Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[Warragul]

My reading of this offer is that adding flights/changing cities to OWA itinerary booked prior to 30 sep 2022, would not be covered by the fee waiver, as it only mentions change of flight date or cancellation.

Flexible Classic Flight Rewards | Qantas Frequent Flyer

Book an eligible Classic Flight Reward using your points, we’ll waive any change or cancellation fees until 31 October 2020.

www.qantas.com

I'm hoping to travel September/October 2023 and wondering if I make a booking now with the first leg or two whether I can add flights and/or change cities 'fee free' until December this year.

Any advice keenly accepted.

 

[Mr H]

My reading of this offer is that adding flights/changing cities to OWA itinerary booked prior to 30 sep 2022, would not be covered by the fee waiver, as it only mentions change of flight date or cancellation.

Flexible Classic Flight Rewards | Qantas Frequent Flyer

Book an eligible Classic Flight Reward using your points, we’ll waive any change or cancellation fees until 31 October 2020.

www.qantas.com

I'm hoping to travel September/October 2023 and wondering if I make a booking now with the first leg or two whether I can add flights and/or change cities 'fee free' until December this year.

Any advice keenly accepted.

Yes you are right but IIRC, the first flight has to be within a year of the original booking so you may have problems changing it if it takes that departure date beyond 365 days of when you did your initial booking. Having said that, the rules have been in flux for some time…

 

[QF029]

I'm hoping the experts here may be able to shed some light on why the below itinerary prices out at more than 318k. All legs are J (U) except PHL-MIA and MIA-JFK which are both Y (T fare bucket on AA).

MEL-LAX (QF)
LAS-PHL-MIA-BOG (AA&LA)
BOG-MIA-JFK (all AA)
JFK-SYD-MEL (QF)

Is there an issue adding LA? I'm doing this to get a second non QF carrier and everything I read is that they are OW and therefore eligble.

 

[aikman]

LA left oneworld in 2020

 

[QF029]

LA left oneworld in 2020

Thanks, I totally missed that. It looks like I'll need to add an AS flight if I want to make it a OWE.

Do American Eagle count as standard AA? I'm assuming so given their flight numbers are AAxx_x.

 

[Warragul]

Yes you are right but IIRC, the first flight has to be within a year of the original booking so you may have problems changing it if it takes that departure date beyond 365 days of when you did your initial booking. Having said that, the rules have been in flux for some time…

Thanks. I think the 12 months is from the original departure date not ticketed date. Will check though.

 

[DC3]

Do American Eagle count as standard AA?

Yes

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Can confirm there is a disparity between what we can see on line, and what can actually be ticketed.

I use ‘ticketed’ because QF seems to have implemented secret restrictions which mean flight combinations otherwise perfectly within the rules are being stopped because of commercial considerations.

There’s another thread discussing how domestic segments can’t be added on to inbound QFi flights… so even though the multi-city tool shows flights for SIN-SYD and SYD-MEL, you’ll get an error.

Calling in the call centre can’t see any domestic connections in conjunction with the inbound SIN-SYD.

Those routings are perfectly valid, they show in the multi-city tool, but it seems commercial considerations are being given priority.

Given some of the issues outlined above with various connecting flights being ‘unavailable’, this seems like it is going to become more widespread

Of course you can ticket the connections if using a separate booking and paying the increased fare.

A couple of other points from the last few pages.

The multi-city tool will often error out if you attempt to book something using all 6 available flights. Limiting it to 5 should help on the planning process, before calling to book all the flights you need.

The second issue, and this has happened twice on call to SA this week… agents are claiming you can book two sets of flights separately and they can combine them. This is *not* possible. Once flights are on separate PNRs that’s where they stay. They can ‘link’ the bookings, but you’ll lose any through-fare benefits.

 

[Mr H]

Thanks. I think the 12 months is from the original departure date not ticketed date. Will check though.

I thought travel had to commence within 12 months of the original booking date and travel had to be completed within 12 months of the departure date, but I may be wrong (would not be the first time).

 

[ozflier]

Some advice on a complicated set of flights to my initial destination please.

We are travelling on a business class OWA.

I am going to Marrakesh Morocco later this week from Brisbane.

The original routing was Brisbane- Haneda – London – Marrakesh. ( Minimal transit times and I thought doable with minimal stress)

Qantas cancelled the direct service BNE-HND a month or so ago!

The only available options to replace it were BNE-SIN-HND.(Qantas and BA did not have any award available seats SIN- LHR and QF would not free up QF revenue seats for us either via LHR or LAX.)

