Yes. I did my research before calling and laid out a tentative itinerary by using the the award search features on the Cathy website and Lan website (I had to join each airlines FF programs). The BA portion was hit or miss but I had read that F availability from DXB was available most of the time. Once my itinerary was laid out, I called the AA International award desk. I happened to speak with an agent who understood what I was trying to do and I gave them what I wanted segment by segment
Unfortunately, Iberia only operates Business Plus class now on their A340's. Since this was the only thing available from MAD-EZE (No LAN availability), I had to suck it up and go with Business class. I hope its not as bad as I have read.
Why don't you stop for 23 hours in each city? Doesn't it only count as a stop if it's over 24 hours? The way you have it, if a flight is late, you won't be able to leave the airport in a lot of cities.
Why don't you stop for 23 hours in each city? Doesn't it only count as a stop if it's over 24 hours?
No, you can't specify a long connection. The rule is:
"Passenger has 4/6 hours to connect (depending on domestic or international travel). If there are no scheduled flights within this timeframe, regardless of availability, the passenger must take the next scheduled flight but, may not exceed 24 hours. If the connection exceeds 24 hours, it will be considered a stopover.
If there is a non-stop flight that departs after the 4/6 hour window and arrives at the destination earlier than a connecting flight within the 4/6 hour window, the passenger may be booked on the non-stop flight. It is not necessary to check every flight/carrier to ensure passenger is booked on next scheduled flight. "
No, you can't specify a long connection. The rule is:
"Passenger has 4/6 hours to connect (depending on domestic or international travel). If there are no scheduled flights within this timeframe, regardless of availability, the passenger must take the next scheduled flight but, may not exceed 24 hours. If the connection exceeds 24 hours, it will be considered a stopover.
If there is a non-stop flight that departs after the 4/6 hour window and arrives at the destination earlier than a connecting flight within the 4/6 hour window, the passenger may be booked on the non-stop flight. It is not necessary to check every flight/carrier to ensure passenger is booked on next scheduled flight. "
Wow, thanks for that. I had thought the only reason someone might do this was if they could stop in HKG, DBX, EZE and elsewhere for a day each. If it's only for a few hours, there's absolutely no reason to book a trip like this other than to collect pajamas.
No, you can't specify a long connection. The rule is:
"Passenger has 4/6 hours to connect (depending on domestic or international travel). If there are no scheduled flights within this timeframe, regardless of availability, the passenger must take the next scheduled flight but, may not exceed 24 hours. If the connection exceeds 24 hours, it will be considered a stopover.
I don't think this applies to oneworld award tickets. For example, OP has a connection in EZE that is over six hours when other earlier LA flights exist:
IBERIA
6843 MAD Madrid 11/25/2005 11:40 PM EZE Buenos Aires 11/26/2005 06:55 AM Business unassigned
LAN CHILE
460 EZE Buenos Aires 11/26/2005 01:15 PM SCL Santiago 11/26/2005 03:30 PM Business unassigned
FWIW (or FWINW), OneWorld awards issued by Cathay seem to have some slight variation in implementation than OneWorld awards issued by American. [And don't even get me started about BA.]
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Like TSA, DL SkyMiles management treats airline customers as if they are the enemy or sheep to be fleeced and it shows.
CX OW awards are very different, not slightly different.
Yes. Very different in implementation and slight variation are not mutually exclusive. Each has its own place for its own purpose, some for better and some for worse.
At one time, OW awards were supposed to be standardized, and so the template rules were used as a basis of what to do for implementation. However, times do change and the airlines rule the roost more than some scratch-my-back-scratch-your-back entity.
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Like TSA, DL SkyMiles management treats airline customers as if they are the enemy or sheep to be fleeced and it shows.
Yes. Very different in implementation and slight variation are not mutually exclusive. Each has its own place for its own purpose, some for better and some for worse.
AA seems to enforce the 4/6 hour rule on a hit or miss basis. I had one supervisor who was very unyielding and enforced on everything I tried to book. Most of the agents never even mentioned it however and in the end AA ok'd it,, so go figure.
AA seems to enforce the 4/6 hour rule on a hit or miss basis. I had one supervisor who was very unyielding and enforced on everything I tried to book. Most of the agents never even mentioned it however and in the end AA ok'd it,, so go figure.
It's most definitely not one of the rules that "pops out" to an agent, IME as well. Unlike most of the other rules-- like the # of transits/stopovers rule, as an obvious example-- a violation of which would never make it past the review liaison-- if you get past the reservation stage with a minor violation of the 4/6 hour rule, it seems to get approved a good % of the time, from what I've been told.
AA seems to enforce the 4/6 hour rule on a hit or miss basis. I had one supervisor who was very unyielding and enforced on everything I tried to book. Most of the agents never even mentioned it however and in the end AA ok'd it,, so go figure.
How many AAgents do you know to have pulled up your record?
The 6-hour rule at the time has hit me with AAdvantage ticketing before; so even if the EXP desk went ahead and set up an award ticket the way I wished, I've had it come back and be rejected (even after the paper award ticket was delivered). [A polite letter communicating the trouble which resulted from that post-ticketing change yielded a voucher for $200.]
So apparently in my situation there was the EXP desk, "ticketing" and then a "post-ticketing" review. This last thing resulted in changes to an already-issued paper award ticket whereby my new schedule was not properly reflecting flights/flight times on the paper ticket in hand.
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Like TSA, DL SkyMiles management treats airline customers as if they are the enemy or sheep to be fleeced and it shows.
I thought there was a recent thread in the OW forum stating that the 6 hour international rule has been eliminated by AA and is now back to 23 hrs 59 minutes.
Anyway, do any other OW carriers besides AA calculate OW award mileage based on the destinations as opposed to the sum of the individual city pairs?
How many AAgents do you know to have pulled up your record?
The 6-hour rule has hit me with AAdvantage ticketing before; so even if the EXP desk went ahead and set up an award ticket the way I wished, I've had it come back and be rejected (even after the paper award ticket was delivered). [A polite letter communicating the trouble which resulted from that post-ticketing change yielded a voucher for $200.]
Interesting. This is an electronic ticket so anything is possible. Im sure they could come back and make changes to the itinerary but obviously I hope that they don't. I look at it this way...since they have already ticketed the res, they should honor it...just as if this was a mistake fare.
