Oneworld Classic Flight Reward Discussion - The Definitive Thread

[elanshin]

@elanshin I wonder if it’s too many sectors.

On your preferred itinerary I count 16 sectors, but the system needs to add the mileage back to point of origin.

That final “sector” doesn’t need to be ticketed as you’re not actually flying it, but IIRC the QF system incorrectly counts it as a sector.

Called again and the agent suggested it's likely the sectors
so we tried to amend it to

CGK - HKG - TPE (stop 1)
TPE - HKG - PVG (stop 2)
PVG - SYD- MEL (Stop 3)
MEL - SYD - DFW - DCA (Stop 4)
BUF - ORD - SEA - LAX - SYD (Stop 5)
MEL - CGK(END)
That should have sole the sector issues as we got rid of a surface segment and ended in CGK so there's no 'final sector'
but the computer also couldn't price it and said it was invalid with:
"can not stop in Australia twice".

I wonder if this is a hidden technicality. the issue i have though is I have done dummy bookings and right now the QF multi city lets me do

CGK - HKG - TPE
TPE- HKG - PVG
PVG - SYD
MEL-SYD-LAX-DCA
LAX-SYD-MEL
MEL-CGK

Which whilst not the ame as my trip covers many of the same points

 

[Captain Halliday]

I see you have two options here.

1. Book the routing that the multi-city tool allows, or the one ending in SIN and get yourself from SYD to MEL after either stop 3 or 5.

There’s generally good availability and consider it a small price to pay to keep the rest of you plans in place.

2. Ask them exactly which of the rules it break and push for escalation or manual intervention.

Only you can decide.

14.4.4 The following Stopover conditions apply to oneworld Classic Flight Rewards:

(a) up to five free Stopovers are permitted;
(b) more than five Stopovers are not permitted;
(c) only one Stopover is permitted in any one city in the Itinerary; and
(d) only two Transfers may be taken at any one city in the Itinerary.

 

[tandlj]

Our quest for knowledge and know-how and our questions to this expert thread are hopefully not too naïve and basic. We are not complete newcomers (we made an extended Europe trip in Business class in 2017, with a little help with the then-still affordable assistance from what’s now the Concierge Service) but have lost confidence to navigate the changed situation now.

In 2025, we (my wife, who will be 67, and I, by then 86) want to go to Europe one last. time, mainly to visit relatives in Austria, Italy, and Sweden, ideally with stops in Japan and Tanzania on the to and from Europe. We expect to leave Australia in June and return in late September.

We have one focused question: since we have only Bronze Qantas Status, we would like to ask one of our sons, who has Platinum Status (until OCT 2024 at this stage), to book the OneWorld Award Business Class tickets for us (transferring our FF points, of which we have plenty, to his Qantas FF Account) – is this permitted and easily doable?

We would also be very grateful for any comments, suggestions, and informed opinions about our plans. We are thinking about this as a possible itinerary: Canberra-Sydney-Tokyo-Helsinki-Stockholm-Vienna/Salzburg-Milan-Dar es Salaam/Dodoma-Melbourne-Canberra, or perhaps the other way around. But, as it is still early planning days, we are flexible and certainly open to other possibilities (or necessities because of seat availability issues). Sweden in July 2025 is the only planned stay with a fixed time.

Thank you very much for any assistance you can give us!

 

[Jacques Vert]

We have one focused question: since we have only Bronze Qantas Status, we would like to ask one of our sons, who has Platinum Status (until OCT 2024 at this stage), to book the OneWorld Award Business Class tickets for us (transferring our FF points, of which we have plenty, to his Qantas FF Account) – is this permitted and easily doable?

Yes it is doable but may not be necessary.

Your son could ring (hopefully getting an agent in HBA) and just say that he is helping you because when you tried to book online you kept getting an error (which you most likely would). I've helped family and friends book many times.

Hopefully the agent will waive the phone assistance fee.

 

[cjd600]

Yes it is doable but may not be necessary.

