"oneworld" award (132.4K/249.6K/318K/455K) Planning - The Definitive Thread

[kctt]

Another useless call to Fiji today. I asked agent to make change to booking. Clearly explained route is cancelled so there won't be any availability for replaced flight. She said let she check and put me on hold. She got back that Support team told her I should wait 2-3 weeks later where there maybe new flight available then they can book me new flight.
I insisted I find alternative flights with long transit and want to add new flights to booking.
She said cannot add flights to booking. I insisted that she just try adding flights and update booking to get reprice. She put me on hold then call got disconnected (with Qantas rating message) in a few seconds. I reckon she intentionally hanged up.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Another useless call to Fiji today. I asked agent to make change to booking. Clearly explained route is cancelled so there won't be any availability for replaced flight. She said let she check and put me on hold. She got back that Support team told her I should wait 2-3 weeks later where there maybe new flight available then they can book me new flight.
I insisted I find alternative flights with long transit and want to add new flights to booking.
She said cannot add flights to booking. I insisted that she just try adding flights and update booking to get reprice. She put me on hold then call got disconnected (with Qantas rating message) in a few seconds. I reckon she intentionally hanged up.

‘not being able to add flights to an existing booking’ is a recurring problem. AFF’s editor reached out to qantas who said ‘sure you can add extra flights’… but without this filtering down to the call centres there’s nothing we can do about it

 

[DC3]

She said cannot add flights to booking. I insisted that she just try adding flights and update booking to get reprice. She put me on hold then call got disconnected (with Qantas rating message) in a few seconds. I reckon she intentionally hanged up.

Maybe the Call Centre agent didn’t want to argue with the customer.

 

[kctt]

Another useless call to Fiji today. I asked agent to make change to booking. Clearly explained route is cancelled so there won't be any availability for replaced flight. She said let she check and put me on hold. She got back that Support team told her I should wait 2-3 weeks later where there maybe new flight available then they can book me new flight.
I insisted I find alternative flights with long transit and want to add new flights to booking.
She said cannot add flights to booking. I insisted that she just try adding flights and update booking to get reprice. She put me on hold then call got disconnected (with Qantas rating message) in a few seconds. I reckon she intentionally hanged up.

Second call to Philippines: agent was able to remove a segment of 2 flights with Finnair. However for Sydney-Tokyo-Osaka flight with JAL she said it's married segment so cannot cancel Tokyo-Osaka segment. Sydney-Tokyo was available originally but i booked Sydney-Tokyo-Osaka so i could continue on Osaka-Helsinki. If i booked each segment Sydney-Tokyo and Tokyo-Osaka as 2 separate flights, now i can just cancel Tokyo-Osaka with no problem. This could be a tip for other people to book separate segments if available?
Call was disconnected abruptly and she called me back a few times.
I can see segment of 2 flights with Finnair is removed in my booking. She said booking would be ticketed in 24-48 hours.
I asked to add new flights to replace the cancelled flight Osaka-Helsinki. She tried making change then call is disconnected and she did not call me back this time.

Third call to Fiji: agent said booking is pending change / waiting to be ticketed. He cannot add flights or do anything. I have to wait for booking to be ticketed then call to request change. Is this true?

 

[DC3]

… agent said booking is pending change / waiting to be ticketed. He cannot add flights or do anything. I have to wait for booking to be ticketed then call to request change. Is this true?

In any case, I would wait for each change to be properly processed and ticketed before making the next change. But that’s just me maybe.

 

[kctt]

In any case, I would wait for each change to be properly processed and ticketed before making the next change. But that’s just me maybe.

Thanks. I will wait for booking to be ticketed then.
I was thinking it would save time to make all changes then go to ticket. It seems like a waste of effort even for Qantas to issue ticket/reprice/refund to be changed again.

 

[DC3]

Thanks. I will wait for booking to be ticketed then.
I was thinking it would save time to make all changes then go to ticket. It seems like a waste of effort even for Qantas to issue ticket/reprice/refund to be changed again.

