Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[troutgirlsummer]

By the sound of it, you have made two separate booking, Qantas can't merge those bookings into one, without cancelling one of them (and taking the risk that the cancelled award are not put back into award inventory). If you want an OWA, you need to build your itinerary on the same booking (you can add segments when they appear).

Hi, wondering if you can clarify this?
We have tried every itinerary under the sun and despite confirming flight availability for each leg on the multi-city booking tool, when we try and book the whole thing we receive an error (or the call centre tells us that certain flights can only be booked individually, and it won't let them book our whole itinerary).
If we book 90% of our itinerary at once, meeting the OWA criteria and paying 318,000 each, can we then later add flight segments on without having to pay additional points?

Post automatically merged: Dec 7, 2024

By the sound of it, you have made two separate booking, Qantas can't merge those bookings into one, without cancelling one of them (and taking the risk that the cancelled award are not put back into award inventory). If you want an OWA, you need to build your itinerary on the same booking (you can add segments when they appear).

Hi, wondering if you can clarify this?

My partner and I have tried every itinerary under the sun and despite confirming flight availability for each leg on the multi-city booking tool, when we try and book the whole thing we receive an error (or the call centre agent tells us that certain flights can only be booked individually, and it won't let them book our whole itinerary). We just got to the page where it told us our itinerary would cost 636,000 points + $1500ish in tax, put our names and numbers in (had never got this far before) and clicked submit, and were given an error.

If we book 90% of our itinerary at once, meeting the OWA criteria and paying 318,000 each, can we then later add flight segments on without having to pay additional points?

 

[Captain Halliday]

If we book 90% of our itinerary at once, meeting the OWA criteria and paying 318,000 each, can we then later add flight segments on without having to pay additional points?

No, the change fee will apply.

 

[troutgirlsummer]

No, the change fee will apply.

Thanks for the quick reply.

So what's the deal with trying to book the award? Do you literally just have to get through to a Hobart agent to make it work?

 

[Captain Halliday]

Thanks for the quick reply.

So what's the deal with trying to book the award? Do you literally just have to get through to a Hobart agent to make it work?

Not necessarily. But HBA is generally considered an advantage.

If you can see availability and the agent can’t book it, phantom availability on the website is the likely cause.

HUACA.

 

[DC3]

Hi

Welcome to AFF

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Not necessarily. But HBA is generally considered an advantage.

If you can see availability and the agent can’t book it, phantom availability on the website is the likely cause.

HUACA.

It may not be phantom… could be married segments… or the hard system block preventing domestic connections (meaning you can’t separately add a domestic connecting flight from a capital city to another, for example you can’t add MEL-SYD onto an existing SYD-LAX), or it could be the ‘you can only book these flights for new bookings’

By the way… have we got a solution to the last one yet? That is, when you go to add flights, agents say they are only for new bookings?

Unless you are platinum status or higher, getting through to hobart can be very difficult (if not impossible)

 

[DC3]

By the way… have we got a solution to the last one yet? That is, when you go to add flights, agents say they are only for new bookings?

 

[WilsonM]

By the way… have we got a solution to the last one yet? That is, when you go to add flights, agents say they are only for new bookings?

This sounds like agent ineptitude/ignorance for explaining why certain flights can't be added onto a booking (could be POS issues, could be married etc etc). Or more general incompetence ofc

My partner and I have tried every itinerary under the sun and despite confirming flight availability for each leg on the multi-city booking tool, when we try and book the whole thing we receive an error (or the call centre agent tells us that certain flights can only be booked individually, and it won't let them book our whole itinerary). We just got to the page where it told us our itinerary would cost 636,000 points + $1500ish in tax, put our names and numbers in (had never got this far before) and clicked submit, and were given an error.

Are you able to post the itinerary - the knowledgeable folk here might be able to point out where it's going wrong without you having to spend years (exaggeration, but still) on the phone

 

[troutgirlsummer]

It may not be phantom… could be married segments… or the hard system block preventing domestic connections (meaning you can’t separately add a domestic connecting flight from a capital city to another, for example you can’t add MEL-SYD onto an existing SYD-LAX), or it could be the ‘you can only book these flights for new bookings’

By the way… have we got a solution to the last one yet? That is, when you go to add flights, agents say they are only for new bookings?

Unless you are platinum status or higher, getting through to hobart can be very difficult (if not impossible)

This is the itinerary:
6 August MEL - NRT
14 August NRT - FRA
13 September OSL - HEL
14 September HEL - ICN
22 September ICN - HKG
22 September HKG - MEL

Can see availability for the whole itinerary - get to the payment page and get an error. Call centre says they can book the bolded segments individually, but not include them in the whole OWA reward booking.