Your son could ring (hopefully getting an agent in HBA) and just say that he is helping you because when you tried to book online you kept getting an error (which you most likely would). I've helped family and friends book many times.

Hopefully the agent will waive the phone assistance fee.

No phone assistance fee on J awards

 

[tandlj]

Yes it is doable but may not be necessary.

Your son could ring (hopefully getting an agent in HBA) and just say that he is helping you because when you tried to book online you kept getting an error (which you most likely would). I've helped family and friends book many times.

Hopefully the agent will waive the phone assistance fee.

Thank you very much! I suspect HBA stands for the Hobart call centre (and that it is pot-luck to end up talking with them).

 

[Mr H]

Our quest for knowledge and know-how and our questions to this expert thread are hopefully not too naïve and basic. We are not complete newcomers (we made an extended Europe trip in Business class in 2017, with a little help with the then-still affordable assistance from what’s now the Concierge Service) but have lost confidence to navigate the changed situation now.

In 2025, we (my wife, who will be 67, and I, by then 86) want to go to Europe one last. time, mainly to visit relatives in Austria, Italy, and Sweden, ideally with stops in Japan and Tanzania on the to and from Europe. We expect to leave Australia in June and return in late September.

We have one focused question: since we have only Bronze Qantas Status, we would like to ask one of our sons, who has Platinum Status (until OCT 2024 at this stage), to book the OneWorld Award Business Class tickets for us (transferring our FF points, of which we have plenty, to his Qantas FF Account) – is this permitted and easily doable?

We would also be very grateful for any comments, suggestions, and informed opinions about our plans. We are thinking about this as a possible itinerary: Canberra-Sydney-Tokyo-Helsinki-Stockholm-Vienna/Salzburg-Milan-Dar es Salaam/Dodoma-Melbourne-Canberra, or perhaps the other way around. But, as it is still early planning days, we are flexible and certainly open to other possibilities (or necessities because of seat availability issues). Sweden in July 2025 is the only planned stay with a fixed time.

Thank you very much for any assistance you can give us!

I don’t think this is really necessary. You are going to have to book flights as they are released and amend your itinerary several times. Just book the first flights in line and then add more flights by phoning up. It’s not as daunting as people say. I would also have a think about how you’re going to get to Tanzania. I don’t see an obvious way to do that on a OW redemption flight.

 

[tandlj]

I don’t think this is really necessary. You are going to have to book flights as they are released and amend your itinerary several times. Just book the first flights in line and then add more flights by phoning up. It’s not as daunting as people say. I would also have a think about how you’re going to get to Tanzania. I don’t see an obvious way to do that on a OW redemption flight.

Thank you very much!

There used to be a cost to itinerary changes of, as I remember it, at least 3,000 points - is that no longer the case, or is it that J class awards now do not attract a phone fee at all (as another response to my post pointed out)?

 

[Mr H]

Thank you very much!

There used to be a cost to itinerary changes of, as I remember it, at least 3,000 points - is that no longer the case, or is it that J class awards now do not attract a phone fee at all (as another response to my post pointed out)?

You will have to pay change fees each time. 5,000 points per person per change. But you have zero chance of being able to book this as a oner.

 

[yaziyo]

We would also be very grateful for any comments, suggestions, and informed opinions about our plans. We are thinking about this as a possible itinerary: Canberra-Sydney-Tokyo-Helsinki-Stockholm-Vienna/Salzburg-Milan-Dar es Salaam/Dodoma-Melbourne-Canberra, or perhaps the other way around.

I think Tanzania will be the real challenge here. Qatar flies there from Doha, but there is practically no availability for Qantas customers on their flights due to them hating each other's guts. Apparently Oman flies there too, which could become an option when they eventually join, if that happens soon enough.

BA flies to neighbouring Kenya which could be another avenue to explore. This site is useful for exploring "possibilities", but bear in mind, practically speaking, that Qatar air is not an option Oneworld Route Map - Flights and Destinations

 

[N860CR]

Seems im having married segment issues with QF-QF which I haven’t seen before. BLR-SYD is available and SYD-ADL also is, but it can’t be booked as BLR-SYD-ADL.