So, by the time we now arrive in HND, the connection thru to LHR had already departed .

The only way to get to Marrakesh then was via New York and Casablanca.

Sorry to make it a long story but I wanted to explain the complexity of the routing we are now forced to take .

New routing BNE-SIN-HND-JFK-CMN-RAK. ( QF/JAL/JAL/AT/AT)

Some of the transits are over 8 hours .

Still at least we found a way to get there no thanks to Qantas.

My issues-

Baggage – only one hold bag and an additional carry on one – I was afraid that anything put into the hold may not make to Marrakesh – even a day late and we would be on a trek and goodness knows when bags would catch up with us! ( We would cope for a week with our carry on) Need a lot of baggage as we are away for 4 weeks.

The best option would be to tag bags only thru to HND but I would need to clear Japan immigration to collect them and recheck in – not doable at the moment.

We have a nine and a half layover in JFK – I was thinking of requesting the hold bag go only as far as JFK and recheck it there . We have booked a six hour stay at a nearby hotel so could just take all our bags there with us and come back and check in with Royal Air Maroc in T1 at JFK prior to the 2040 hrs departure .

Would Qantas BNE check-in be prepared to check my hold bag thru to JFK only? Would it be legal? Are there downsides?

Then it comes to the boarding passes being issued . I find it hard to believe that we would be issued with BPs all the way to CMN or RAK . Partly because Morocco have requirements before a BP is issued for that country and BNE staff may be unaware of them.

So the other question is could I request BPs only thru JFK and recheck just for the JFK-CMN-RAK. ( I realise I would need to collect my baggage at CMN to enter the country anyway).

Can you see any downside of having BPs only thru to JFK.

Thank you for your advice . I was unhappy that QF left me with such a complicated set of flights, but I guess that’s life .

I look forward to your thoughts and thank you in advance.

 

[Phoenix-1]

There’s another thread discussing how domestic segments can’t be added on to inbound QFi flights… so even though the multi-city tool shows flights for SIN-SYD and SYD-MEL, you’ll get an error.

Can you link this thread? I'm having the same issue...

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Would Qantas BNE check-in be prepared to check my hold bag thru to JFK only? Would it be legal? Are there downsides?

Regardless of where QF are able to tag the bags, you’ll have to collect them at JFK and clear immigration and customs. So you’ll be reunited with the bags there and have to check them in again with AT anyway.

I’m surprised QF would not release seats for you after they cancelled the BNE-HND flight. Their terms and conditions say they will find alternative flights, and those flights do not need award inventory.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Can you link this thread? I'm having the same issue...

Qantas married segment logic

Any advice on what to do here would be appreciated..booked a flight with points LAX-MEL (but want LAX-SYD). LAX-SYD did not appear on the search engine for that day - only LAX-MEL. I even did a multi city, LAX-MEL-SYD and it priced correctly, but errored out (generic error) at the final step. I...

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

The relevant stuff starts from post 14, by vetrade.

 

[Mr H]

I’m surprised QF would not release seats for you after they cancelled the BNE-HND flight. Their terms and conditions say they will find alternative flights, and those flights do not need award inventory.

QF might well release a revenue seat but Fiji do not put in the requests for it. They lie and say they will, but they don’t.

 

[Phoenix-1]

Qantas married segment logic

Any advice on what to do here would be appreciated..booked a flight with points LAX-MEL (but want LAX-SYD). LAX-SYD did not appear on the search engine for that day - only LAX-MEL. I even did a multi city, LAX-MEL-SYD and it priced correctly, but errored out (generic error) at the final step. I...

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

The relevant stuff starts from post 14, by vetrade.

Thanks

 

[jpp42]

Question about points deduction - I booked a RTW (J x 2) on Friday around 9pm Sydney time, via the multi-city tool (thanks to the great team at Award Flight Assist for finding my flights), and got my e-tickets about 24 hours later - both travellers' e-ticket numbers showing in the PDF attachment. Have double checked on Royal Jordanian web site as well and e-tickets are showing. However, no points have been deducted from my QFF account (should be 636,000 pts deducted). The taxes are showing as pending on my credit card. Do the points normally take several days to be deducted? I am just worried that something isn't as it should be - what's the risk everything will be cancelled here?

 

[DC3]

… However, no points have been deducted from my QFF account (should be 636,000 pts deducted). The taxes are showing as pending on my credit card. Do the points normally take several days to be deducted? …

This is perfectly normal. The points deduction will happen ‘in the fullness of time’. As for the pending credit card transaction, I get that all the time, for a few days after a transaction.

