Originally posted by Darren:
Also, I might suggest going through BA.
Agreed. In many cities that you're visiting, AA has no presense, and if you need to make any changes, BA is much easier to locate.
Codeshares are not allowed. Doesnt matter if it is a codeshare for another OW airline.
Not quite true, code share metal operated by other OW airlines are allowed, and is useful to pick up the Finnair codeshare between LHR-YYZ on BA to earn AA miles. I believe you have to start the AY flight in Finland to get this code-share, but if you really want to get BA miles in your AA account, this is the only way.
Dubai is in the middle east. Cairo is in the middle east. You can only do one middle east run, so you will need to drop one.
There is no way out of this restriction, you can't pay the extra segment like you do with the 5 intra-Europe segments. You'll have to drop one them.
You need to do some serious open heart surgery on your itinerary, especially your dates. At your last stop, all segments terminate. For instance if you went oHKG-oNRT-HKG-oSIN-HKG-SYD, where the o is a stop, you will be hit with an extra segment fee because in Singapore you lose any unused segments. So they charge for the SIN-HKG. If you went HKG-oNRT-HKG-oSIN-oHKG-SYD you wouldnt be hit. I didnt look if you have any others like that, but you need to look. Mmmm...I see in Sydney you have the same problem.
I have read this here before with this issue, but have yet to see this in the rules or experience it with my own RTW. In Asia, I flew YYZ-HKG-BKK/SIN-HKG-TPE/TPE-NRT/NRT-HKG-LHR without any problems. Similiarly, HKG-LHR-PRG/WIE-BCN/BCN-IST/IST-LHR-YYZ without issues. In both cases I had intra continent segments after the 3rd stop. I thought the rules was you lose all stop-overs after you've exceeded your segment maximum, not the other way around.
STAM4NICK:
1. You may consider taking advantage of CX DXB-HKG flight instead of returning to LHR to get out of Europe. It will save you a segment fee.
2. Sign up for the Platinum challange so that you
may earn 100% bonus on base miles once you've earned 16,000 points.
3. Unless you really like to fly and wanted to earn points, SIN-SYD direct is faster than SIN-HKG-SYD