Mar 30, 2014, 12:53 pm
Last edit by: JDiver
WIKI POST: Using US Dividend Miles for oneworld Award Flights
As further details become available, please fill in this wikipost.
As further details become available, please fill in this wikipost.
N.B. Booking opportunities for new Dividend Miles awards of all kinds ended 11:59 PM Wednesday, 25 March 2015. Please continue using this thread for trips booked or in progress through 24 March 2016.
Changes on USDM oneworld award tickets
This is the only official statement about changing issued USDM award tickets:
If I need to make changes to a Dividend Miles award reservation, which program’s rules will apply?
Minor changes such as date/time can be made provided seats are available without requiring a new award to be claimed. More substantive changes such as changes to stopovers or origin/destination may result in the need to reinstate the previously claimed Dividend Miles award, then claiming a new AAdvantage award under the existing AAdvantage program rules.
The old membership rules do 'generally' still appy to USDM tickets.
For awards ticketed / reticketed on 001- ticket stock, go to the AA Refunds site with your ticket number at hand (unsure if it works with 037- stock at this time)to:
- Print a receipt with ticket number (instead of Request a refund)
- See total fees, taxes, etc. attached to your ticket
- See applicable detailed fare rules
- Request a refund (may not be useful for awards)
- Some were able to change their ticket without beeing charged the USD 150.- changing fee.
- No chance to change a ticket after the first flight segment has been flown.
- ...
Old stuff
oneworld member airlines - airberlin, American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Finnair, Iberia, Japan Airlines, LAN, Malaysia Airlines, Qantas, Qatar Airways, Royal Jordanian, S7 Airlines (Sibir), SriLankan Airlines, TAM Airlines, US Airways and their affiliates.
Award Chart for oneworld awards using US Dividend Miles:
http://shopping.usairways.com/en-US/...wardtravel.pdf
You can use the American Airlines, British Airways, JAL, or Qantas sites to search for oneworld award inventory. AA and QF also allows you to search for award inventory using a handy 30 day calendar view. However, availability on the calendar is dependent on site coverage (e.g. QF does not include JL or MH, AA does not include CX and others). Also, the calendar view may not be completely accurate on all partners, so use it as a guide but do not rely on it fully.
One of the easiest ways to search for oneworld availability is through the use of an outside tool such as Award Nexus, ExpertFlyer, KVS Tool, or The Wandering Aramean oneworld Search.
Award Nexus has a free community membership for flyertalk members, and award email alert with premium membership. ExpertFlyer has email alerts and direct GDS access to select oneworld award inventories, such as AA, QF, and US. ExpertFlyer can also search J class certificate upgrade inventory. With KVS Tool, you can search QF, BA, JL and CX's search engines, in addition to other alliances, on your PC (Mac / Linux with CrossOver). You can also set up an alert via The Wandering Aramean oneworld Search. This tool will automatically search on QF for your alert once per day with a free account and four times per day with a paid account.
N.B. With all of the above tools, it is best to search one segment at a time. Most oneworld search engines have difficulty marrying segments.
For route searching with itinerary information, use the interactive oneworld map and timetable.
For searching Intra-North America availability, the best tool is AA.com. Unlike the other oneworld engines, AA is pretty good at marrying segments, so you can search origin to destination.
Regarding availability, the strategy that has been most effective for people looking to book award travel on oneworld is to start searching right at 330 days prior to departure. This is generally when availability is at its best. After that, availability tends to be sporadic until starting 8 weeks prior to departure where some airlines open up availability, and will vary all the way up until the day of departure.
If you're having trouble finding availability, it may be best to look at alternate airports (JL, for example, serves SAN, YVR, and BOS, in addition to the larger markets of SFO, LAX, YYZ, ORD, and JFK).
