Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[DC3]

OK, now she's saying we have to delete 4 flights - down to 8 flights, in order for her to price the ticket. This is out of control. Qantas is a mess!

HUACA. Probably talking to the wrong person.

 

[sydney]

Any issues here? Seems to be a problem with the last few legs.

AKL-KUL - Transit
KUL-NRT - Stopover 1
NRT-HEL - Transit
HEL-LHR - Stopover 2
CDG-HEL - Transit
HEL-HKT - Stopover 3
BKK-KUL - Transit
KUL-SYD - Stopover 4
SYD-MEL - Transit
MEL-DPS - Stopover 5
DPS-MEL - Transit
MEL-SYD - End trip

They 'escalated' it and I spoke to another person who didn't know the rules and said I'm not allowed to have a stopover in Sydney if I end the trip in Sydney.
They said I had to delete the last 4 flights. Also tried to tell me that the Helsinki transit is a stopover because it's the next day, even though it is a transit because it is within 24 hours.
They're saying that once I leave the Asia zone, I can't return back to Asia. I understand this is incorrect.

 

[DC3]

They 'escalated' it and I spoke to another person who didn't know the rules and said I'm not allowed to have a stopover in Sydney if I end the trip in Sydney.

From memory, there’s a quirk of the system that lumps NZ as being part of Australia. So, transiting/stop-over in Oz may be a problem, as that would be where “the trip ends” (i.e., returning to the ‘country of origin’). Sounds crazy, I know.

 

[sydney]

From memory, there’s a quirk of the system that lumps NZ as being part of Australia. So, transiting/stop-over in Oz may be a problem, as that would be where “the trip ends” (i.e., returning to the ‘country of origin’). Sounds crazy, I know.

I suspected that so tried to change our itinierary to leave from Nadi to Singapore and do Asia first, but now it won't price for the 318k. Does the online system recognise FJ as One World yet?

So much pain. Been on multiple calls and 5hrs on one call. So many don't know the rules and keep telling me stuff that are wrong. Also told me I should not call as can book the One World award online.

 

[mt1552]

I suspected that so tried to change our itinierary to leave from Nadi to Singapore and do Asia first, but now it won't price for the 318k. Does the online system recognise FJ as One World yet?

So much pain. Been on multiple calls and 5hrs on one call. So many don't know the rules and keep telling me stuff that are wrong. Also told me I should not call as can book the One World award online.

Nope, system does not recognise FJ as a full oneworld member yet.

 

[nickfromeastryde]

From memory, there’s a quirk of the system that lumps NZ as being part of Australia. So, transiting/stop-over in Oz may be a problem, as that would be where “the trip ends” (i.e., returning to the ‘country of origin’). Sounds crazy, I know.

I think Auckland being regarded as part of Australia has been an issue in the past but there are posts on here that suggest competent call centre operators can get around that.

FJ are a full OneWorld member now so should be OK but who knows what updates have been made by Qantas and the wider OW network to ensure they can be included in these trips.

You do seem to have 6 stopovers with the last one SYD being a second stopover in the same city. You have not returned to Auckland so from a system perspective, you have not closed the booking.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I suspected that so tried to change our itinierary to leave from Nadi to Singapore and do Asia first, but now it won't price for the 318k. Does the online system recognise FJ as One World yet?

So much pain. Been on multiple calls and 5hrs on one call. So many don't know the rules and keep telling me stuff that are wrong. Also told me I should not call as can book the One World award online.

So the reason for the failed booking is very simple! Rightly or wrongly, the system considers NZ and AU as the same country for OWA purposes. You *may* be able to find an agent trained to fix that, but it might be a stretch.

So, given AU and NZ is the same, you can’t come back to your starting country and leave again. It’s as simple as that.

That’s why the agent told you to delete the last four flights… although it really only needed to be the last three, you could have still flown your SYD-MEL.

As for the Helsinki advice, the problem is that the agent probably didn’t know why your booking was failing. Probably not aware of the system limitation for AU/NZ. In those cases, agents are trying to be ‘helpful’ by coming up with reason why it isn’t working. So they focused on HEL, albeit incorrectly.

As mentioned, FJ is not fully integrated for OWA purposes at the moment, hence you can’t get it in the cap.

These booking are actually fairly simple… it’s just when trying to maximise the mileage you can end up in knots. And come up against some system anomalies.

Post automatically merged: Today at 11:21 AM

You do seem to have 6 stopovers with the last one SYD being a second stopover in the same city. You have not returned to Auckland so from a system perspective, you have not closed the booking.

You don’t need to ‘close’ the booking with a return to AKL. You just need to include the mileage back to AKL.

 

[sydney]

I think Auckland being regarded as part of Australia has been an issue in the past but there are posts on here that suggest competent call centre operators can get around that.

FJ are a full OneWorld member now so should be OK but who knows what updates have been made by Qantas and the wider OW network to ensure they can be included in these trips.

You do seem to have 6 stopovers with the last one SYD being a second stopover in the same city. You have not returned to Auckland so from a system perspective, you have not closed the booking.

So the reason for the failed booking is very simple! Rightly or wrongly, the system considers NZ and AU as the same country for OWA purposes. You *may* be able to find an agent trained to fix that, but it might be a stretch.

So, given AU and NZ is the same, you can’t come back to your starting country and leave again. It’s as simple as that.

That’s why the agent told you to delete the last four flights… although it really only needed to be the last three, you could have still flown your SYD-MEL.

As for the Helsinki advice, the problem is that the agent probably didn’t know why your booking was failing. Probably not aware of the system limitation for AU/NZ. In those cases, agents are trying to be ‘helpful’ by coming up with reason why it isn’t working. So they focused on HEL, albeit incorrectly.

As mentioned, FJ is not fully integrated for OWA purposes at the moment, hence you can’t get it in the cap.

These booking are actually fairly simple… it’s just when trying to maximise the mileage you can end up in knots. And come up against some system anomalies.

Post automatically merged: Today at 11:21 AM

You don’t need to ‘close’ the booking with a return to AKL. You just need to include the mileage back to AKL.

On phone again. We ticketed SIN-KUL instead and left out the last two flights and it tickected.
The agent is saying that if we return to SYD, then the 2nd SYD is a stopover. So then we have too many stopovers?? I know this is not true because our last e-ticket that was cancelled ended in SYD.

The agent was able to return our original AKL-KUL. So now, it is:
(DRATS! He can't get t ticketed. Says the ticketing team found an error in the booking.)
AKL-KUL - Transit
KUL-NRT - Stopover 1
NRT-HEL - Transit
HEL-LHR - Stopover 2
CDG-HEL - Transit
HEL-HKT - Stopover 3
BKK-KUL - Transit
KUL-SYD - Stopover 4
SYD-MEL - Transit
MEL-DPS - Stopover 5

Last 2 flights that were removed still not able to be re-added:
DPS-MEL
MEL-SYD

Any suggestions please?

Latest: So after removing the SIN-KUL and inserting AKL-KUL, it won't re-ticket.
Had an E-ticket this morning for the SIN-KUL, but that's now gone.