Originally Posted by
Hagbard Viking
This is information I got from a couple of different travel agents as recent as last year (all other info I got was correct so I had no good reason to doubt this particular piece). But they may have been wrong (I ended up booking itineraries not including any US mainland - Hawaii flights). Actually, that would be good news to me...
The TAs are in error. I have flown in A on HNL segments in DONExs recently.
Edited to add: SIN-NRT on JL is fine. One never knows what seat/plane configuration one will get on JL; the older J seats are comfortable enough if old fashioned; the service is always excellent.
Can't comment on JALways - reviews have said they use older 743s with no individual IFE; however the schedule shows 744s on NRT-HNL, but as mentioned JAL has a bunch of different configurations of 744s so don't know if the plane is the same but service diminished, or what. JALways is JL's budget subsidiary, used for high-density tourist routes.
If your intent is to make BAEC Gold, then IIRC any routing that gets you to 1500+ TP will do the trick. Don't forget that D tickets book into A on AA 2-class domestic flights in the USA, so HNL-LAX/DFW/SFO would earn 180 TP, as would any 2-class US transcon (SFO-MIA, LAX-MIA etc.) There's no first class on Caribbean, Canadian or Latin America routes, so only D TPs on those.
By comparison, ARN-LHR-HKG-NRT-SIN-NRT-DFW-ANC-DFW-MIA-PTY-MIA-LAX-LHR-DXB-LHR-ARN earns 1640 TP, provided you're traveling during the seasonal Alaska service.