so will have to try and build one where I can’t get J all the way. I’ll give it a go and report back.

 

[Familyman1]

Off memory, earlier correspondence in this thread suggests that you are within the rules, however, some QF phone agents argue (incorrectly?) that it counts as two. Are all segments available online? Try a dummy booking and see if it gets to the pricing/checkout page.



I think there was a case a few pages back of someone being able to book separate classes and not get caught by MSC, despite being caught by MSC when trying to do J the whole way through. Are you able to get to the pricing page? Alternatively, if you search AKL-TLV, does it show up as a mixed class option?

Thanks. Yes I was able to try a dummy booking and BNE-HKG(Stop)-LHR(Stop, surface)-BGO-HEL-SIN(Stop)-HEL-DUS(Stop, surface)-HEL-PVG(Stop)-HKG-BNE did come in at 140,000 points for an economy seat.

 

[cambriamarsh]

After spending some hours on this trying to find a date where CX J wasn't available AKL-TLV but CX W/J was available AKL-HKG and CX J was available HKG-TLV with no success I've decided to go and enjoy some fresh air and come back to this challenge.

It seems the CX flights on both legs are quite hard to get at the moment and CX is not releasing the same availability to QF as it does to its own Asia Miles members (PS in QFF and NB in Asia Miles). Does that sound right?

Cheers, CM

 

[geoffb78]

Hi all

I'm part-way through booking my second OneWorld Explorer award and think I have made a minor but rookie error.

My current routing is SYD-xPER-HKG-xDOH-FRA-surface-HEL-SIN (all in J). I'll add some further segments to the end once they become available.

Separately, I booked ZRH-HEL under a separate award booking (saving around $800 for 28,000 points).

After doing this, I realised I should have incorporated the ZRH-HEL leg into the Explorer award.

Can I do this now? I realise I could just cancel the award seats from ZRH-HEL and take a chance that the inventory becomes available again but given the cash savings at risk, I'd be reluctant to do that. Can two award bookings be 'merged' or similar?

I'd also like to add BNE-SYD to the beginning of the itinerary. Is this possible too/either?

Thanks for your collective advice.

Cheers

Geoff.

 

[Captain Halliday]

Can I do this now? I realise I could just cancel the award seats from ZRH-HEL and take a chance that the inventory becomes available again but given the cash savings at risk, I'd be reluctant to do that. Can two award bookings be 'merged' or similar?

Can you see award seats for your preferred date for ZHR-HEL? If so, add them to your booking first, then cancel the separate booking later. Note the change fee on your OWA and the cancellation fee on the single sector classic awards will both apply.

I'd also like to add BNE-SYD to the beginning of the itinerary. Is this possible too/either?

Yes, assuming you’re still within 35,000 miles. But do it at the same time as your other change so you only pay one change fee.

 

[geoffb78]

Can you see award seats for your preferred date for ZHR-HEL? If so, add them to your booking first, then cancel the separate booking later. Note the change fee on your OWA and the cancellation fee on the single sector classic awards will both apply.


Yes, assuming you’re still within 35,000 miles. But do it at the same time as your other change so you only pay one change fee.

Thanks for the info.

The award seats for ZRH-HEL are no longer there (I guess I took them when I made the separate booking the other day). I'm worried that if I cancel that booking, the award seats might not become automatically available for adding to my Explorer booking. Any thoughts on that issue?

The advice about change fees is appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Jacques Vert]

Can I do this now? I realise I could just cancel the award seats from ZRH-HEL and take a chance that the inventory becomes available again but given the cash savings at risk, I'd be reluctant to do that. Can two award bookings be 'merged' or similar?

Why not call and ask? They can only say "yes" or "no".

Most likely the answer will be "no", but I seem to remember one member saying they had success in getting an agent to merge two bookings. (It will probably depend on the agent who answers the phone.)

 

[Captain Halliday]

Thanks for the info.

The award seats for ZRH-HEL are no longer there (I guess I took them when I made the separate booking the other day). I'm worried that if I cancel that booking, the award seats might not become automatically available for adding to my Explorer booking. Any thoughts on that issue?

The advice about change fees is appreciated. Thanks.

There’s no guarantee they’ll reappear. If the cash fare is significant I’d stick with the separate award booking and take it as a lesson learned.

But look on the bright side, you can still add BNE-SYD though!

 

[JohnM]

Please, please, please, stop referring to a OneWorld Explorer Award. There is no such thing and it causes immense confusion.

There are two different things that keep getting subsumed into each other in naming:

A OneWorld Explorer is a paid RTW, unlimited distance, maximum 16-sector fare.

A OneWorld Award is a FF points redemption, distance and stopover-limited itinerary with no requirement to go RTW.

 

[geoffb78]

Please, please, please, stop referring to a OneWorld Explorer Award. There is no such thing and it causes immense confusion.

There are two different things that keep getting subsumed into each other in naming:

A OneWorld Explorer is a paid RTW, unlimited distance, maximum 16-sector fare.

A OneWorld Award is a FF points redemption, distance and stopover-limited itinerary with no requirement to go RTW.

Yep, I realised this a few minutes ago. For clarity, it's the OneWorld award I'm referring to.

 

[cjd600]

Please, please, please, stop referring to a OneWorld Explorer Award. There is no such thing and it causes immense confusion.

There are two different things that keep getting subsumed into each other in naming:

A OneWorld Explorer is a paid RTW, unlimited distance, maximum 16-sector fare.

A OneWorld Award is a FF points redemption, distance and stopover-limited itinerary with no requirement to go RTW.

was waiting for that,JohnM...you're getting very quick...
Lucky they didnt say the saved $800 in "taxes" or Serfty would be in as well

 

[Janusjiang]

Hi all,

Sorry if these questions have been asked before but I couldn't find any answers in my planning to book the 280k-point business class oneworld classic rewards:

1. Could I call Qantas to add segments to a simple 'one-way' ticket, so that this ticket will become one-world classic rewards? The reason I want to do this because I want to make a booking as soon as the availability of the first segment appears before it quickly disappear. I don't mind paying the change fee of 5,000 points.
2. What changes could I made after I fly my first segments? Can I change the class of travel from Y to J? For instance, the first segment and last segment is 11 month apart. When I fly my first segment, only Y is available; however, sometimes closer to the departure of the last segment, more J seats are available, could I change from Y to J in that case?

 

[exceladdict]

Hi all,

Sorry if these questions have been asked before but I couldn't find any answers in my planning to book the 280k-point business class oneworld classic rewards:

1. Could I call Qantas to add segments to a simple 'one-way' ticket, so that this ticket will become one-world classic rewards? The reason I want to do this because I want to make a booking as soon as the availability of the first segment appears before it quickly disappear. I don't mind paying the change fee of 5,000 points.
2. What changes could I made after I fly my first segments? Can I change the class of travel from Y to J? For instance, the first segment and last segment is 11 month apart. When I fly my first segment, only Y is available; however, sometimes closer to the departure of the last segment, more J seats are available, could I change from Y to J in that case?

1. Yes (i think)
2. No. The only voluntary changes after flights flown are dates. Must be same origin, destination, class, and carrier

 

[cjd600]

1. Yes, definitely.
Just say you want to make a change to an existing award and add a flight.
Don't say something like you want to change a one-way award into a OneWorld Award, this will confuse the hell out of them.
No choice but to pay the 5k change fee.
Don't let them try entertain the 8k assistance fee that doesnt apply to J awards though