Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[cjd600]

I am turning a two flight booking into a OWA. I tried to add four flights to it that are in January 2024. Two went on fine, but three different agents have said that the next two flights are visible on the system but are being rejected for adding on. One agent hypothesized that they have been made visible on the system but have not yet been released for availability. Is that conceivably possible?

I've previously had issues with flights only available for "new bookings" not adding to existing.....

 

[SimonR32]

Tried to book another 318k ticket over the weekend... Had 6 sectors all lined up but it kept popping up an error online. Apparently one flight business class from Tokyo to Honolulu (JAL) didn't even exist according to several call centre operators even though it was showing up on multiple flights on multiple days on multi city... Then another sector that was NRT-KUL-PER that was a mix of JAL and MAS didn't exist when they looked for it and also brought up a booking error on the website (hence the reason I was booking on the phone).

Ended up trying to book it over the phone after a lot of juggling of flights, but they stuffed one of the sectors and booked me in Itami not Kansai and was connecting through Kansai with borderline at best time to get between the airports. Rang back about 6 times, none of them had the skills to fix the mistake, no points or fees were ever deducted so I assumed it was going to remain unticketed. Requested for it to be cancelled... it didn't cancel, so I had to ring back again next day, tried to fix again as I was on the phone, they couldn't comprehend, so I just asked them to cancel again... It was actually cancelled this time, so then I waited 24 hours for the flights to luckily appear again and booked online but compromising the itinerary because I only used 6 sectors through multi-city as I have little to no faith they can book it over the phone.

Long story, but I believe after booking my third Business class one world award in as many months I'd recommend others to only try and book online and stick with the 6 "flights" as if you do it seems to work and be ticketed almost straight away. If not, you're almost guaranteed headaches by calling and either it won't be ticketed or you'll have to call lots of times to get a result and may lose your flights. There also seems to be a new error with flights connecting within 24 hours that the website just can't deal with.

 

[Phoenix-1]

Anyone know any routes out of DXB that have decent availability in J and are non-EK?

 

[Mr H]

Anyone know any routes out of DXB that have decent availability in J and are non-EK?

Only you know when and where you want to go. The basic legwork then is to search possible routes/connections on the multi-city search engine.

 

[levelnine]

Anyone know any routes out of DXB that have decent availability in J and are non-EK?

Plenty for you to check. Royal Air Maroc to CMN, BA to LHR, Cathay Pacific to HKG, Sri Lankan to CMB, etc etc.

 

[Guvner]

RJ to AMM and beyond.

 

[Phoenix-1]

AY also fly from DXB. I've just never seen availability except for CX via HK. Wanted to see if anyone else had experience or I'm just chasing phantoms.

 

[Guvner]

 

[Kiwiash]

Anyone else had their RJ flight from HKG cancelled? Apparently no alternative flights available. Has the route been cancelled?

It wouldn't be a OWA without a couple of hiccups. I thought after spending hours resolving a dropped sector I'd served my fair share but obviously not...

 

[Mr H]

Tried to turn a LHE-CMB-MEL redemption on UL into a OWA by adding SYD-HKG-DXB with CX. Alas the delay in ticketing had led to the cancellation of the previously ticketed UL flights - and the LHE-CMB has not come back into the award availability.

 

[pjm99au]

Anyone else had their RJ flight from HKG cancelled? Apparently no alternative flights available. Has the route been cancelled?

It wouldn't be a OWA without a couple of hiccups. I thought after spending hours resolving a dropped sector I'd served my fair share but obviously not...

View attachment 314678

Yes. Ours were canceled on Tuesday for a week later than your flight

 

[Mr H]

Anyone else had their RJ flight from HKG cancelled? Apparently no alternative flights available. Has the route been cancelled?

It wouldn't be a OWA without a couple of hiccups. I thought after spending hours resolving a dropped sector I'd served my fair share but obviously not...

View attachment 314678

CX does not fly to AMM. Try routing through BKK.

 

[Youfah Mizzum]

This thread is littered with cancelled flights on OWA reward redemptions. It seems like its the norm rather than the exception. Not only this thread but I know close friends who've had reward flights cancelled and they need to scramble to sort out other flights, spend big $ on revenue fares (and hope their QFF points are credited) or the several hours trying to call the QFF line.

A bit of crystal balling but I wonder when we can finally use the QF multi-city tool & it not error, and if we do get bookings which are actually ticketed, that they'll stick until T-0? It just seems such a frustrating merry-go-round right now.

I'd dearly love to arrange a OWA 318K for Mrs Danster & myself some time in the future, (like 353 days out as that's when seats are released, right?) but no amount of fiddling with the multi-city tool comes up with a successful itinerary. And even I did get a successful itinerary, & go to book then I can be pretty much certain those flights will get cancelled.
And even if I don't try for 353 days time & its much closer so that all desired legs would be available/release then I still get errors.
Rough itinerary:
SYD - UK (maybe LHR, MAN, EDI, DUB) - east EU (maybe FRA, BUD) - USA (so JFK, LGA or something) - AKL or ZQN - SYD.
No flights should have a layover greater than 3-4 hours, would prefer to just disembark & stay overnight & explore whatever city it is.

Maybe my question is rhetorical, but I don't have much faith in QF right now.

 

[Mr H]

This thread is littered with cancelled flights on OWA reward redemptions. It seems like its the norm rather than the exception. Not only this thread but I know close friends who've had reward flights cancelled and they need to scramble to sort out other flights, spend big $ on revenue fares or the several hours trying to call the QFF line.

