cynstalker

What a great thread! Thanks to all who made such thoughtful & informative posts.

sassy_cat

I've been reading up on flyertalk; there's so much information out there to wade through that I'm doubly grateful for the more digestible answers here.

I have a few more queries.
#1
My daughter and I will be accompanying my husband on a couple of trips in the near future.
I've looked at flights for Hong Kong/Beijing and Oneworld is much more expensive to the tune of $400 per person.
It's quite likely we'll not be joining him for the full trip so we'll be on separate flights anyway.

Am I right to assume that it's best to buy the cheaper flights (which would be in coach flying Continental) as we're unlikely to accrue mileage at anything like the rate he does.
My daughter is 14 so I think she's ineligible to collect miles anyway.

#2
My husband is in China right now but he missed a connection due to bad weather on the way out and ended up being rerouted via SFO (after overnighting at LAX.. yeah, he was NOT happy!).
Does this mean that he gets a few extra miles or just the miles for the original journey?

#3
For a business trip in November my husband has to fly BOS>LHR>PER>SYD>HKG>PEK>CNF>BOS He can't change the order (apart from reversing HKG & PEK) but will any of this work for a RTW ticket or should he book each leg separately?

rkkwan

1a. I've always maintained that unless one can annually achieve at least the lowest elite level (25,000EQM), then just buy the cheapest ticket for each trip.

1b. Your daughter can definitely earn miles with CO/UA. Babies can earn miles.

2. He can generally get miles for the rerouted flights. If the rerouted miles are fewer than original, then he can request original (more) mileage.

3. Looks like a RTW ticket for me, and RTW business class is generally cheaper than separate ones. But since this involved Australia, he has to calculate overall mileage. Others with more info on RTW tickets can elaborate.

Gardyloo

<i>My daughter and I will be accompanying my husband on a couple of trips in the near future.
I've looked at flights for Hong Kong/Beijing and Oneworld is much more expensive to the tune of $400 per person.</i>

By "Oneworld" do you mean Cathay Pacific? From NYC or Chicago? American to Tokyo then Japan Airlines? British Airways via London or Finnair via Helsinki? More info is needed.

<i>My husband is in China right now but he missed a connection due to bad weather on the way out and ended up being rerouted via SFO (after overnighting at LAX.. yeah, he was NOT happy!).
Does this mean that he gets a few extra miles or just the miles for the original journey?</i>

Chances are he'll get the additional miles; if he doesn't he should phone and ask for them.

<i>For a business trip in November my husband has to fly BOS>LHR>PER>SYD>HKG>PEK>CNF>BOS He can't change the order (apart from reversing HKG & PEK) but will any of this work for a RTW ticket or should he book each leg separately?</i>

By CNF do you mean Belo Horizonte in Brazil? If so, then he could use an RTW ticket; however it would require quite a lot of fooling around at both the beginning and end, as one cannot transit the country of origin in the middle of a RTW ticket, and the only way to get from Asia to South America is via North America given his route. It would be easier and cheaper for him to fly separately to the UK and originate the ticket there, then end in the UK sometime within the following year.

Also he'd need to buy a one-way ticket from Sao Paolo (GRU) to CNF since one of the arcane rules in the Oneworld RTW ticket product is that one can enter North America twice, provided one of them is a direct transit through just one airport going or coming. Since the only Oneworld service into CNF is on an AA nonstop from Miami, and since there are no nonstop flights from Asia to Miami, he'd have to change planes twice, once in say LAX or JFK (or ORD, SFO, or YYZ) and then to Miami to get to CNF. That would be two connections between Asia and S. America, one too many.

The solution would be to go Asia-DFW-GRU, or Asia-JFK-GRU, then buy a one-way ticket outside the RTW to get to Belo Horizonte; from which he could then fly back to the US via Miami on the AA flight, do his N. American segments (he's allowed 6) before going BOS-LHR to finish the RTW.

The route would look like this (actual RTW segments in bold, "x" means just an immediate connection (within 24 hours): (BOS-)<b>LHR-xSIN-PER-HKG-PEK-NRT-xDFW-GRU//CNF-MIA-BOS-LHR-</B>(BOS). That would only use 11 of the 16 available segments, so if he wanted to do some traveling in the US as part of the ticket before ending in the UK, it would be easy to do.