(N.B. Although US was not adding fuel surcharges to awards, there are reports that they have started doing this for awards containing BA flights.) With the exception of BA & IB, no oneworld carriers require you to pay a fuel surcharge for awards. With BA, be aware that you may have to pay both a fuel surcharge as well as the UK Air Passenger Duty departure tax for intercontinental J and F flights out of UK. These fees vary with class of service and length of flight and are determined by BA; the Air Passenger Duty (see specific thread) is due for all UK departures not under 24 hour connecting flights. APD applies to coach tickets, too, but at a reduced rate. The fuel /YQ surcharge with IB is generally considered minimal.
Known Problems / Workaround:
- Dep 00:00AM : Some agents have difficulty finding flights leaving between midnight and 2 AM. This is because the US systems show it leaving the day before. If the agent cannot find it, please ask to look at the day before. > source <
- LA : Flights put on hold will be cancelled after 24h. Workaround: Issue the ticket immediately. > source <
- JL : US Rep cannot find available seats. Workaround: "Always have to remind Rep to open JL reservations on a new screen". > source <
- MH : US Rep cannot find awards in First Class. Workaround: First class needs to be booked in P-cl instead of Z-cl (as on most other OW carriers). > source < booking classes: > KVS <
- All : If you are booking outbound flights at the US Air 335 day window US Air will often allow you to put your reservation on a longer than 3 day hold to capture the return seats once they open up at T+335. There is a report of this for 30 days here, and FT user beofotch was successful in getting a 13 day hold here. Workaround: Huaca until you get an agent who is competent enough to do this. It may help to act naive and ask for your return flight on your preferred date even if it is after T+335 days. Once they get an error from the computer may be a good time to bring it up.
- ...
Fixed Problems:
- CX : US Rep cannot find seats on flight CX 645 HKG-DOH. Workaround: none so far, search for different routing/carrier (CMB/DXB/...?)... > source < > fixed <
> fixed < - CX : US Rep cannot find seats on flight CX 640 DOH-HKG. They admit, the flight exists, but are unable to book <source>. Workaround: none so far, search for different routing/carrier
> fixed < - BA/Comair : US rep could not see / or unable to book intra-South Africa flights in BA flight number operated by Comair despite AA treats Comair a full fledged oneworld member under BA, in the same context as KA under CX. Only one reported success booking - poster reported agent had trouble at first but on consulting a supervisor was told "where to look"; the agent did not give any further information. Most everyone else reported unable to book Comair flights.
> fixed < - IB : Flights will be cancelled after ticket issued. Workaround: None yet... > source <
> fixed <
LUS: USDM oneworld Award Bookings - (Closed to new bookings) [Master FAQ and Help]
Mar 29, 2014, 6:27 pm
#1
Moderator: American AAdvantage & Marriott Bonvoy
Original Poster
Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: PHX
Programs: American ExPlat; Marriott/SPG Lifetime Plat; Hyatt Globalist
Posts: 8,116
LUS: USDM oneworld Award Bookings - (Closed to new bookings) [Master FAQ and Help]
Beginning Monday, March 31, the US Airways Dividend Miles program will be a member of the Oneworld Alliance. This means all alliance partner travel awards will involve Oneworld partners, rather than Star Alliance partners.
This thread is for discussion of using US miles for Oneworld flight awards. It replaces this massive thread which covered issues related to Star Alliance redemptions. (Note that it has received more than 1.6 million views!)
So this is now the place to find out what others have learned, ask questions and share knowledge about booking Oneworld flights with Dividend Miles.
If anyone would like to begin work on a wiki for this thread, or contribute to it, please feel free to jump in. As details emerge, having a nice solid wiki which addresses the common questions and issues will be a very helpful resource for FlyerTalk members.
Thanks -- and good luck everyone in the transition to Oneworld!
-AZ
Co-Moderator
This thread is for discussion of using US miles for Oneworld flight awards. It replaces this massive thread which covered issues related to Star Alliance redemptions. (Note that it has received more than 1.6 million views!)
So this is now the place to find out what others have learned, ask questions and share knowledge about booking Oneworld flights with Dividend Miles.
If anyone would like to begin work on a wiki for this thread, or contribute to it, please feel free to jump in. As details emerge, having a nice solid wiki which addresses the common questions and issues will be a very helpful resource for FlyerTalk members.
