RTW in J or F

[Foreigner]

Came across an interesting article:http://travelsort.com/blog/tips-for-planning-complex-awards-with-multiple-destinationsThe ANA option looks interesting. Has anyone used points for award bookings and what are the possibilities?

 

[anat0l]

Aaaah... Ben Schlappig, also known as One Mile at a Time on the Boarding Area blogs on Flyertalk.

One thing to note that some of the awards he talks about aren't necessarily RTW strict awards per se, rather they are continental-zone-to-continental-zone awards, travelling through another continental zone and taking advantage of the stopover or open jaw rules. For example, travelling from North America to Asia via Europe, with a stopover.

The USA based FFPs tend to be the most generous with routing, which explains why if you can put up with it, sometimes you can book many sectors (provided it's all in a generally forward direction) and as long as you don't spend more than 23 hours and 59 minutes there, it's not counted as a stopover in the rules and you can keep going. (Other carriers insist on the direct routing and even if you aren't strictly having a stopover - i.e. > 24 hours - they will insist that you adopt the most direct routing or otherwise split the award with a resulting cost increase).

A lot of this generosity of course is due to a popular Americanism: if it isn't in the rules, then it's not illegal and you can't stop me from doing it.

I have no experience with ANA's award as Ben has mentioned in the post.

People have conceived some very intense and creative routings with US awards, thanks to US's very generous miles buy-up scheme(s). Just search for the US Dividend Miles awards thread on AFF just to see some examples. Of course, many people don't mind the intense travel or extra transits because these routings are often in Business or First class. (In saying that, US are clamping down a bit on the generosity of award routings, for example you cannot travel from South West Pacific to Europe via America now).

 

[Foreigner]

Aaaah... Ben Schlappig, also known as One Mile at a Time on the Boarding Area blogs on Flyertalk.One thing to note that some of the awards he talks about aren't necessarily RTW strict awards per se, rather they are continental-zone-to-continental-zone awards, travelling through another continental zone and taking advantage of the stopover or open jaw rules. For example, travelling from North America to Asia via Europe, with a stopover.The USA based FFPs tend to be the most generous with routing, which explains why if you can put up with it, sometimes you can book many sectors (provided it's all in a generally forward direction) and as long as you don't spend more than 23 hours and 59 minutes there, it's not counted as a stopover in the rules and you can keep going. (Other carriers insist on the direct routing and even if you aren't strictly having a stopover - i.e. > 24 hours - they will insist that you adopt the most direct routing or otherwise split the award with a resulting cost increase).A lot of this generosity of course is due to a popular Americanism: if it isn't in the rules, then it's not illegal and you can't stop me from doing it.I have no experience with ANA's award as Ben has mentioned in the post.People have conceived some very intense and creative routings with US awards, thanks to US's very generous miles buy-up scheme(s). Just search for the US Dividend Miles awards thread on AFF just to see some examples. Of course, many people don't mind the intense travel or extra transits because these routings are often in Business or First class. (In saying that, US are clamping down a bit on the generosity of award routings, for example you cannot travel from South West Pacific to Europe via America now).

Thank you for your reply. Ben's blogs make interesting reading on One Mile at a Time. He makes the point about Air Canada's Aerplan offer, and I copy the para below:"e stopover rules for the various airlines. Air Canada’s Aeroplan, for example, allows two stopovers on awards between regions. So on an award from the US to Australia, you could have a stopover in Europe on the way out and Asia on the way back. Then just book cheap regional flights to complete the ticket, and you have a pretty fancy round the world ticket for only 100,000 miles in business class or 140,000 miles in first class (at least until they revise their award chart on July 15."With Air Canada flying into Australia, I wonder if it's possible to do Australia to NA but taking advantage of the rules about stopovers and creating stops in Asia and Europe. 140k miles in first class sounds good. I take it ticketing can be done 12 months ahead from before 15 July. Your views?