 

[BriarFlyer]

Seems im having married segment issues with QF-QF which I haven’t seen before. BLR-SYD is available and SYD-ADL also is, but it can’t be booked as BLR-SYD-ADL.

This Domestic/International (and vice versa) on Qantas flights is a common issue these days. You need to search BLR-ADL and if unavailable, you're likely SOL ... although some agents (HBA usually) can add the domestic connection flight.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

This Domestic/International (and vice versa) on Qantas flights is a common issue these days. You need to search BLR-ADL and if unavailable, you're likely SOL ... although some agents (HBA usually) can add the domestic connection flight.

This problem has been around since 2022, and been the subject of many many posts here in AFF

 

[Mr H]

This Domestic/International (and vice versa) on Qantas flights is a common issue these days. You need to search BLR-ADL and if unavailable, you're likely SOL ... although some agents (HBA usually) can add the domestic connection flight.

You can get around it by factoring in a 24 hour stop or booking the two flights on separate redemptions. If you go for the former option then you may get lucky with a schedule change allowing you to renegotiate the flight times to eliminate the stopover.

 

[FlyingFiona]

The following "script" has worked for me the best when trying to make changes: Start with "I want to check for award availibility". Then you feed the agent each route + date + flight number and ask them to add each one to your booking. Finally you ask them to remove any existing flights that you don't need anymore. IME when you say you want to change flights, some agents say that you cannot make segment changes. And asking for an availibility check first means that if you need to HUACA, the agent wouldn't have touched your existing flights yet.

I really appreciated this message, thank you. Armed with this script I rang tonight and added on segments to my existing booking to close out my OWA. (Pretty sure the agent was in South Africa.)

Segments added, ticket immediately reticketed whilst I was on the phone. Done and dusted!

Now just have a 329 day wait until departure...

 

[Gonetroppo]

Gearing up to book a third OWA booking with Mr Gonetroppo (WP by next week) in J around April 2025. I'm finding it harder to find seats than our first two OWAs (2019 and 2023), despite a lot of flexibility with the planning. The absence of CX and QR awards is a big factor (so sad!), as is the proliferation of non-Oneworld partner awards in QF crowding out the search results.
Is there a reliable way to filter out awards that are not relevant to OWAs (China Eastern, Emirates mainly), please? Seats Aero looked like it had the functionality but not for QF awards.

 

[Amanad78]

Gearing up to book a third OWA booking with Mr Gonetroppo (WP by next week) in J around April 2025. I'm finding it harder to find seats than our first two OWAs (2019 and 2023), despite a lot of flexibility with the planning. The absence of CX and QR awards is a big factor (so sad!), as is the proliferation of non-Oneworld partner awards in QF crowding out the search results.
Is there a reliable way to filter out awards that are not relevant to OWAs (China Eastern, Emirates mainly), please? Seats Aero looked like it had the functionality but not for QF awards.

With seats.aero, on the laptop I can search for OneWorld, but not on the phone app

 

[sap1l]

Seats Aero looked like it had the functionality but not for QF awards.

The way to do it is to filter out specific carriers (there's a checkbox to exclude instead of include).

Then, once the results load, you can select QFF in the programs dropdown.

The only issue with this method is that it will still show all carriers when you hover over, like this:




To get around that, you can check the "show individual flights", but I find that it's only really helpful for a narrow search.

I think you can do this on the phone as well, but I haven't used seats.aero on my phone.

 

[sap1l]

The absence of CX and QR awards is a big factor (so sad!)

Side note: I found quite a decent amount of CX availability in J when planning my OWA. There was also tons of Y and Y+ on CX as well.

What routes are you specifically looking for?

 

[elanshin]

Side note: I found quite a decent amount of CX availability in J when planning my OWA. There was also tons of Y and Y+ on CX as well.

What routes are you specifically looking for?

CX just isn't releasing at the expected ~360 days i find. They're much more once they're a bit further in, but fairly bare at the near maximum dates.