i thought the revenue sharing is based on certain formula desinated by IATA, which is mainly mileage based for such fares.
(i.e. transpacific portion shall get more share than transtalanic, and more than intra-continental, depending on the mileage. e.g. bos-jfk will get perhaps only $50 of the share)

of course, special arrangements with their own pre-set split (different from such formula) do exist, e,g AA-CX fare via NRT, CX-KA fare via HKG/etc. the CX-KA joint fare was discussed and disclosed in HK court recently when KA disputed the right for CX to fly into mainland

back to the topic, the issuing airline is just trying to steer you into flying them. this is not the intention of OWE. (i think they are violating the OW arrangement) in reality, you can have a coupon of, HKG-LHR issued in BA, and go to CX counter and take CX 25x without any hassle.
similar, if one follows OWE fare rule, one shall be able to go to AA counter at SFO, and redeem a coupon of BA SFO-LHR, in reality the AA staff are more stubborn and they always call RTW desk for interpretation. (and RTW desk may intentionally mis-interpret the rule).

my experience with AA has been: they tried to steer you, but they would allow BA transatatlantic if the AA schedule doesnt work (eg LAX-LHR, the AA flight are earlier, or if you picked a route that there is no alternative) --- what i was saying is, it is up to there discretion. they just refuse to ticket it, but they may not refuse to book it. TA can book you any airline. or you shall book with CX when your first intercontinental is transataltantic

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btw, AA RTW desk issued me hand-written OWE tickets before. do NOT worry about number of segments!

[This message has been edited by pegasus8228 (edited 04-05-2003).]