i want a good deal on RTW business class

[ozziemuzza]

hi

hope you are well.

do you know who a good travel agent that offers good round the world business class tickets or at least good business class deals to the usa.

thank you

best regards from the west
murray

 

[estate]

Check this link out for tips on cutting the cost of a DONE4:
http://www.frequentflyer.com.au/community/travel-insider-tips/rtw-j-3-000-less-12843.html

I don't have much experience with this type of thing, but I can give you one personal example - Flight Centre found me a RTW in J with LX that cost $7500 inc taxes, stopping in NY and LA. Bear in mind LX aren't part of OW, so you won't earn any FF points on their metal, although that fare does use QF for the first and last legs into and out of Australia.

 

[localknowledge]

The link by estate is a good one with tonnes of info. The following links are pretty good also:

Australian Travel Agent : Best Flights - discount travel - Travel Agent Australia

Australian Travel Agent : Best Flights - discount travel - Travel Agent Australia

cheers.

 

[vowgs]

AY now offer RTW J class itineraries. Any combo of OW carriers (with limits on number of intl transfers) but must include NYC-HEL with AY vv in one direction. Points on the entire journey.

eg. MEL - LAX - NYC - HEL - LON - HKG - MEL (QF/AY/BA/CX)

Don't have exact rates in front of me, but believe approx. $7500 plus taxes (approx. $550).

 

[Travel Guru]

You'll find you won't save much by shopping around between travel agents on RTW tickets as the margins simply don't make it possible to discount and generally all agents will sell for the full gross as it doesn't make commercial sense to discount.

With point to point J fares, the best fares (especially Qantas) aside from the recent spate of specials are corporate fares which can be access by corporate agents obviously as well as a few other agents (myself included) which are quite a few hundred dollars cheaper than standard QF J tickets that retails agents sell.

TG

 

[vowgs]

With point to point J fares, the best fares (especially Qantas) aside from the recent spate of specials are corporate fares which can be access by corporate agents obviously as well as a few other agents (myself included) which are quite a few hundred dollars cheaper than standard QF J tickets that retails agents sell.

TG

I was quite surprised when I saw what corporate fares are out there and the difference in price between corporate/retail on certain airlines. Do restrictions exist as to who can purchase or is the issue purely who is able to ticket them? And are fare rules/restrictions aligned with the retail equivalent?

 

[Travel Guru]

I was quite surprised when I saw what corporate fares are out there and the difference in price between corporate/retail on certain airlines. Do restrictions exist as to who can purchase or is the issue purely who is able to ticket them? And are fare rules/restrictions aligned with the retail equivalent?

There can be some fantastic savings with corporate fares, especially during times unlike now when airlines dont need to put on crazy specials to fill the premium cabins.

It almost always comes down to who can ticket them, you have to have the authority to ticket a corporate fare to get it ticketed, otherwise the airline can ADM you for the difference.

There are company specific and route specific deals, but again its all down to the agent being able to ticket them.

TG

 

[Evan]

Our agent can ticket E class on SQ for example less than 2 week returns. Very good prices, they can also get good CX prices, lots lots cheaper than retail.

But thats all whY flying, J i am not sure if the discounts are that good.
I suspect point to point return they would be but RTW i doubt they have any useful discounts.

Some people here mention they even get a discount on xONEx's though there corp travel agents or travel dept but there is restrictions like as many flights as possible on QF and the rest on BA or AA for example.... i guess QF set some rules and only if you meet it can it be ticketed.

 

[vowgs]

The CX/SQ discounts are more likely to be due to an agent who knows the tricks of getting the most out of an airline's yield for a certain booking class. You'll find many experienced agents will offer fare prices which appear impossibly cheap based upon online availability seacrhing - CX/SQ are two examples where this is common.

 

[Evan]

The CX/SQ discounts are more likely to be due to an agent who knows the tricks of getting the most out of an airline's yield for a certain booking class. You'll find many experienced agents will offer fare prices which appear impossibly cheap based upon online availability seacrhing - CX/SQ are two examples where this is common.

Don't think so for SQ as we pick the flights, and say i want this flight and 98% of the time if there is full Y they can get E. Maybe TG can confirm what exactly E is intended to be. It looks largly like a flexible Y (no change costs) with 2 weeks limit on trip duration and 12 months validity. I could pull the fare rule if anybody really wants.

For CX they have to email the airline to get the flights, but i think your probably fight on this.
If i try to book SIN-HKG-KIX on CX and searching for fares even months out it seems to want to force SIN-HKG into J, but i know there must be cheaper fares, i never understand how the booking engine in CX works. And availability is changed daily of not every few hours its almost as if they randomly load and remove fares from the system every few days. If you see a bargin on CX grab it else it will be gone later nearly always... and then could probably return in just the same unexpected way.

 

[vowgs]

It looks largly like a flexible Y (no change costs) with 2 weeks limit on trip duration and 12 months validity.

12 month validity sounds good - 35 day/3 mth validity has become an issue for Asian carriers in Y. Have also noticed SQ are now offering FOC date changes pre-dearture on all fares (even if fare rules state different).

And availability is changed daily of not every few hours its almost as if they randomly load and remove fares from the system every few days.

Grrr the eternal question: book now at what seems a good price; or wait for a better offer but risk losing what's available now?

 

[Evan]

1<..>

Grrr the eternal question: book now at what seems a good price; or wait for a better offer but risk losing what's available now?

Yes, and i and plenty of others have paid more than we should at times. But thats life isn't it. Still if you see a great CX deal just book it... sometimes once its gone from some search engines you can still pick the same price up on Zuji for an extra few hours or a day, no idea if it actually allows booking though.

Anyway back O/T, for RTW business you have to either choose one of the mini RTW fares (Check best blights for some examples) and these are often only on restrcited carriers and cities but may be useful to you, or go to the *A or OW milage or continent/segment limited fares.

As this board is heavily QF centric, you will find most expereince is with the OW xONOx/xGLOBx products with a big bias towards xONOx but also similar products are available from *A.
Skyteam has almost zero presence in Australia so i suspect you will not find a lot of knowlege on there products here.

 

[albatross710]

Have also noticed SQ are now offering FOC date changes pre-dearture on all fares (even if fare rules state different).

Can you please expand on this or point me in the right direction to understand the SQ offer on this FOC date change. Have a booking in October that could do with a day change.

 

[vowgs]

Can you please expand on this or point me in the right direction to understand the SQ offer on this FOC date change. Have a booking in October that could do with a day change.

AFAIK this can only be requested via the agent who ticketed the fare (it may have been implemented to incentivise agents to offer SQ). It applies until 31 March 2010. Call your agent to arrange the change, or if booked elsewhere you could try SQ Res. Keep in mind this is outside the standard fare restrictions so neither SQ nor the agent has a responsibility to adhere.

The gist of it:

- up to four free changes on all ticketed SQ published fares
- subject to availability in same booking class
- rebooking within the validity of the ticketed fare.
- cancellation pentalies remain unchanged
- seasonal fare differences still apply​