DONE5 American leg questions

[Claudius]

Hi,

Im booking some DONE5 tickets, the American parts of this trip appear to automatically upgrade to F, do they count as F for point purposes or J?

Can a DONE5 (paid) be booked through the Qantas site to earn additional points rather than the OneWorld site?

Thanks in advance.

 

[DC3]

My DONE4 several years ago provided me with first SCs when flying the six AA segments, seated in F (on two-class flights), when crediting to my QFF account. Three-class flights (e.g., some transcon) will book into J from memory, and need to be avoided if chasing the SCs.


Edit: Regarding which oneworld airline to book through, QF is often the most expensive. However, you need to take into account pre-positioning costs if done through another airline.

 

[Himeno]

Hi,

Im booking some DONE5 tickets, the American parts of this trip appear to automatically upgrade to F, do they count as F for point purposes or J?

2 class flights within North America (and on QR within the middle east) do not have business class, they have First and Economy. The rules cause these flights on a DONEx to book in to A. FF programs will treat those flights as A flights. (However, if you book those 2 class flights on the QF code, you will be booked into D. AA does not sell ICDJ booking classes on their North American 2 class flights. The QF codeshares do.)
This rule covers almost every flight by AA and US within the US, Canada and parts of Mexico and the Caribbean. Flights not covered are those short haul international flights were the domestic F cabin is sold as Business, the 1 class regional jets, the JFK-LAX/SFO A321T flights and selected 777 hub-hub flights.

The rule works as follows:
If D is offered, but not available > book as Y.
If D is not offered > book as A. If A is not available > book as Y.

xONEx flights, depending on the exact flight can book into one of the following booking class: GHLYIDJA. The FF program will credit the flight with the rules subject to that booking class and airline.

(I did an LGLOB26 in 2006, LONE4's yearly from 07-09 and combined DAS13/DONE3 yearly since 2010)

Can a DONE5 (paid) be booked through the Qantas site to earn additional points rather than the OneWorld site?

No. Booking online via the link on the QF website takes you to the oneworld site booking tool with QF branding. There have been some reports that following the QF link causes the quote to be more, but it doesn't mean that QF will issue the ticket. In order for QF to take payment and issue the ticket, you need a QF coded flight as the first sector or to call QF or a travel agent and make the booking offline.

 

[Claudius]

Thank you for the very detailed answer Himeno

would you you advise offline booking? Can you select seats for a DONE5?

 

[Himeno]

would you you advise offline booking?

With all the bugs currently in the online tool? yes. I used the online tool all the time before they changed it to the current version and the amount of bugs increased. My last DONE3 was booked with CX Japan via email.
What works best for you would likely depend on what your planned trip is. It might be easiest to book a basic plan via the online tool, then call the issuing airline and have it changed to what you really want with the $125USD change fee.

My trips in 2006-2008 were booked in person at the local Qantas Travel agency until they closed in early 2009. Other then 2011 and this year, I've used the tool with the tickets issued by AA, QF and CX. In 2011, I called the AA RTW desk in Dallas to set it up and ticketed via an agent in Toronto using a now removed rule allowing tickets issued in Canada to cost the country of departure converted to CAD. Canada used to have an exception to the rule requiring that the price paid is that of the country where the ticket is issued, even if the ticket departs from another country and the price for that country is cheaper. (hence why I depart my DONE3's from Korea or Japan and use the online tool or an agent in Korea/Japan to ticket. If I ticket via an agent in Australia, I'd be paying around $9000 more.)

Can you select seats for a DONE5?

Yes. Subject to the seat selection rules of each airline. Once the ticket is issued and you have the PNRs for each airline, you can generally select seats as normal via each airlines website.