Just want to share with you all on my recent experience with an AA RTW ticket.

I had a DONE4 issued by AA last year and had some remaining sectors with AA and CX left.

When I was in the US a few weeks back I wanted to change the times of some flights. I called AA Reservation (US) to make the amendments (as the RTW desk was closed at the time).

The change is just a time change and not even a date change. The agent insisted that it require a ticket reissue?? I explained that a DONE4 does not require a reissue, just a revalidation. After arguing for 15 minutes, the agent still insisted it require a reissue, but there will be no additional charge. As I was running out of time I told them I will deal with it later.

I went to an AA FL at JFK a few days later. I asked the agent at the FL about this change and she initially said that a reissue is required. She then processed a reissue, but however she called reservations later. After 1/2 an hour they discovered that it does not require an reisssue and had to undo the changes the made.

THEN comes the fun part. As there are 2 pax on the PNR, AA decided to reissue one pax and didn't for the other pax. And to complicate things more, when they find out they made the mistake, they voided the coupon for the new reissue and somehow reinstated the initial coupon, but for one of the pax they still issued a new coupon.

OK, from a pax perspective this shouldn't have a problem as we won't see the saga unless we see the whole reservation. BUT the agent did not link the bookings properly with the ticket nos so:

1) When I check in for the AA flight the checkin agent couldn't find the tix no and it took them like 30 minutes to sort it out.

2) For the CX segements I did a MFU with CX. CX have processed the upgrade with the inital AA ticket nos. But when AA did the reissue, cancel the coupon, reinstating a coupon etc..... they did not link the ticket nos with CX. Luckily the CX Marco Polo club actually gave me a call when I was in New York (a few days before my CX flights) to inform me of the problem. They were really good and said they will sort it out with AA.
CX called me up after 1 day and told me exactly which ticket nos are valid for travel and they linked it in the system for me.

OK, so to avoid any problems in the future:

1) If you require a date/time change on your flights MAKE SURE they don't reissue the ticket. If they insisted to do it, make sure you get transfer to the RTW desk and not just the nomral reservations line.

2) Keep track of your ticket nos and make sure you call the other non AA airlines to reconfirm the ticket nos as I was told AA is quite famous in forgetting to link the reservations with the ticket nos. Also if you feel there are problems already, ask them to see whether the coupon is OPEN for use or is it VOID.

I guess you pay what you get for.