Thanks everyone. I was able to do this - sort of. I called the Philippines, but they kept rejecting me, saying a transit couldn't be made into a stopover, even after we had all the availability locked in. I then called Hong Kong/China, and they did it without issue, with my broken Cantonese.

However, the taxes were very high. I then told them to remove the UK APD, and that brought it down about HKD2,000 to around HKD8,000.

What is left is the YQAC fee of around HKD$3,700. I looked at a previous booking for SYD-MEL-HKG-AMS / AMS-HKG-SYD, also in J, and the YQAC was only HKD$117. Is there sometihg incorrect about YQAC?

Does anyone know of the discrepancy? Is it valid? Can I do anything about it? I'm happy to ticket as it stands, but thought I would ask about this first.

THANK YOU EVERYONE!