A bit of crystal balling but I wonder when we can finally use the QF multi-city tool & it not error, and if we do get bookings which are actually ticketed, that they'll stick until T-0? It just seems such a frustrating merry-go-round right now.

This has become the norm. QF ticketing does not work - not sure whether it ever did.

OWAs will always be tricky because they can almost never be booked in one hit as flights become available at different points in time. By the time the last required flight becomes available, other required flights will have been taken by someone else. Even if the multi-city tool is error free, there would still be multiple changes required to each itinerary - and in my experience, the call centre usually manage to get the first booking done OK, it is the changes that cause the problems.

Bookings will seldom remain unchanged if they are booked a year in advance. Flight schedules change at least twice a year.

What is needed is a ticketing function that will ticket immediately, and contact the passenger if a problem is encountered rather than just timing out. And in the case of a schedule change, the system needs to automatically reticket - as happened to me the other week when a BA Avios on QR had time changes and I was sent new e-tickets immediately.

 

[Phoenix-1]

View attachment 314649

Thanks. RJ isn't that appealing due to the the aircraft, but it's a reasonable route.

Also something that may help someone in the future - seems like you can make flight changes on Finnair's website that would otherwise be unavailable. I was offered a flight change on Finnair's website that I used to change the date to one day prior. Qantas in MMB didn't offer any alternatives. Received an email shortly after from Qantas saying flights have changed, accepted it in MMB and was ticketed this morning. Furthermore, the original flight has now re-appeared in Qantas's classic award inventory.

Also weirdly enough there was some glitch on Finnair's end where they sent me e-tickets....64 e-tickets in total over about 20 minutes. I think this finally stopped once I accepted Qantas's MMB change, but I can't say for sure.

 

[algae]

Also something that may help someone in the future - seems like you can make flight changes on Finnair's website that would otherwise be unavailable. I was offered a flight change on Finnair's website that I used to change the date to one day prior.

Now that's useful advice. Hadn't even thought of that. In the event of a change, probably worthwhile checking the carrier's website before accepting through Qantas. Good tip!

Did you get an email from Qantas saying the time had changed on that day, but then the Finnair website additionally offered a move to the previous day instead of accepting the time change?

 

[Phoenix-1]

Now that's useful advice. Hadn't even thought of that. In the event of a change, probably worthwhile checking the carrier's website before accepting through Qantas. Good tip!

Did you get an email from Qantas saying the time had changed on that day, but then the Finnair website additionally offered a move to the previous day instead of accepting the time change?

That's correct. Exact chain of events for future reference if anyone ever goes through the same thing:

1. Flight change email from Qantas regarding Finnair flight time change
2. Accepted change
3. Checked Finnair's website to see if seat selection is required and noticed they have a reschedule option
4. Meanwhile e-ticket from Qantas is issued for 1st flight change while I'm mulling over risking my OWCA
5. Selected a new flight on Finnair's website to avoid my 16 hour layover (changed flight to previous day)
6. Finnair page went to a "Please wait while we change your flight, don't close this page"
7. Started receiving mass e-ticket emails + "Your flight has been confirmed" emails from Finnair. E-tickets did not reflect the change in step 5, but the emails did.
8. Received a "Your flight has changed, please accept changes" email from Qantas containing the new flight change made in step 5.
9. Accepted flight change in Qantas MMB (which seemed to stop the Finnair spam, but I also closed the ever-loading page in 7 at the same time).
10. Received email this morning from Finnair saying "Unfortunately your flight time has changed" but it was just showing the flight change in step 5.
11. Called Qantas this morning to push through the e-ticket as I hadn't received it. Received the e-ticket 10 minutes after calling. All flights showing as ticketed in CMT.

 

[pyramidforce]

Hi everyone, my first post, please be gentle.

I must admit I am feeling uneasy at the oneworld RTW flight i booked through Qantas departing this december. With some creative routing, I managed to find business flights to all of the cities I wanted to visit and even managed to keep taxes down by avoiding LHR etc.

But reading through this thread, I must admit it is making me feel somewhat uneasy. Based on what I have read so far, It sounds like when an airline changes anything at all, even the timing of its flight by 5 minutes (or more, which they do multiple times per year), this somehow stuffs up the QF ticketing, you get kicked off flights, airlines cancel your ticket and QF refuses to reticket you because their call centres supposedly dont understand what you want them to do. Considering I am 300+ days out and airlines change their schedules a few times per year, this appears almost guaranteed to happen multiple times between now and then.

I have loaded my trip into CMT, qantas app, Cathay app, etc and at least for now, everything looks right. Still have a 081 eticket number. But when a Cathay or Malaysia airlines or whoever invariably changes their departure time for operational reasons sometime during the year, do I have no other choice than to spend 9 hrs on the phone followed by cc carpet bombing the executives to get the changes confirmed and reticketed, multiple times in the year?

Ive read what the member above me posted and it sounded like they just had to press a confirm button, and...everything eventually sorted itself. Im very happy to receive 65 emails from Finnair and a 16 hr layover if it means i actually get to fly.

Im sorry if this is coming across as very melodramatic but this is the first time I or any one of my friend group/family have done anything like this before. I really appreciate your time in reading this and any advice you could give me about my situation.

 

[aikman]

any advice you could give me about my situation

Don't book any non-refundable hotels.

 

[Phoenix-1]

I really appreciate your time in reading this and any advice you could give me about my situation.

I think the fact that you're aware of it is a great start. You can head off any issues immediately. Also every (I think?) person who's had ticketing issues eventually does get them resolved. Lastly, the vast majority of people end up flying just fine - the horror stories are the ones that we only hear about.