Thanks -- and good luck everyone in the transition to Oneworld!
-AZ
Co-Moderator
Last edited by AZ Travels the World; Mar 30, 2014 at 12:54 pm
Mar 29, 2014, 6:32 pm
#2
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: In the air
Programs: Occasional RTW club
Posts: 6,924
As someone who didn't burn all their USDM miles prior to the joining, I am anxiously waiting to see what comes out of this, so thanks for creating the thread!
Mar 29, 2014, 6:38 pm
#3
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: ZRH/SFO
Programs: A3*G - AZ CFP- HH DIA
Posts: 3,666
Hopefully the OW flights were bookable without charging the YQ fees, until US and AA FFP will merge 
^.
^.
Mar 29, 2014, 6:40 pm
#4
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: In the air
Programs: Occasional RTW club
Posts: 6,924
Mar 29, 2014, 7:23 pm
#5
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: NYC
Programs: No longer loyal "over-entitled" 1K
Posts: 3,822
Mar 29, 2014, 8:36 pm
#6
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: Not here; there!
Programs: AA Lifetime Gold
Posts: 29,586
Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.601 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)
I expect that US will start offering a distance-based, multi-partner award akin to AA's "Explorer" award. (This would be in addition to -- not instead of -- US' "regular" awards.)
I expect that US will start offering a distance-based, multi-partner award akin to AA's "Explorer" award. (This would be in addition to -- not instead of -- US' "regular" awards.)
Mar 30, 2014, 12:31 am
#7
Join Date: Nov 2011
Posts: 6,385
I'm hoping they have all the partners loaded 3/31 and ready to go... but i doubt it.
Mar 30, 2014, 6:11 am
#8
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jun 2001
Programs: DL 1 million, AA 1 mil, HH lapsed Diamond, Marriott Plat
Posts: 28,190
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...-qf-rj-us.html
Last edited by 3Cforme; Mar 30, 2014 at 7:54 am
Mar 30, 2014, 6:27 am
#9
Suspended
Join Date: Apr 2011
Programs: RIP
Posts: 506
No reports yet of bookings on AA? I guess they should be here too.
Mar 30, 2014, 7:34 am
#10
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: BWI
Programs: Everyone!
Posts: 1,024
Not available until tomorrow, we are still in * today.
Mar 30, 2014, 8:01 am
#11
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: ZRH/SFO
Programs: A3*G - AZ CFP- HH DIA
Posts: 3,666
Mar 30, 2014, 8:49 am
#12
Join Date: Sep 2000
Location: DCA/IAD
Programs: AA EXP; 1W Emerald; HHonors Diamond; Marriott Gold; UA dirt
Posts: 7,816
Mar 30, 2014, 10:18 am
#13
Join Date: Feb 2009
Programs: IHG Plat, Marriott Gold, Hilton Gold, SPG Gold, United Silver, Garuda Silver, Delta Silver
Posts: 70
so does anyone know if we will be able to use USDM to book oneworld awards tomorrow?
Mar 30, 2014, 10:20 am
#14
Join Date: Nov 2011
Posts: 6,385
aa.com doesn't support award search for all oneworld carriers, let alone all AAdvantage partners. If for some reason usairways.com offers a much broader set it will see some heavy use! aa.com offers award bookings on AA, AB, AS, AY, BA, HA, HG, QF, RJ, US
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...-qf-rj-us.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...-qf-rj-us.html
who knows. several agents i've talked to have said their systems are up and ready to go on the 31st. of course, agents have also said airlines in oneworld like thai, jal and iberia would be ready tomorrow...
Mar 30, 2014, 10:49 am
#15
Join Date: Feb 2009
Programs: IHG Plat, Marriott Gold, Hilton Gold, SPG Gold, United Silver, Garuda Silver, Delta Silver
Posts: 70
Did you talk to US Air agents that said they are ready to book oneworld awards (cathay, JAL etc) using USDM tomorrow? That would be awesome.