I think that there’s always a risk that multiple changes sitting in the queue may complicate the ticketing process. Not sure about the technicalities but my gut feeling is to avoid this.

 

[algae]

Thanks. I will wait for booking to be ticketed then.

I personally wouldn't wait. I'd call and ask for it to be ticketed there while you wait on the line. Don't want to risk losing the seats. Too many horror stories of that on here.

Sometimes it takes 20mins, sometimes it takes 2h. So be prepared for a sore arm holding your phone.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

The qantas terms and conditions for FF award seats say you can make unlimited changes to a booking *before* ticketing.

Last week I’ve also had the call centre tell me they cannot make changes once ticketed.

so really it shows most of them have no idea what they’re talking about.

 

[levelnine]

Third call to Fiji: agent said booking is pending change / waiting to be ticketed. He cannot add flights or do anything. I have to wait for booking to be ticketed then call to request change. Is this true?

It might be true for Fiji agents, but it is not true as a general matter. I just had a Hobart agent makes changes to a ticket that was stuck in the queue and then get it reticketed.

It's very clear that overseas call centres have limited functionality. A South African agent wasn't able to access domestic JAL flights for me last night. The Hobart agent found it in 2 seconds this morning.

 

[DC3]

Yes. Hobart is in a league of their own. Unfortunately, many will not get through to Hobart.

 

[SydneySwan]

It is about time Qantas allowed discretionary access to Hobart call centre, something like;

Gold 10 calls per annum
Silver 5 calls per annum
Bronze 2 calls per annum

 

[andye]

It is about time Qantas allowed discretionary access to Hobart call centre, something like;

Gold 10 calls per annum
Silver 5 calls per annum
Bronze 2 calls per annum

You should get issued them like lounge passes (and then have an AFF call swop forum )

 

[kctt]

Today's call to Philippines: agent tried hard, worked with support team but they still could not get booking ticketed. She said booking change is less than 24 hours so would need to wait 24-48 hours for ticket team to process. It looks like she does not have a way to escalate to ticket team and/or there is rule in call centre that they are not allowed to contact ticket team if booking is put in ticket queue less than 48 hours.
She absolutely has no liberty to make additional change in while booking is waiting to be ticketed. She asked Support team if she can do that. I think the answer is no because she stopped at waiting for booking to be ticketed.
She took note of additional flight changes that I want to add and said next agent can see her notes and can add new flights in.

 

[SydneySwan]

You should get issued them like lounge passes (and then have an AFF call swop forum )

Yes Yes Yes! Although I can imagine that Qantas would prefer to monetise this and sell you these vouchers. I am only half-kidding.

 

[lovedbymarylane]

Hi all, excuse the newbie question but I want to make sure I'm not making a mistake. Does a surface segment count as one or two of my five stopovers?
For example, if I were to fly into MAD, spend a few days there and leave, that uses up one of my five stopovers.
If I fly into MAD, travel by train and fly out of BCN, has that still only used up one of the stopovers?

 

[algae]

If I fly into MAD, travel by train and fly out of BCN, has that still only used up one of the stopovers?

Correct, only counts as 1

 

[DC3]

If I fly into MAD, travel by train and fly out of BCN, has that still only used up one of the stopovers?

MAD will be the only stopover, not BCN

 

[SnowmanShroomz]

Hi i've booked the first two sectors of my round the world trip and the two bookings have come out as 189k + 145k = 334k total. This is higher than the 318k cap for business class tix. I have adhered to all the guidelines incl. two other oneworld airlines (AA & Iberia), less than 35k miles, only 2 stopovers thus far etc.

Any idea why i'd be getting charged more than the 318k points?
Cheers

 

[levelnine]

Any idea why i'd be getting charged more than the 318k points?

You'll need to provide the full itinerary. We can't tell you which rule you've broken from that information.