I guess the last two flights are married segments, but not the first two. Dunno what the issue is there.

 

[Mwenenzi]

This is the itinerary:
6 August MEL - NRT
14 August NRT - FRA
13 September OSL - HEL
14 September HEL - ICN
22 September ICN - HKG
22 September HKG - MEL

What airlines are showing?

 

[troutgirlsummer]

What airlines are s?

Here's the whole thing. Have checked partner airlines so the first two don't look like they're phantom.
We are looking at how we can change the last two now to avoid the married segment issue.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

This sounds like agent ineptitude/ignorance for explaining why certain flights can't be added onto a booking (could be POS issues, could be married etc etc). Or more general incompetence ofc

So this apparently a ‘thing’.

There’s some way to add new flights to an existing itinerary… a way of seeing and ‘selling’ them… but o/s agents aren’t necessarily trained how to do it. HBA can add the same flights with no difficulty as they understand how the system works. There’s some special way to be able to see the flights when looking from within an existing PNR. O/s agents only see them when doing a fresh search.

If we can work out the exact process, we’d be able to advise the agents.

 

[BriarFlyer]

So this apparently a ‘thing’.

There’s some way to add new flights to an existing itinerary… a way of seeing and ‘selling’ them… but o/s agents aren’t necessarily trained how to do it. HBA can add the same flights with no difficulty as they understand how the system works. There’s some special way to be able to see the flights when looking from within an existing PNR. O/s agents only see them when doing a fresh search.

If we can work out the exact process, we’d be able to advise the agents.

I'm battling this at the moment and I cannot manage to jag a HBA agent. I'm trying to add Qantaslink regional connections to the start and end of my booked international CR intinerary. The o/s agents I've spoken to quote one of:
1. there are no awards available on these flights (there are)
2. there are no flights on this route (there are)
3. there are awards but they're only available on new bookings.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I'm battling this at the moment and I cannot manage to jag a HBA agent. I'm trying to add Qantaslink regional connections to the start and end of my booked international CR intinerary. The o/s agents I've spoken to quote one of:
1. there are no awards available on these flights (there are)
2. there are no flights on this route (there are)
3. there are awards but they're only available on new bookings.

Two different things here.

Adding domestic connections in australia has been blocked since 2021/22. You cannot search MEL-SYD and SYD-LAX separately and create a single trip. The only way you can do it is search MEL-LAX, and if it offers you via SYD, you’re good to go.

That’s different from adding sectors outside australia, for example adding HKG-SIN into an existing award. Some agents say they can only book it as a new booking, because they don’t know how to search for the availability within the existing PNR.

The block on adding domestic sectors is impossible to get around unless you get Hobart or Auckland.

The block works quite well. If the agent searches MEL-SYD, then the flight SYD-LAX doesn’t show in their system. If they book the SYD-LAX first, then the MEL-SYD doesn’t show!

 

[termx]

Miss 18 is very pleased that I discovered Finnair fly HEL-ICN I reckon that won me dad of the year right then.

Booked a OWA online using the Qantas multi-city page a few days ago for Miss 18's cousin to accompany her

MEL-NRT (JL)
NRT-ITM (JL)
HND-HEL (JL)
HEL-VIE (AY)
VIE-HEL (AY)
HEL-ICN (AY)
GMP-HND (JL)
NRT-MEL (JL)

$1131.70 in taxes plus 132,40 points.

Incredibly, ticketing took only 20 minutes, which feels like a world record to me.

 

[timbo86]

Hi all,

I have a question about interpreting one of the fare rules:
"You must include at least two other oneworld airlines besides Qantas, and not include any non-oneworld airlines."

Does this mean you HAVE to include Qantas in your itinerary, or not necessarily and it is valid to have an itinerary without any Qantas flights?

FYI we have booked our OWA itinerary successfully and it includes a final leg with Qantas from Singapore to Melbourne. But the final flights are just dummy bookings for now because it was too far out to see flight availability for when we are planning to return home. So the question is about whether we will need to find a replacement Qantas reward seat to get home once the calendar opens up, or whether we could swap that last Qantas flight out for another one world airline if there was a better option available.

Appreciate any advice. Thanks!

 

[Captain Halliday]

Does this mean you HAVE to include Qantas in your itinerary?

Asked/answered multiple times in this thread.

No.

 

[timbo86]

big thread to dig through and after an hour of reading, risking asking the question again seemed reasonable. thanks anyway

 

[Mr H]

big thread to dig through and after an hour of reading, risking asking the question again seemed reasonable. thanks anyway

Clue - first post, sixth line.

 

[DC3]

big thread to dig through and after an hour of reading, risking asking the question again seemed reasonable. thanks anyway

Welcome to AFF. I found that it took weeks of reading to get a grip on most of this.