It’s up to QF when points are deducted. You have the e-tickets so are good to fly.

 

[jpp42]

It’s up to QF when points are deducted. You have the e-tickets so are good to fly.

Thanks! Yep I expect it will take a few days for the CC charges to finalise, especially over a weekend, no surprises there - didn't realise that would happen with points also. Cheers.

 

[yaksha98]

Thought I'd share my ordeal over the past month with my upcoming OWC booking for June/July 2023 in case anyone was interested (we are bronze & gold - and never once got hobart).

It has thankfully concluded in our favour but goodness knows how it ever got to this point.

25 July - booked the most of our flights online, departing BKK to Europe and some intra Europe flights for June 2023 on QR and IB. No issues with the online booking with points deducted, credit card charged and tickets issued.

Late July - added first leg of flight back to Australia for CDG-HND on JL, surprisingly did not encounter an issue with the call centre, helpful chap in the SA contact centre made the booking and knew about the issues with ticketing and we miraculously had it ticketed in 3 hours from when we made the change with emails and updated etickets in CMT.

30-31 July - this is where the nightmare started. found the last segment of this trip HND-SYD on JL as it became available online. Call to the call center and operator could not add it for some reason, HUACA a few times and same issue. Thinking now it was married segment issues or we were too slow and someone snapped it up. Luckily we however managed to find on another date a single CDG-HND-SYD trip so called again to have that added. As it was ex-BKK, took a while for operator to calculate taxes/points, etc but took all our credit details down and and we saw it pop up on CMT. Failed to get operator to issue ticket on the spot but she said it was in queue for ticketing.

Over the next 3 days, multiple calls yielded different information, including credit card payment issues (had to provided payment details again) and recalculated taxes/points etc - despite us trying to escalate for ticketing expressly telling the operator risk of QR flights dropping off.

As expected, overnight on 3rd day, our first segment departing BKK on QR to Doha and Europe dropped off..... frantic calls to Qantas for reinstatement ensued and in short, over the next 4 weeks we had to make over 20 calls, lodged a customer care complaint online within the first few days and sent 8 emails to Stephanie Tully and the customer care email.

Not sure what the trigger was (email to Stephanie or the customer care complaint online) but at some point we were aware that someone in the Auckland centre had been assigned to resolve the issues.

Over 1-2 weeks we had sporadic contact including a few missed calls from Auckland. Finally managed to have a proper conversation with him last week which resolved our issues - but raised more questions in my mind. Let me explain.

In the morning, he confirmed multiple times on a call that QR had rejected/declined the reinstatement request and so we had proposed some flexibility to fly ex-SIN to Europe and if he could put in a request to convert revenue seats on QF1 to London for us - given this is entirely within QF's control, and gave some options for dates, etc. He had the cheek to ask if we were OK with an economy seat on some legs, or paying additional $ for a commercial fare - which we outright rejected. He said he would go ahead and put together a request for SIN-LHR but could not promise anything.

3-4 hours later, he called back and miraculously had managed to reinstate or find our original ex-BKK flights with QR to Europe and had it rebooked and ticketed all on the same dates as our first booking. As to how, or what changed - he could not explain. And sure enough, the updated e-tickets appeared in my emails immediately and also appeared in CMT.

So whilst relieved the whole thing has been resolved - not knowing what actually happened to get the QR flights back is bizarre, nor knowing what the actual issue was 4 weeks back (taxes not calculated properly? flights not added right by fiji/manila/capetown?) to ensure this doesn't happen next time....

Not looking forward to making any changes to this early next year when we try to add 2024 flights for this as we are positioning from Europe in 2023 to get two trips out of the OWC.

All in all, here are my takeaways if you do need to make changes via the call centre.

- There is some hope in the world to get dropped QR flights even after 4 weeks later.

- Lodge a customer care form online, and do the multiple emails to customer care and Stephanie Tully detailing the terrible customer outcomes on each contact with the offshore centre (even though we never got a formal response back).

- Keep calling and persevering.

- The Auckland agent assigned admitted that he was not very familiar with the oneworld carriers as he was mostly working on QF metal and he had to contact his support team. He did however seem to manage to get ticketing onto the case pretty easily as compared to offshore.

 

[hoochwombat]

Totally new to the One World Multi City Game but planning to book two business flights for August-September 2023 when the windows open. As an ignorant newcomer what does married segments mean?
Also…
should I risk starting a booking online with segments that are available now and adding through call centres once to other dates open or is it safer to wait until my return flight date opens up (September 20, 2023)?
sorry for the basic questions but I am a total newbie