Starting in the UK, the RTW ticket, if in business class, would also be around $1500 cheaper than starting in the US ($1800 cheaper if in coach) since the prices of RTW tickets vary hugely according to where one buys and begins the trip.

sassy_cat

Hi,
Thank you both for the replies.
rkkwan, Thanks for the info.. 1a. that's been my MO so far. I hate to pay more for 'miles'
I think my daughter does have a CO FF number but I thought minors weren't able to accrue miles with BA (Oneworld).

Gardyloo>>By "Oneworld" do you mean Cathay Pacific? From NYC or Chicago? American to Tokyo then Japan Airlines? British Airways via London or Finnair via Helsinki? More info is needed. <<
The cheapest Oneworld flights I found were on AA. BOS-HKG via Chicago/NRT outbound and returning PEK-ORD-BOS. Delta/UA/Continental were cheaper

Yes by CNF I meant Belo Horizonte. The 'fooling' around at the beginning and end would work as he will need to travel to LHR in March 2012 (probably other dates too but this we already know about).

Regarding the additional N.American segments.. would these have to be booked at the time we book the ticket? Any wiggle room to change/cancel these segments?

You left out Sydney from the itinerary.. is he allowed to include a leg PER-SYD? He doesn't have time to return to Perth before flying to HKG.

Thanks again for all your help
Can I attempt to price this online? Which site? Or do I need to call someone?`

Gardyloo

Yes, he could go LHR-xSIN-PER-SYD-HKG-PEK-NRT-xDFW-GRU-(CNF)-MIA-BOS-LHR. He could also get to GRU via JFK, going either PEK-NRT-xJFK-GRU or PEK-HKG-xJFK-GRU, etc.

The extra North America segments could be added later; changes require that the RTW ticket be re-issued with a $125 fee (plus any additional airport taxes etc.) but quite easy to do. Only one nonstop transcontinental flight is allowed (e.g. BOS-LAX) but travel could also include Canada, the Caribbean, Mexico, Central America, etc. The trip has to end in the country where it started, e.g. if he starts in the UK it has to end in the UK, but if he wanted to go somewhere else in Europe or the Middle East before, that would be fine too. (He'd be allowed 4 flights in Europe/Middle East and wouldn't have taken any if he'd gone straight to Oz at the beginning.) But the ticket is limited to a maximum of 16 segments, including any "overland" segments, e.g. if he needed to go from GRU to CNF.

Yes, it can be priced and ticketed online, but be aware that there are a lot of rules and sometimes the learning curve can be steep.

http://www.oneworld.com/ow/air-trave...inerary-online

Note that any re-issues or changes would have to be made on the phone; the Oneworld website has a very limited toolbox.

He could also phone the AA RTW desk at (800) 247-3247 and go over his needs with them - they're really very good.

sassy_cat

Gardyloo,
Thank you again. Perhaps I should have asked this first but what are the benefits to booking a RTW as opposed to separate legs?
Is it more cost effective (if so I'm not sure if it's worth the extra hassle for business trips)
More miles? or tier points?

I presume he could add the extra segments later for personal travel (pay the change fees) but we've already booked flights for one family vacation next year and honestly with all this business travel he's leaning towards spending the rest of his vacation time at home!

Gardyloo

The price will be roughly one-third of the cost of point-to-point tickets on itineraries as complex as this. I just priced out LHR-PER-PEK-CNF-BOS-LHR (so way less than he'd be flying) in business class and the cheapest I got was $25,000 and change. An RTW ticket in business class from London for the same itinerary would be in the $10,000 range. If he started (and ended) in the Middle East, say Israel or Jordan, the cost would go down to the $8000 range, less than 1/3 the point-to-point.

Full mileage and tier points, elite status pretty much guaranteed, and, for example, on a sample itinerary like his, it would be easy to earn ca. 100,000+ frequent flyer miles, enough for a round-trip to Europe or Asia in business class for... you?

Trips in first class to Hawaii make great Christmas presents.

Gardyloo

Sorry, meant to say one-third to one-half.

sassy_cat

I'm sold!